National treasure Davina McCall has not always been the high-spirited exercise enthusiast that we all know and love, as she has previously revealed she had a long battle with drug addiction when in her 20s.
Prior to finding fame on the Channel 4 dating show Streetmate, Davina, who is now 53, was veering off course and down a very dark path as a heroin addict.
At the time, Davina was dating British rock guitarist, Eric Clapton, and it seemed he was the only person who could save her from her addiction.
A number of past interviews have seen Davina pinpointing her upbringing, along with the rocky relationship she held with her mother Florence, at the root for feeling the need to self-medicate her pain.
Davina McCall’s life once looked very dark as she battled a heroin addiction
Things turned tough for the budding TV starlet when her parents parted ways when she was just 3, with mum Florence heading off to France and leaving Davina to be raised by her grandparents.
While living in Surrey with her grandparents, she kept in contact with her dad but was often left feeling deeply saddened by her mums efforts, as she would often cancel their rare meetings at last minute.
With all the agonising heartache, at just aged 16, she had experimented with both cocaine and heroin, later becoming a full-blown addict in her twenties.
In a former candid interview with The Mirror, she openly admitted: “I was a mess. You name it, I took it. Cocaine, Ecstasy and heroin.”
Her life turned a very dark corner and resulted in a drugs overdose that would change her life forever (Image: Channel 4)
Explaining that she was more open-minded now due to her own track record, she added: “Because of my mistakes I am less judgmental of others.”
The final frightening straw came for Davina after she’d taken a concoction of drugs to make herself feel “normal” that caused the star to overdose – the Sun on Sunday reported.
Delivering a motivational speech at an International Women’s Day event, Davina explained: “Drugs took me to a very, very, very dark place and, one night, I overdosed.
“It was very frightening as it was a very gradual overdose. I’d had a cocktail of drugs, because I didn’t want to feel normal.
“I was constantly trying to escape myself – I was like a piece of fruit rotting from the inside.”
With the help of Davina’s ex boyfriend Eric Clapton she managed to turn the tides and landed her first presenting role with MTV
At the age of 25, Davina decided that she needed to clean up her act after a friend gave her the reality slap that she needed, telling her that had become a complete “mess”.
With the support of her then-boyfriend Eric Clapton and the help of Narcotics Anonymous, she did just that and got to work at leaving her drug taking days behind her
After around a year of attending NA meetings, she was finally clean and freed from her habit.
Davina went on to have great success and bagged herself the hosting position on Channel 4’s popular reality show Big Brother (Image: PA)
When dating the legendary rockstar, with his help, she managed to strike up a groundbreaking presenting role in 1992 with MTV that would eventually change her life forever and keep her on the straight and narrow.
Sadly, their whirlwind romance ended and Davina later struck up a romance with Andrew Leggett, with the pair meeting in May 1997 and going on to tie the knot just six months later.
It ended in heartache for the reality presenter and they swiftly divorced after just three months.
Fast forward to the year 2000, while dog walking in a West London park, Davina bumped into her future husband Matthew Robertson and later that same year bagged herself the starring role of host on Channel 4’s Big Brother.
The couple have three children together, Holly, Chester and Tilly but eventually split in 2017 after seventeen years of marriage.
Following her successful stint on Big Brother, Davina became the front woman for programmes such as The Million Pound Drop, The Jump and more recently, ITV’s celebrity talent show The Masked Singer.
After overhauling her life, the mum-of-three became an avid fitness fanatic and with that she went on to release a number of chart topping workout DVDs and books too.
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
