Demi Lovato’s new YouTube documentary, Dance with the devil, shows some painful acknowledgments from the pop star about her battle with drug abuse and eating disorders, her 2018 overdose and her experiences with sexual assault. With just two days left before the four-part series – which just premiered at SXSW – makes its debut on March 23, the former Disney Channel star for CBS Sunday Morning about her recovery and finally find joy.
As CBS correspondent Tracy Smith notes, this is not the first time Lovato, 28, has talked about addiction and eating disorders. In a 2016 interview with Smith, Lovato spoke of gratitude that he is still alive. But just two years later, in July 2018, the singer experienced a virtually fatal overdose, causing a heart attack and three strokes, from which Lovato says she is still visually and hearing impaired.
Smith spoke to the 28-year-old in her Los Angeles home and asked Lovato about the breakup between her 2016 quotes and the ongoing battle with addiction.
“I’ve been sober for years, but I’m still miserable,” Lovato explained of her attitude in 2016. “And then no matter how you feel at that moment, you want to say, ‘Yes, I’m fine’ because I’m standing in front of a camera, I’m doing an interview. I, for the first time in my life, had to I’m dying to wake up. ‘
She added that despite being sober during her 2016 interview, things behind the scenes were not quite so perfect.
“I had no control over my life at that time,” Lovato shared, “but yes, I also had to grow up and take control. And this is something I have not done in the last two years of my life; it is that I now have control over my finances. I am now in control of the food I eat, how often I exercise.
“It was clear that I was in control of what I put in my mouth,” she explained, “but sometimes there were times when phones were taken out. Every time I was in a hotel room, my phone was taken out of the room so I could not order room service. ‘
But Lovato refused to blame others.
“Regardless of what other people have said or done, my actions put me in the seat that is in front of you today,” she told Smith. “Unfortunately, no one can answer for my overdose except me.”
The interview also touched on Lovato’s preferred form of recovery: moderation rather than complete sobriety. The native Texan still enjoys alcohol and marijuana. In her documentary, she explains, “I’m done with the things that are going to kill me. I tell myself I can never drink marijuana or smoke marijuana, and it feels like I can prepare myself for failure.”
In the conversation with Smith, Lovato explained that she is reluctant to talk too openly about her ‘sober California approach’, which has provoked criticism that it is not strict enough, among others from the former addict Elton John, who appears in Dance with the devil. Lovato also expressed concerns that her endorsement of moderation could affect fans.
“I would say I’m the term I best associate myself with with California sober,” Lovato told Smith, adding: “I really do not feel comfortable explaining the parameters of my recovery to people because I do not. not. want someone to look at my security parameters and think it works for them because maybe it is not.
“I’m careful to say that just as I feel that the complete abstinence method is not a solution for everyone, I do not think that this degree of moderation is a solution for everyone and not for everyone.”
Lovato also spoke about her emotional return during the Grammys in 2020 and told Smith, “I did not know if I would ever step on a stage again.”
Despite her brush with death – “the doctors told me I had five to ten minutes … if no one found me, I would not be here,” she revealed – the singer and actress is confident that she had come out stronger and happier.
“I feel so good,” shared Lovato, who has become more outspoken in recent years about her mental health and sexuality. “I feel more joy in my life than I have ever felt because I do not silence or diminish any part of myself.”
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