Rick’s family aside, currently one of the most heartbroken characters on The Walking Dead is Carol played by Melissa McBride. Carol has been searching for her daughter, and McBride is today talking about getting into a proper state of mind to portray her character.

Q: How do you keep yourself level-headed on set when going through so many emotional swings?

A: Well it can certainly wear on my emotions a bit, but I have a strategy to just be able to let it go and breathe it out. Playing Carol is almost like witnessing a car wreck. It didn’t happen to you but you still have the sense of having witnessed this kind of terrible thing. As the day wears on, it kind of wears off a little. I also really love this part — I have a great interest in psychology and I enjoy trying to figure out what happens with Carol to elicit her reactions to things.

Q: What’s the most interesting part about playing Carol?

A: What’s interesting now is her daughter has gone missing and this is her whole life, but also she’s experiencing guilt about the search for this daughter that is bringing this group of people into some really horrifying circumstances that who knows if they would have gotten into had this not happened.

Read the entire interview on AMC’s official blog.