Audrey Hepburn is known for one of the most legendary Hollywood stars of all time, but what many fans don’t know about her is that she suffered a great amount of trauma in her childhood. Thankfully, she was able to take this trauma and turn it into a life’s purpose for herself going forward.

“She constantly transformed herself and her life through this perennial search of love.” Emma Ferrer, Audrey”s granddaughter, told Closer Weekly.

Audrey was only six years-old when she and her mother were abandoned by her Fascist-sympathizing father.

“When she was a child, she really idolized him,” Emma said.

Just four years later, Audrey and her mother became trapped in the Netherlands after the Germans invaded.

“The last winter of the war, there was nothing to eat and no oil for heat,” said her son, Sean Hepburn Ferrer. “They made bread from peas and ate tulip bulbs.”

Things got better after the war, and Audrey shot to international stardom after starring in the movie Roman Holiday in 1953. However, fame did not fill the hole that was in Audrey from her traumatic past.

She said that her father leaving made her insecure for life,” said Helena Coan, director of the new documentary Audrey: More Than an Icon.

Wanting to help Audrey, her first husband Mel Ferrer tracked down her father through the Red Cross.

“They flew to Ireland and [Audrey] met him, but he was cold. It was just who he was,” said Sean. “She was devastated, but she still took care of him [financially] until the end of his life.”

Audrey also struggled to find happiness with the men in her life.

“She loved my father even though he was a complicated and difficult man,” said Sean, adding that his parents split in 1968. Audrey went on to marry Italian psychiatrist Andrea Dotti, but he cheated on her regularly and that marriage ended in divorce as well.

“There were times in her life, starting with her father and going through her second marriage, when she didn’t understand why her love was unrequited,” said Sean.

When Audrey became disillusioned with her marriages and the movie business, she quit to focus all of her energy on raising her children.

“It was not a sacrifice,” Audrey once said of quitting Hollywood. “It’s what made me happiest, to stay home with my children.”

Helena said that Audrey’s childhood disappointments “affected her relationship with her children in a good way, because she wanted to be a present, loving mother.”

Once her children were grown, Audrey began what she called her “second career” as a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF. Helping children who were victims of war and abandonment became her passion in life.

“To have the opportunity to give something back in a meaningful way as an ambassador for UNICEF made her very proud,” Sean said. “She was very thankful for the opportunity.”

Sadly, Audrey died in 1993, but she is still missed by millions of fans to this day.

“To know happiness, you have to know sadness,” explained Sean. “When she died at 63, she was very much at peace.”