Staying strong. Demi Lovato has been open about their struggle with drugs and alcohol since their first stint in rehab in 2010.
Lovato sought treatment at the age of 18 after they got into a fight with one of their backup dancers when they were on tour with the Jonas Brothers. To help maintain their sobriety and cope with their struggles with an eating disorder and bipolar disorder, they entered a sober house in 2013. After six years of sobriety, the former child star revealed that they had relapsed in a 2018 power ballad titled “Sober.”
One month after releasing the track, Lovato was rushed to the hospital following a near-fatal drug overdose at their California home. They remained hospitalized for nearly two weeks and subsequently spent three months in rehab.
As they continued their challenging recovery, a source told Us Weekly exclusively that the Disney Channel alum’s daily routine wasn’t always easy. “Every day is a constant struggle for Demi,” the insider said in July 2019, one year after the life-changing incident. “[But] [they’ve] remained determined to lead a life of sobriety and live [their] life to its fullest potential, especially following the first anniversary of her relapse.”
At the time, Lovato was “surrounding herself with supportive people,” including ex-boyfriend Wilmer Valderrama, who had been a rock for their throughout their sobriety journey. The pair dated on and off for six years before calling it quits in 2016.
Over the years, the “Skyscraper” singer hasn’t shied away from discussing their most difficult moments in the public eye. In February 2021, they released a trailer for their moving YouTube Originals docuseries, Dancing With the Devil, and got real about the dark details of their 2018 overdose.
“I had three strokes. I had a heart attack,” Lovato revealed. “My doctors said that I had five to 10 more minutes.”
While reflecting on the painful memories and their continued struggles, Lovato maintained an optimistic outlook. “I’ve had a lot of lives, like my cat. You know, I’m on my ninth life,” they singer said in the teaser for the March 2021 web series. “I’m ready to get back to doing what I love, which is making music.”
Scroll through to revisit the star’s most honest quotes about their ups and downs over the years.
"I'm not gonna lie. I was self-medicating," Lovato told Seventeen magazine in February 2012. "I was doing things like drinking and using [drugs], like a lot of teens do to numb their pain." Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP/Shutterstock
“I couldn’t go 30 minutes to an hour without cocaine and I would bring it on airplanes,” Lovato confessed to Access Hollywood in 2013. “I would smuggle it basically and just wait until everyone in first class would go to sleep and I would do it right there. I’d sneak to the bathroom and I’d do it. That’s how difficult it got and that was even with somebody [with me], I had a sober companion, somebody who was watching me 24/7 and living with me … I was able to hide it from them as well.” Joanne Davidson/Shutterstock
“I was going to the airport and I had a Sprite bottle just filled with vodka and it was just nine in the morning and I was throwing up in the car and this was just about to get on a plane to go back to L.A. to the sober living house that I was staying at … I had all the help in the world, but I didn’t want it. When I hit that moment I was like, it’s no longer fun when you’re doing it alone,” they told Access Hollywood in 2013. “I think at 19 years old, I had a moment where I was like, ‘Oh my God… that is alcoholic behavior. [It’s] no longer, I’m young and rebellious and out having fun, it was, wow, I’m one of those people … I gotta get my s—t together." Broadimage/shutterstock
“People say that relapses happen before you use. Your mind starts setting up the relapse before you take that drink or that first hit. The times we’d broken up, I had already gone to that place of, ‘Yeah, this is what’s happening,’” the “Sorry Not Sorry” singer told Cosmopolitan magazine in September 2015 about their on-again, off-again relationship with Valderrama. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but I just wanted to sabotage everything around me so that I could sabotage myself.” Mediapunch/Shutterstock
“I lived fast and I was going to die young. I didn’t think I would make it to 21," Lovato told American Way in July 2016. ”So now I’m in rehab, and I thought, ‘Oh great, now the world thinks I’m just another stereotype … I didn’t go into treatment thinking, ‘OK, now I’m going to be an inspiration.' At times I was resentful for having that kind of responsibility, but now, it’s really become a part of my life. It holds me accountable.” Rich Fury/Invision/Ap/Shutterstock
“[My sobriety anniversary] means so much to me because I feel like the day that I got sober was the day that I actually started living and so I like to call myself five years old,” the “Tell Me You Love Me” crooner said during an April 2017 appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, one month after their five-year anniversary of being sober. “I’ve decided to be open about my story and share everything that I’ve been through because it helps others. And I’ve had several people come up to me and say, ‘Hey, my dad got sober because you did.’ or ‘I got sober because you did.’ And it just is so meaningful and impactful to me that I wouldn’t change it for the world.” Eric Charbonneau/Shutterstock
Lovato credited their younger sister Madison De La Garza as one of the reasons they got sober during a September 2017 appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show. “I knew that I had a lot of life ahead of me but one of the main reasons of getting sober was so that I could be around my little sister because my mom and dad [said I couldn’t be around her] if I was doing stuff,” Lovato explained. Eric Charbonneau/Shutterstock
“My first time doing coke I was 17, working on Disney Channel, and I was with a couple friends and they introduced me to it. I was scared because my mom always told me your heart could just burst if you do it. But I did it anyways and I loved it,” Lovato confessed in their 2017 YouTube documentary, Simply Complicated. “I felt out of control the first time I did it. My dad was an addict and an alcoholic. Guess I always searched for what he found in drugs and alcohol because it fulfilled him and he chose that over a family.” Bob A'mico/Disney Channel
“I was using while I had a sober companion and I went through like 20 sober companions. I was either craving drugs or on drugs. I was not easy to work with,” the Disney alum said in their 2017 YouTube documentary, Simply Complicated. “It’s embarrassing to look back at the person that I was.” Kevin Mazur/Getty Images
Lovato released a powerful song in June 2018 about addiction and revealed that she had relapsed after more than six years of sobriety. “Mama, I’m so sorry I’m not sober anymore / And daddy please forgive me for the drinks spilled on the floor/ And I’m sorry for the fans I lost who watched me fall again / I wanna be a role model, but I’m only human,” they sing. Kevin Mazur/Getty Images
The Sonny with a Chance alum was hospitalized after they overdosed at their L.A. home in July 2018. Lovato broke her silence on the near-fatal incident nearly two weeks later with a now-deleted Instagram post on August 5, 2018. “I have always been transparent about my journey with addiction,” they wrote. “What I’ve learned is that this illness is not something that disappears or fades with time. It is something I must continue to overcome and have not done yet.” The singer continued: “I want to thank God for keeping me alive and well. To my fans, I am forever grateful for all of your love and support throughout this past week and beyond. Your positive thoughts and prayers have helped me navigate through this difficult time. I want to thank my family, my team, and the staff at Cedars-Sinai who have been by my side this entire time. Without them I wouldn’t be here writing this letter to all of you.” Steve Granitz/WireImage
The “Fix a Heart” crooner hinted there was more to their overdose story than what had previously been reported with a series of tweets in December 2018. “If I feel like the world needs to know something, I will tell them MYSELF,” Lovato wrote at the time. “Otherwise people stop writing about my recovery, because it’s no one’s business but mine. I am sober and grateful to be alive and taking care of ME. Someday I’ll tell the world what exactly happened, why it happened and what my life is like today ... but until I’m ready to share that with people please stop prying and making up s--t that you know nothing about. I still need space and time to heal…” Ari Perilstein/Getty Images for Fabletics
Lovato acknowledged their second chance at life with a raw post to Instagram Stories on New Year's Eve 2018. “So grateful for the lessons I’ve learned this year. I will never take another day in life for granted, even the bad ones. Thankful for my fans, friends, family, and everyone who supported me throughout this year. God bless.” John Shearer/Getty Images for MTV
The two-time Grammy nominee reflected on her growth on what would have been their seven-year sober anniversary. “Today I would’ve had 7 years sober. I don’t regret going out because I needed to make those mistakes but I must never forget that’s exactly what they were: mistakes,” the singer wrote on Instagram Stories in March 2019. “Grateful that AA/NA never shuts the door on you no matter how many times you have to start over. I didn’t lose 6 years, I’ll always have that experience but now I just get to add to that time with a new journey and time count.” Neilson Barnard/Getty Images for The Huffington Post
Lovato explained on The Ellen DeGeneres Show that an eating disorder relapse and being abandoned by their former team led to her 2018 relapse. “I asked for help and I didn’t receive the help that I needed. So I was stuck in this unhappy position. Here I am sober and I’m thinking to myself, ‘I’m six years sober, but I’m miserable. I’m even more miserable than I was when I was drinking. Why am I sober?’” Lovato said in March 2020. “Ultimately, I made the decisions that got me to where I am today. It was my actions that put me in the position that I’m in.” Courtesy of Michael Rozman/Warner Bros.
Lovato revealed to Bustle in July 2020 that spending time at home amid the coronavirus pandemic helped them heal. “It's very common for people to only really work on themselves when crisis happens or when they notice that they're slipping into old patterns or behaviors,” Lovato explained. “So to be able to walk into this experience without a personal crisis and just be like, I can do the work on myself now because I have the time. … It was a beautiful thing. I wasn’t in rehab; I was outside in the world with Netflix. So when I was too tired of therapy, I'd put on Schitt's Creek.” She added: "Before quarantine, it was very difficult for me to cry. I had programmed the thought into my head when I was 16 that I'm only going to cry if people pay me to. I started doing all this work, allowing myself to feel the pains of all the losses that I've had or the adversities or traumas that I've faced. I think my ability to be vulnerable and be more intimate with people has really heightened.” Courtesy of Demi Lovato/Instagram
A decade after Lovato first opened up about their struggles with addiction, Lovato revealed it was “too soon” for them to be giving interviews. “I came out of the experience with the choice of talking about my struggles or my journey with the possibility of helping people, or keeping my mouth shut and going back to Disney Channel. And I was like that doesn't feel authentic to me. So I chose to tell my story,” the Camp Rock actor told Bustle in July 2020. “And I had this, like, savior complex, where I thought, ‘Oh, I made this pact with God when I was young and now I have to save people.’” Imagespace/Shutterstock
Lovato credits manager Scooter Braun for helping them get to a good place in 2020. “I used to have people watching me the night before a photo shoot to make sure that I didn’t binge or eat and be swollen the next day,” they said in July 2020. “It’s just a totally different world now. … I don’t prepare for photo shoots, even. I can eat Subway for breakfast.” Amy Harris/Invision/AP/Shutterstock; Frank Micelotta/FX/Picturegroup/Shutterstock
In the first look at their eye-opening YouTube Originals docuseries, Dancing With the Devil, Lovato discussed the gritty details of her 2018 overdose like never before. "I had three strokes. I had a heart attack," they said in the teaser, which was released in February 2021. "My doctors said that I had five to 10 more minutes." As she looked back on all of her ups and downs through the years, the "I Love Me" singer hoped to put her past behind her. ""I've had a lot of lives, like my cat. You know, I'm on my ninth life," she added. "I'm ready to get back to doing what I love, which is making music." YouTube
"I was left with brain damage, and I still deal with the effects of that today," Lovato admitted during a Television Critics Association panel in February 2021, one month before their Dancing With the Devil docuseries premiered. "I don't drive a car because I have blind spots in my vision. I also for a long time had a really hard time reading. It was a really big deal when I was able to read out of a book, like, two months later because my vision was so blurry. I've dealt with the repercussions, and they're there to remind me what could happen if I get into a dark place again. I'm grateful for these reminders." YouTube
"One thing that I think people have a common misconception of is that if people are using drugs, or if they are dealing with an eating disorder or self-harm, that they want to die. I actually said there were many times in my life that those things stopped me from dying,” Lovato told Diane Guerrero on an episode of the Jane the Virgin star's “Yeah No, I’m Not OK” podcast in March 2021. “I think I turned to those coping mechanisms because I genuinely was in so much pain that I didn't want to die, and I didn't know what else to do. I did the best that I could at times, and now that I have other tools and other resources, I know how else to deal and how else to cope so I don't have to resort to those behaviors again," the "What Other People Say" singer continued. Courtesy of Demi Lovato/Instagram
During a March 2021 interview with Glamour magazine, Lovato revealed that they haven't completely cut out marijuana and alcohol since their near-fatal 2018 overdose, admitting that an "all or nothing" style of sobriety isn't the right fit for them. "I think I want to try this balance thing in the substance side of my life too," Lovato remembered telling their sober coach. "A one-size-fits-all solution does not work for everybody. Any path that is right for someone else does not mean that it is an effective, meaningful, safe path for you. ... What I'm encouraging people to do is just make choices for themselves. Autonomy, for me, is what changed my life." Lovato later revealed that she had hesitations about being upfront with her choice to smoke and drink "in moderation." In her eye-opening Dancing With the Devil doc, she said being "such a black and white thinker" has made it difficult to fully give up certain substances. "I don't want people to hear that and think they can just go out and try having a drink or smoking a joint. ... You shouldn't be forced to be sober if you're not ready. You shouldn't get sober for other people." Amanda Charchian
"I didn't just overdose, I also was taken advantage of," the Staying Strong author recalled in the Dancing With the Devil documentary, nearly three years after the night of their 2018 OD. "When they found me, I was naked, I was blue. I was literally left for dead after he took advantage of me, and when I woke up in the hospital, they asked if I had consensual sex. There was one flash that I had of him on top of me. I saw that flash, and I said yes. It actually wasn't until maybe a month after my overdose that I realized, 'Hey, you weren’t in any state of mind to make a consensual decision.'" YouTube
"I wish I could say the last night that I ever touched heroin was the night of my overdose, but it wasn't," the two-time Grammy nominee said in their March 2021 YouTube documentary. The "Alone" singer "ended up getting high" with the same drug dealer who sold them the laced heroin that sent them to the hospital in 2018. (Lovato also claimed that the dealer sexually assaulted her the night of her overdose.) "I had just done a weeklong intensive trauma retreat. The night that I came back from that retreat, I called him. I wanted to rewrite his choice of violating me. I wanted it now to be my choice," Lovato added. "I called him back and said, 'No, I'm gonna f--k you.' It didn't fix anything. It didn't take anything away. It made me feel worse. ... I thought, 'How did I pick up the same drugs that put me in the hospital?' I was, like, mortified at my decisions." YouTube
"There are periods of time where I forget about my food struggles and other times it’s all I think about. Still," Lovato captioned a Boomerang via Instagram of a mug with a symbol for the National Eating Disorder Association (NEDA) in May 2021. "But that is what ED recovery looks like for some people and I still have hope that someday I won’t think about it anymore. For now my mug reminds me that I am worth it, and today I believe it." Courtesy of Demi Lovato/Instagram; Shutterstock
“I've definitely been through a ton. That's no secret to the world,” Lovato revealed during a June 2022 appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. “After going through even more stuff last year — I came out of treatment again — and I realized I really want to do this for myself, and I want to make the best album possible.” They added: “Something that really represents who I am, and I think the best way to do that — and the easiest way to do that, and the most authentic — is to do it clean and sober. I made this album clean and sober. I can't say that about my last album, but this one I'm really proud about.” Holy Fvck is set for an August 19, 2022, release. Todd Owyoung/NBC
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