Eminem Celebrates 10 Years of Sobriety in Instagram Snap

Rapper Eminem (real name Marshall Mathers) celebrated a major milestone on Saturday as he reached 10 full years of sobriety.

“Celebrated my 10 years yesterday,” he wrote on Instagram, posting a photo of himself holding a sobriety coin from Alcoholics Anonymous.

Eminem checked himself into rehab back in 2005 for addictions to prescription drugs and alcoholism and decided to finally get clean after nearly dying of a methadone overdose in 2007.

He’s spoken about his desire to stay sober in numerous interviews ever since he joined Alcoholics Anonymous.

“The thing sobriety has taught me the most is the way I’m wired–why my thought process is so different,” Eminem said in a GQ interview back in 2011. “I’ve realized that the way I am helps with the music. Sporadic thoughts will pop into my head and I’ll have to go write something down, and the next thing you know I’ve written a whole song in an hour. But sometimes it sucks, and I wish I was wired like a regular person and could go have a f–kin’ drink.”

“But that’s the biggest thing about addiction,” he continued. “When you realize that you cannot — for f— sake, you can not — f— around with nothing ever again. I never understood when people would say it’s a disease. Like, ‘Stop it, dickhead. It’s not a disease!’ But I finally realized, F—, man — it really is.”

In 2015 he spoke with Men’s Journal, revealing just how bad things had become by the time he went sober in 2008.

“In 2007, I overdosed on pills, and I went into the hospital,” he said. “I was close to 230 pounds. I’m not sure how I got so big, but I have ideas. The coating on the Vicodin and the Valium I’d been taking for years leaves a hole in your stomach, so to avoid a stomachache, I was constantly eating — and eating badly.”

“When I got out of rehab, I needed to lose weight, but I also needed to figure out a way to function sober,” he added. “Unless I was blitzed out of my mind, I had trouble sleeping. So I started running. It gave me a natural endorphin high, but it also helped me sleep, so it was perfect. It’s easy to understand how people replace addiction with exercise. One addiction for another but one that’s good for them.”

Fresh off the release of his 2017 album Revival, Eminem is scheduled to perform at the Coachella Music Festival on Sunday night.