Demi Lovato is opening up about the dark and painful realities of suffering from addiction and mental health problems. In a trailer for her new series of documents on YouTube, released on Wednesday, Lovato revealed that the overdose she experienced in 2018 caused her to have three strokes and a heart attack.
“I had a lot to say in the past two years, wanting to clarify what happened,” said the actress and singer at the beginning of the trailer.
The four-part documentary, “Demi Lovato: Dancing with the Devil”, focuses on Lovato’s personal and professional life before and after the overdose she experienced in July 2018.
“I had three strokes. I had a heart attack,” said Lovato. “My doctors said I had five to ten more minutes.”
Many of Lovato’s family, friends and other celebrities, including Elton John and Christina Aguilera, are seen in the trailer. Some of the participants said they were not sure whether she would survive the overdose.
“I have had many lives, like my cat. I am in my ninth life,” said Lovato. “I’m ready to go back to doing what I love, which is making music.”
During a virtual panel for the Television Critics Association on Wednesday, Lovato also told reporters that she continues to suffer brain damage due to the incident affecting her daily skills, according to the Associated Press.
“I got brain damage and I still deal with the effects of that today,” she said. “I don’t drive a car because I have blind spots in my vision. For a long time, I had a hard time reading. It was very important when I was able to read a book, which was two months later, because my vision was very blurred.”
The 28-year-old singer and actress has been open for years about her fight against mental health and addiction. Several of his songs discuss these battles, and in his 2017 YouTube documentary “Simply Complicated,” Lovato revealed that he first tried cocaine when he was 17 and worked for the Disney Channel. A few years later, she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
Mental health and addiction are common problems worldwide, and each of these problems can exacerbate the other, research shows. Research shows that about half of people in the United States who suffer from mental illness also suffer from substance abuse disorders, according to studies cited by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
Lovato told Glitter Magazine on Wednesday that, ultimately, she hopes the documentary “helps people who are on the same path as me”.
“What I learned is that it’s much more than just mental health, you know? My life now is about spiritual growth and how I can help everyone, even people who don’t have mental illness, how we can help raise everyone’s vibrations to that we can live on a more positive planet, “Lovato told the magazine.” That’s how I navigate my day; how will my choices today affect the people around me in a positive way? How am I going to improve today? So, I hope people can see that in the document as well. “
The YouTube documentary will be released on March 23.