Demi Lovato is thankful to be sober after surviving a near-fatal overdose in 2018. The 30-year-old singer spoke of their yearslong struggle with addiction, saying they began experimenting with hard drugs when they were young.
Appearing on the Call Her Daddy podcast, the Grammy winner got candid about their sobriety struggles. “I started experimenting for the first time when I was 12 or 13. I got into a car accident and they prescribed me opiates,” Demi recalled. “My mom didn’t think that she’d have to lock up the opiates from her 13-year-old daughter, but, like, I was already drinking at that point.”
The “Anyone” singer said they turned to the pills because they were “looking for an escape.” Demi’s mom locked up the pills after noticing how quickly they were disappearing.
Demi said they “drank a lot in my teenage years” and began abusing pills when they were 15 and 16. “I’d steal my mom’s Xanax … she had a Xanax addiction, so it was off and on,” the singer recalled. “And then at 17 is when it kind of was the first time I tried [cocaine] and loved it too much. And then that kind of led into me going to treatment right after I turned 18.”
The singer also admitted to “doing crack” between 2016 and 2018. Demi said this journey is represented in their new album, Holy Fvck, and in the song “29,” which was written after seeking treatment again.
“I … came out of treatment with anger. I came out of treatment with understanding and growth. And so it was like a reflective song for me,” they said. “And even though there’s undertones of anger … I really learned a lot about that experience.”
Holy Fvck is available to stream and purchase now.
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