Wendy Williams Opens up About Cocaine Addiction: ‘It’s a Miracle I Was Able to Stop’

Wendy Williams opened up about her cocaine addiction in a new interview with Entertainment Tonight, telling the show it’s a “miracle” she stopped using the drug.

Williams, 54, said she used cocaine during her radio days, before she became a daytime TV talk show host.

“I was a functioning addict though. I report to work on time, and I’d walk in and all my co-workers, including my bosses, would know but since I would have my headphones on and walk in the studio and [they] wouldn’t fire me because I was making ratings,” Williams explained.

The Wendy Williams Show host said it took great effort to get to work on time and keep her wild lifestyle.

“[A] functioning addict has several alarm clocks, you’re organized,” she told ET. “It’s a miracle I was able to stop.”

Williams also told ET she is “not embarrassed about anything,”

Williams started her career in entertainment as a radio DJ in New York and Philadelphia, before she landed her talk show in 2008. She also battled a cocaine addiction for a decade.

“Drugs were a demon I had to overcome,” Williams told PEOPLE in 2014.

In 2014, Williams launched the Hunter Foundation to help people affected by drug abuse with her husband, Kevin Hunter, and son Kevin Hunter Jr. The foundation recently hosted the annual Wendy Williams Birthday Give Back Gala to raise money to support and raise money for Facing Addition and the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence.

Williams’ health came back into the spotlight in recent months after she fainted on live television during her Halloween show. While dressed as Lady Liberty, audiences at home and in her studio saw Williams collapse before getting up to finish the show.

“First of all, I was trending all day — fabulous,” Williams said on her show the day after the fall. “But a lot of people thought that was a joke. No, that was a not a joke. I don’t want to fall. I’m a tall woman, and it’s a long way down. I’m also a woman of a particular age, and I’m not trying to break anything. Also I don’t do stunts and jokes for you like that. I don’t need that.”

In February, Williams looked frail after she announced a three-week hiatus from television to treat Graves’ disease and hyperthyroidism. She returned to television on March 18.

“I love doing the show, but I love me more. So I’m going to take care of me, so I can be there for them,” Williams told Good Morning America in March.

The Wendy Williams Show was renewed through 2020 in 2016.

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