This is one of Demi Lovato's assistants calling 911 as the pop star collapses at
her 8-million-dollar home in Hollywood Hills. On 24 July 2018, the 25-year-old US singer was
rushed to a Los Angeles hospital after an apparent drug overdose.
Two years later, she would call it her "miracle day".
"I'm so blessed to have one. It represents how the doctors at Cedar's Sinai saved my life.
How my life has become something beyond my wildest dreams," she would say on Instagram,
looking back at the incident that nearly cost her life.
Wow. It looks like those guys really worked miracles.
In a trailer to the YouTube documentary series "Dancing with the Devil", which is expected to
be released on 23 March, Lovato reveals the details of the episode for the first time.
According to Demi, doctors said that death was practically on her doorstep.
Lovato said she was still living with the overdose effects,
including brain damage and blind spots in her vision, preventing her from driving.
Just a couple of months prior to the nearly-fatal relapse, the former child star marked six years of
sobriety. She celebrated the milestone during the Tell Me You Love Me tour with DJ Khaled.
But how come her family and friends did not see this coming? Was this battle too tough for the
young and famous to handle on her own? Or was it that eating disorder and daddy issues backfired?
Well, while everyone seems to be second-guessing now, Rumor Juice investigates Demi Lovato's
real story to sift out the truth. Stay tuned and subscribe to our channel to learn more!
Lovato has been open about her struggles with mental health
problems and addiction throughout her career.
In her first documentary, Stay Strong, released in 2012,
she spoke of her "daily battle" with eating disorders, about self-harm, mental issues and
addiction. Demi felt like she was on edge with no-one there to give her a helping hand. At some
point, she lost control and was out of the line punching her back-up dancer in the face. This
happened during her tour with the Jonas Brothers, which she abruptly cancelled after the incident.
The pop star was admitted to rehab, where she went through treatment putting her career on a hiatus.
Five years later, in a new documentary on her life and career, Demi Lovato: Simply Complicated,
she confessed to being dishonest about the outcome of her initial treatment and also revealed that
she was under the influence of cocaine while being interviewed about her sobriety for the film.
It takes guts to make such a statement.
But Demi has never been shy when it came to sharing her personal struggles.
And while we can't really tell if she was on drugs during any of her interviews,
what we know for a fact is that the story of the pop star's addiction goes back to her childhood.
Her first time doing coke was at the age of 17. She was working on the Disney channel at
that time. Demi’s friends introduced her to it. The teen star was scared, remembering mother’s
words that her heart could just explode if she did it. But she tried the drug anyway. And loved it.
Demi was hooked on Adderall, commonly used for Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, by the
time she was 18, and pretty soon she had inpatient treatment related to drug use for the first time.
When the singer was 19, she tried to go sober. She was not even of legal age then! But as we
know it did not work and Demi had to go through the same circles of hell over and over again.
In numerous interviews, Lovato also spoke about a complicated relationship with her late father,
Patrick Lovato, who suffered from addiction.
There were reported instances of physical abuse in the family.
In her memoir Falling with Wings: A Mother's Story, Lovato's mother Dianna De La Garza
shared details of domestic violence episodes that drove her to divorce Demi's father.
Dianna had been sure she could change the man and fought for
his well-being till the very last moment but his addiction prevailed.
Well, no surprise Demi got into the downward spiral of addiction.
Situations when you become a witness to something like that rarely leave no scars.
Lovato once revealed they were estranged with her dad, whom she referred to as her birth father.
"The last time I talked to him was two years ago," she said, adding that she
"had to cut off all connection" with him because it was hurting her too much.
By the time he passed away, their relationship seemed to have improved.
Lovato wrote on Twitter, "There's an overwhelming sense of peace knowing my
dad is no longer battling his demons anymore and that makes me so happy."
It looks like relations with her dad really had an impact not only
on her personality but also on her career. She wrote several songs dedicated to him.
One of her popular tracks, Daddy Issues, explores the lasting effects of the birth father's absence.
However, this did not seem to affect the pop singer's relations with her stepfather
Eddie De La Garza. She posted a warm Instagram post with Father Day's greetings.
"To the man that raised me as his own, gave me everything he could to have a
wonderful childhood.. I love you. You're an incredible man with a heart of gold.
I couldn't have asked for a better father," the singer wrote.
Apart from obvious daddy issues, Lovato had complicated relations with food and exercise.
She repeatedly talked about this on social media and in her interviews.
As a kid, Demi was bullied at school, which led to self-harm and her struggling with
bulimia as an attempt to cope. The bullying was so bad that she had to switch to homeschooling.
In one of the interviews, she shared that her schoolmates went so far as
to draft a petition for her to take her own life, and people signed it.
That's insane! No surprise the family of the future star chose to keep her away from school.
One of Lavato's biggest hits, by the way, Sorry Not Sorry, was dedicated to her bullies.
Even though it might seem like a perfect revenge song after a break-up.
Commenting on her 2018 relapse, the pop singer said that it was
actually the eating disorder that led her to a downward spiral and to the overdose as a result.
"I thought the past few years was recovery from an eating disorder,
when it actually was just completely falling into it.
And I just realized that, like, maybe my symptoms weren't as obvious as before,
but it was definitely an eating issue," she said on Ashley Graham's Pretty Big Deal podcast.
However, Lovato also said that while playing a dirty trick on her, eating disorder saved
her from suicide. She claimed it was not true that people resort to using drugs,
excessive eating or self-harm if they want to die. It can be actually quite the opposite.
The singer said that addiction was a "destructive coping mechanism", that,
despite being harmful, allowed her a path other than taking her life.
Demi also called out the people around her who pressured her to lose weight.
She explained how hard it is to have, quote, "certain people around you
that are telling you certain things, that you should look a certain way".
This was confirmed by her sister Dallas, who said that Demi was
pressured into changing the way her body looked. The star was sick and tired of
"running herself into the ground" with workouts and extreme dieting.
Well, no surprise! Lovato practically lived in the gym. Can you imagine having
three workouts a day? We bet that would drive nuts even enthusiastic bodybuilders.
The pop star felt like she traded her freedom for perfect looks.
The situation was so critical that her team members would control what she ordered to eat.
In one of the interviews, she shared that her team members were literally controlling
what she was consuming. They checked her Starbucks orders on her bank statements.
Fortunately, it all seems to have remained in the past. After years of struggling with body
image issues, Demi says she has learned to accept and love herself regardless
of whether she gained some weight or not. She does not count calories and exercise anymore,
and, what’s even more important, doesn’t live her life according to diet culture. And we can tell.
Her Instagram account is a goldmine of body positive images,
where she is not ashamed of posting the pics of stretch marks on her thights.
And Lovato’s fans like her this way. “Thank you for showing us that we are beautiful
just the way we are”, “Every body is worth celebrating”,
“It’s totally worth the long fight for self”, the comments to her IG posts read.
In the latest body positivity move, Demi had her hair cut off
saying she felt like using it to cover her body and hide from the people.
But she does not need it anymore. The pop singer says she seeks to
inspire other women to accept themselves and call for kindness and compassion.
Well, it's hard to say now if this pattern is going to stay for good.
But we really hope so and wish this to Demi.