Demi Lovato has been so incredibly brave. In her documentary series Dancing With The Devil, she has laid bare the most personal, raw moments of her life — from her sexual assault from a drug dealer at the age of 15 to the visual impairment she still suffers from strokes resulting from her overdose.
But the candid conversations continue off screen as the Cool For The Summer singer opens up in interviews about the doc. And in her talk with Paper magazine, the 28-year-old has revealed another piece of her sobriety journey. Well, not sobriety exactly — but more on that later.
Related: Broken Engagement Helped Demi Embrace The Exploration Of Her Queerness!
While pop stardom has given her the money to get the best treatment money can buy, her fame has also littered her path with stumbling blocks most don’t have to deal with: like trolling comments and awful press coverage.
Right after her 2018 stint in rehab, Demi was hit with some body shaming that almost made her go right back to drugs! She recalls:
“I think it was right after I got out of rehab in 2018. I saw an article somewhere that said I was morbidly obese. And that is the most triggering thing that you could possibly write about somebody with an eating disorder. That sucked, and I wanted to quit, I wanted to use, wanted to give up.”
OK, first off… WHAT WAS THAT WRITER SMOKING?!? This is Demi Lovato we’re talking about! When has she ever NOT looked fit and strong and amazing?!
Anyway, that led her to ignore the bulk of what anyone was saying about her online.
“And then I just realized that if I don’t look at those things then they can’t affect me. So, I stopped looking and I just really try not to look at anything negative.”
Thankfully that didn’t keep her from wanting to share her story, warts and all, with the masses. She says:
“I think the positives outweigh the negatives. I think that if they didn’t, I wouldn’t be doing this.”
It isn’t just dealing with haters online that’s been more difficult for Demi. The former Disney darling gets overwhelmed by the love from fans in person, too. She admits:
“It’s draining, yes, and it’s hard. There’s reasons why my meet and greets have gotten a lot shorter over the years. More than a handful of people would tell you each time, ‘You saved my life,’ or they would show me the cuts on their wrists. I know that they mean well, I know that they are confiding in me because they have no one else. But it does take a lot.”
So the Confident singer almost fell off the wagon after being criticized, even if in such an obviously ill-conceived way.
But as we now know from her documentary, Demi is off the wagon, trading full sobriety for the path of moderation. She drinks and smokes weed again — but considers this not to be crossing the line back into abuse.
How does that work? She explains:
“The way that I’ve come about it is, I went back to treatment after [the overdose], in 2019, after slipping up with substances. I had done so well with my eating disorder, in comparison to the years before. And when I went back, my therapist, my eating disorder specialist there, was like, ‘How do you feel with food recovery?’ And I was like, ‘I feel really great, but I think it’s because I’ve legalized so much.’”
So she decided for her the straightest of paths was too difficult to stay on — and she needed to allow certain things in order to keep sober-ish.
It’s something a lot of addicts and addiction specialists do NOT agree with, so just going public with the decision has been a big move:
“I feel like I wanted to get a great understanding of it for myself before I told the world about it. And also, it’s just really important to note that just because I am trying this doesn’t mean it’s for everybody. Just like the dogmatic views of complete sobriety, that isn’t a one size fits all solution for everybody.”
While it isn’t for everyone, Demi makes a pretty convincing argument it’s right for her, saying:
“In my career, it benefits me to be a perfectionist. In my personal life, it definitely doesn’t. Having been in recovery from eating disorders, body image and perfectionism are not friends in my eyes, and so it’s been difficult to balance. But for the most part it’s just something that you have to walk through with as much grace as possible.”
Hard to argue with that.
But what do YOU think? Is Demi in trouble and just not realizing it? Or is she strong enough to know how to stay safe? Let us know YOUR thoughts in the comments (below)!
[Image via Demi Lovato/Instagram.]
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