Then & Now: The Evolution Of The Middle Star Eden Sher

Eden Sher rose to fame as a young actor portraying Sue Heck in the ABC sitcom "The Middle," but her acting career largely fizzled out after the popular show ended in 2018. Nowadays, she has shifted from acting to comedy, gaining acclaim with her one-woman show, "I Was on a Sitcom." A lot has happened in the meantime. "The Middle" stars all look different today, and Sher is no exception. After all, she was just 17 when the show premiered in September 2009.

Sher has left Sue's baby face behind. She was 33 years old in 2025 when the picture on the right was taken, and while she still boasts that famous Sue Heck smile, her demeanor is a lot more mature. She is still young and looks like herself, but without her famous character's nerdy mannerisms, some social media users struggle to recognize her. "You remind me of sue heck from the middle (major compliment bc that's my fav show)," an Instagram user commented on a December 2025 video. 

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The netizen caught the mistake after posting the comment — and becoming the butt of a few jokes. But it turns out that social media users aren't the only ones who sometimes struggle to place Sher. She could even overhear the medical staff who delivered her twins in late 2021 deliberating where they knew her from. Life after "The Middle" hasn't always been easy, but turning her journey into comedy has helped her make sense of it all. 

After the end of "The Middle" in 2018, Eden Sher focused on her personal life. In July 2020, she tied the knot with screenwriter Nick Cron-DeVico and fell pregnant the following year. Her motherhood journey was complicated from the beginning. Not only did she learn she was expecting identical twins but also that she was carrying a specific type that made her pregnancy very high-risk. That's stressful enough, but Sher's case was made even more so because she's among the celebrities who have been open about living with a mental health condition.

Sher suffers from bipolar disorder, a condition she manages with the help of the medication lamotrigine. On top of having a high-risk pregnancy, she had to understand the risks and benefits of staying on the medication and then make an informed decision. Ultimately, she decided, with the support of her medical team, to stay on it. She felt more prepared to handle her high-risk pregnancy that way, but nothing could have prepared her fully for giving birth at 28 weeks and being separated from her babies, who spent months in the NICU.

After going through all that, Sher developed postpartum depression. Her intimate childbirth story became the basis for "I Was on a Sitcom." While her situation was very specific, she learned how many people experienced similar emotions while navigating different scenarios. "So few people have had twins and have grown up on a television set. And somehow people are like, 'It really resonated with me,'" she told Playbill in 2023.