August Ames Told Adult Performer Keisha Grey ‘I’ve Been Depressed’ Before Suicide

Adult performer Keisha Grey posted a photo on Twitter Friday that appeared to depict a message she received from August Ames discussing her depression. The message was from Nov. 8, 2017.

“Hey I hope you’re doing well!” Ames said in the message to Grey. “I’ve been depressed and it seems like ppl are being dicks and I just wanted to let you know that you can talk to me if you ever want to.”

“That was so sweet thank you,” Grey responded at the time.

Ames, an adult film performer born Mercedes Grabowski, died this week of an apparent suicide. The Ventura County Health Care Agency told International Business Times her cause of death was “asphyxiation due to hanging” and said the manner was suicide.

Ames had spoken openly about her struggles with mental illness in the past. Months before she died, she discussed her depression and bipolar disorder on a podcast. Grey previously posted a photo of herself and Ames saying Ames was there for her during a hard time.

Before her death, Ames received malicious comments online because she chose not to perform with someone who had shot gay pornography in the past. Commenters called her homophobic for the decision. Pansxual adult star Jaxton Wheeler condemned her on Twitter, telling her to either apologize or “swallow a cyanide pill.”

Ames took to Twitter Dec. 3 to defend herself and said she had nothing to apologize for.

“NOT homophobic,” she wrote. “Most girls don’t shoot with guys who have shot gay porn, for safety. That’s just how it is with me. I’m not putting my body at risk, I don’t know what they do in their private lives.”

She defended herself again in a follow up tweet that same day.

“How am I homophobic if I myself am attracted to women?” she said. “Not wanting to have sex with gay men is not homophobic; they don’t want to have sex with me either, so byeeeeee.”

“I don’t have anything to apologize for!” she added in another Tweet. “Apologizing for taking extra steps to ensure that my body stays safe? F--- you guys attacking me when none of my intentions were malicious. I f------ love the gay community. What the f--- ever. I CHOOSE who I have inside my body. No hate.”

In the days following Ames’ death, adult actress Brett Rossi suggested the online backlash may have contributed to her suicide.

“A life wasted simply because HER opinion didn’t mesh with YOURS,” Rossi wrote on Twitter Wednesday.

Ames’ husband, adult film director Kevin Moore, described Ames as “the kindest person I ever knew.

“She meant the world to me,” Moore told Adult Video News.