Demi Lovato Breaks Silence on 2018 Overdose Ahead of ‘Dancing with the Devil’ Premiere

Demi Lovato is breaking her silence on her 2018 drug overdose ahead of the premiere of her documentary Dancing with the Devil. The singer appeared at a Television Critics Association panel while promoting the new project, where she reveals she has no regrets about her past. “Everything had to happen in order for me to learn the lessons that I learned,” Lovato told People magazine. “It was a painful journey, and I look back and sometimes I get sad when I think of the pain that I had to endure to overcome what I have, but I don’t regret anything.”She continued, adding, “I’m so proud of the person I am today and I’m so proud that people get to see it in this documentary and I couldn’t be more grateful that I had someone by my side.”

Lovato claims she knew after the incident that if she wanted to tell her narrative to the public, she had to get very vulnerable to do so. “I wanted to reveal it all for my fans and say this is who I am and this is where I’m at today and this is the journey that got me here, and if it helps you, then I hope that it can because that was ultimately my purpose in putting this out,” she told reporters.

The 28-year-old singer also revealed she’s still dealing with the aftermath of her near-death experience. In the trailer, which was released on Wednesday (Feb. 17), she told fans “I had three strokes. I had a heart attack. My doctors said that I had five to 10 more minutes.”

“I was left with brain damage, and I still deal with the effects of that today. I don’t drive a car, because I have blind spots on my vision,” she said. “And I also for a long time had a really hard time reading. It was a big deal when I was able to read out of a book, which was like two months later because my vision was so blurry.” She adds, “I dealt with a lot of the repercussions and I feel like they are still there to remind me of what could happen if I ever get into a dark place again. I’m grateful for those reminders, but I’m so grateful that I was someone that didn’t have to do a lot of rehabbing. The rehabbing came on the emotional side.” Dancing with the Devil will premiere on March 16.