Amanda Bynes Celebrates Sobriety Milestone Amid Social Media Return
Amanda Bynes is marking a major milestone. On Sunday, the former Nickelodeon star took to [...]
Amanda Bynes is marking a major milestone. On Sunday, the former Nickelodeon star took to Instagram to announce that she is officially 14 months sober, sharing a gallery of images, and showing off her newest face tattoo, when writing that she is "celebrating being sober a year and two months!"
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The Sunday post came just a little more than a week after she revealed to her followers that she was officially a year sober. At the time, she explained that she had reached the milestone in her sobriety journey alongside her fiancé, Paul Michael.
"Hey everyone, this is Paul, my fiancé,""she said in a video shared to her account on Feb. 20. "I'm so lucky. As you can see, he's drop-dead gorgeous. And, he's also the best person on the face of the earth."
"I just wanted to post a video to say sorry to everybody who I called ugly on Twitter," she said. "I was feeling so ugly at the time and it was really hard for me to express myself at the time because I was so drugged out."
"And, now I've remained sober for over a year – same with Paul – and I just want to let you know that I love you guys and I'm so happy now," she added. "I feel like I got what's mine and that is Paul."
In recent months, Bynes hasn't shied away from opening up about her struggle with sobriety. After entirely stepping out of the spotlight, the actress discussed her sobriety battle during a 2018 interview with Paper Magazine, explaining that he first tried marijuana at age 16 before moving on to harder drugs.
"Later on it progressed to doing molly and ecstasy," she said. "[I tried] cocaine three times but I never got high from cocaine. I never liked it. It was never my drug of choice."
She confessed that she "definitely abused Adderall," which she began taking during the filming of Hairspray when she learned it might help her stay thin. Her Adderall addiction escalated to the point that it inhibited her ability to perform on camera, with Bynes stating that "the mixture of being so high that I couldn't remember my lines and not liking my appearance" led her to walk away from Hall Pass.
"Those days of experimenting [with substances] are long over. I'm not sad about it and I don't miss it because I really feel ashamed of how those substances made me act," she said. "When I was off of them, I was completely back to normal and immediately realized what I had done — it was like an alien had literally invaded my body. That is such a strange feeling."
In 2019, Bynes entered a sober living facility, which she left later that year.