Mary J. Blige attending Vibe Magazine’s 20th Anniversary Inaugural Impact Awards Event in her honor at the Sunset Towers in Hollywood. (Feb. 8, 2013)
*Mary J. Blige, a self-confessed born-again Christian, says Whitney Houston’s death in February 2012 hit her hard, and made her realize it was time to seek spiritual help in an effort to cut out her binge drinking.
“I didn’t want to go to rehab,” she tells Los Angeles Confidential magazine. “I believe that anything man himself can do for me, God can do in a greater way. I decided to pray and to seek God on my own. I just stayed in the Word. And it worked.”
Blige admits she struggled with alcohol addiction after trying to cut back and just drink socially.
“I chose to learn how to drink socially and it didn’t work,” she said. “The test comes when you have to decide whether you’re drinking to be social or drinking to cover up something again. To cover up depression, to cover up guilt. Shame. Abandonment… Once I realized, ‘There you go again,’ I had to stop.
“Whitney Houston’s death really affected me. Her death is another reason I stopped. I really do think I’m done. I looked at how that woman could not perform anymore.”
Thought she was done a long time ago. Good for you!!! Sometimes, you got to take baby steps to be successful.
That’s all good and everything but she said her husband, “kantdu” was the one that helped her stopped drinking…so which one is true…UGH
Stephanie, I think Mary’s husband was a God sent catalyst that helped her get through earlier issues during the times when they were courting especially. As Mary explained in the piece above, after she stopped the hard drugs, she chose to drink socially but when it got out of hand, most recently, she saw herself slipping back to her old ways, so she -after Whitney’s death- decided that enough was enough. Even Whitney did the same. As she tried to stop the hard drugs she would still drink socially. She said so on Oprah, “if you see me w/a drink, don’t stop me…it was not my issue”. However, I believe if you are an addict with one struggle but still choose to self mediciate with another substance (like alcohol which most think is okay), you open up a door for addiction to come back. Mary is probably realizing what Whitney didn’t and that is that when you are done with one drug, you need to be done with it all. Anytime you mess with something that is a gateway substance, it’s only (indirect) design is to pull you back through the gates of addiction. What most users don’t realize is that it’s subtle and for some, way too powerful to fight in the flesh. The sad thing about addiction and Whitney’s reality is that some addicts won’t get their deliverance on this side. So, I pray Mary continues to heal and that God’s grace will sustain her and others fighting the same journey.
I am so happy that Mary has given up the alcohol and realize that her singing gift can be at risk if she continues a life of drinking. She needs to deal with life day by day. Sometimes individuals like Whitney Houston and others leave this earth and we feel a great loss. In this loss, our eyes are open to the truth that we have a problem or we have an obligation to help others that are struggling with an addiction. I believe Mary is able to relate to Whitney’s story. I just hope that Mary stays prayerful and remember how precious life is and that God will never leave her side.
Whatever you need to sleep better Mary….I guess. But Whitney was a mess. If that’s what you need to stop drinking, then more power to you.
An alcoholic is an alcoholic for LIFE. Good luck with the struggle.
A substance abuser is a substance abuser for LIFE. It does not matter what your addiction was to.
In Mary’s line of business… all of these substances are readily available… which makes it harder to stay free of them!
Praying that she can stay away from any of these substances.