DEMI LOVATO opens up about her 2018 brush with death.
For the first time, pop star Demi Lovato reveals the heartbreaking truth about how close she really came to death in 2018
No one knew if she would make it. On July 24, 2018, Demi Lovato was discovered in the throes of a drug overdose inside her Hollywood Hills home. Paramedics rushed her to an LA hospital, where things were touch-and-go. Days later, once she was stable, the singer thanked fans for their support, explaining that she was looking forward to “the day where I can say I came out on the other side.”
That time has come. Two-and-a-half years after her spiral into darkness, Demi is telling all for the first time, describing in detail what happened and how she recovered. “I had three strokes. I had a heart attack. My doctors said that I had five to 10 more minutes [to live],” the pop star, 28, reveals in the trailer for a raw fourpart documentary series, Demi Lovato: Dancing With the Devil, which debuts on Youtube on March 23. She also suffered brain damage. “I don’t drive a car because I have blind spots in my vision,” Demi explained during a Television Critics Association panel on Feb. 17, adding that for months, she couldn’t read because her vision was too blurry. The repercussions of her OD, she believes, are “still there to remind me of what could happen if I ever get into a dark place [again].”
OPEN BOOK
She’s not holding back. Though the former Disney star has previously talked about getting clean in 2012 after years of abusing alcohol, cocaine, Adderall and more as a teen — and about falling off the wagon six years later — Demi is now sharing the heartbreaking truth about the depths of her mental health struggles, substance abuse issues (the series’ trailer hints at heroin use) and even, she explained, “past traumas that I have dealt with and I’ve never spoken about [before].”
Demi gave friends and family permission to share her secrets, too. “Some were shocked she was addressing her traumas so openly. They worried it would be too much for her,” says a source. “They were also on the fence about appearing in the documentary,” which features not only her closest pals but her parents, sister and music stars Elton John and Christina Aguilera, “but they did because they’re proud of Demi for going public with her demons and taking control of her life.”
Surprisingly, Demi doesn’t want to erase her past. “I wouldn’t change a thing because everything had to happen in order for me to learn the lessons that I learned,” she said. “It was a painful journey. I look back and sometimes I get sad when I think of the pain that I had to endure to overcome what I have, but I don’t regret anything.”