Hilarie Burton Explains How One Tree Hill Co-Star Moira Kelly "Saved My Life"

Sometimes, thank you just isn't enough.

After six years and more than 130 episodes as One Tree Hill's Peyton Sawyer, Hilarie Burton decided to leave the show that put her on the map due to an allegedly toxic workplace environment. And it was an industry vet who gave her the courage to do it.

In the Oct. 25 episode of iHeartRadio's Drama Queens podcast, Hilarie got emotional when she recalled the support her guest and former co-star Moira Kelly had given her when it was time to decide if she should stay with the series or embark on another adventure.

"Moira, this is the first time I've seen you since I left the show. I've wanted to tell you this for years and years and years, but in the last episode of the show, everyone in my world was telling me, ‘You can't leave. You can't leave,'" Hilarie shared. "I didn't direct because I didn't want to be on set all day because it was so bad. You came and you sat next to me and you started off by just joking, and you were like, ‘What's going on?'"

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Hilarie continued, "I was like, ‘I don't know what to do,' and you said, ‘Run.' You started it off with, like, a joke, and I was like, ‘Yeah?' You said to me, ‘There's so many chapters in life and this is just one. This is just one.'"

According to Hilarie, Moira was the only person "that gave me permission to go" and explore other opportunities.

"I so valued your opinion of me and of our business and the way you prioritized your family over work, and that's what I wanted—what you had is what I wanted," she explained. "You didn't have to say anything because you lived it and we could just, like, see it…I have wanted to thank you for that, honestly, since I was 26 years old."

From Moira's perspective, who played Karen Rose for nearly 90 episodes between 2003 and 2009, she wished she could have been more present during her time on the show.

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"Hearing honestly what all of you young women had to go through—I don't want to get choked up. If I could go back, I would have made my presence stronger there," she told Hilarie and co-hosts Sophia Bush and Bethany Joy Lenz. "I felt like, you know, being somewhat of a veteran, you were all so very young coming into this situation, there's a part of me that feels like I let you all down."

Moira, 53, has appeared in films like The Cutting Edge and The Lion King, and was one of the cast's more recognizable names when the show debuted in 2003.

"If I had been more present, I would have been more aware maybe of what was going on, I surely would have said something," Moira continued. "I surely would have done something, and so, if I could go back and do anything different, I would make my presence so solid on that show and I would have made myself so available to all of you."

In November 2017, 18 cast and crew members of One Tree Hill wrote a letter accusing their former showrunner Mark Schwahn of sexual harassment. He has never spoken out about any of the allegations.

For Hilarie, Moira forever changed her life. "It's like, ‘Oh, my God. You don't know that you saved my life.' I don't know what would have happened to me if I stayed," she shared. "I met my husband [Jeffrey Dean Morgan]. My son [Gus] exists because Moira Kelly told me to run and so I did. I just think about how different my life would be if she wasn't that one person to give me permission to just go."