McFly’s Dougie Poynter says Valium addiction left him unable to remember two years of his life
BASSIST Dougie has revealed he can’t remember the two years of his life that he suffered a terrifying addiction to Valium.
The Sun told yesterday how he had been hooked on the anti-anxiety drug from 2016 until he finally went to rehab in 2018. But he has now confessed the full scale of the impact it had.
Dougie, who also had a stint in rehab in 2011, bravely told me: “It’s a slope that you don’t really realise you’re slipping down until it’s too late. Then climbing out of that hole is a very, very long process.”
Asked if he is unable to remember the period, he said: “Honestly, yeah. I mean, you get flashbacks, but it’s a huge blur. It’s strange.
“That’s something which is really hard to come to terms with, literally losing two years. Two years just went as like a weird dream. Coming out the other end was like, ‘What? Where’s my band?’”
It was terrifying for his bandmates, and Harry was the one who intervened and encouraged him to go to rehab after learning the drug could kill him.
Harry recalled: “I spoke to the guys and I looked it up about Valium – because I had an inkling – and realised how dangerous it is and how you can die if you don’t get help coming off it in a controlled environment with medical support. It’s a very very serious situation.
“I think I probably knew that once we had stepped in, that’s what (Dougie) needed. He didn’t have a choice then.”
Dougie, who is dating model Maddy Elmer, added of recovery: “It needs to be controlled because it’s such a slow process.
“It was certainly an intervention. I don’t remember kicking up a fuss but . . . I don’t remember much really.”
KYLIE VYING HIGH IN NO1 RACE
Kylie Minogue has good reason to be celebrating like this.
The Aussie is expected to go to No1 today, scoring the fastest-selling album of the year with her 15th record, Disco.
Not only is she set to pip Little Mix’s Confetti, it will also land her in the record books as the only female solo artist in history to have had a No1 album in five consecutive decades, having scored her first with her debut Kylie in 1988.
Last night she had shifted 50,397 copies – including an unlikely 4,000 cassettes – while Little Mix had racked up sales of 45,309.
Yesterday Little Mix were getting showbiz pals including Lewis Capaldi, Rupaul and Ella Eyre to post about their record.
It’s been a close battle but I’ll be chuffed for Kylie if she makes it.
PAUL TALK TO JOHN
AHEAD of his new LP McCartney III’s release on December 11, Sir Paul McCartney was asked if he still talks to his late Beatles bandmate John Lennon.
He replied: “Yeah, often. We collaborated for so long, I think, ‘OK, what would he think of this? What would he say now?’ We’d both agree that this new song I’m talking about is going nowhere. So instead of sitting around, we’d destroy it and remake it.”
He told the new Uncut mag how he had worked on one track but disliked the lyric. He said: “This would have been the point where John and I would have said, ‘Let’s have a cup of tea and try and rethink this’.”
PALOMA'S GOT DRIVE
Paloma Faith became a delivery driver during the first lockdown, all while making her fifth album.
At a playback for her new record, Infinite Things – out today – Paloma said: “I was doing four people’s shopping, for some old people who live near me and some NHS workers from around the corner.
“I was driving people’s shopping around. It was all part of being from East London.”
Paloma, who was born and raised in Hackney, also explained the meaning behind her video for new single Gold.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
In the promo, a businessman can be seen discussing buying plots of land, to the disgust of locals. Paloma explained: “Gold is the response to gentrification in our area. I feel a lot of people saw Hackney as an investment opportunity rather than what it really is.
“This guy is trying to buy the flats out there but me and my dancers represent the community – which is the actual gold. The gold isn’t the money.”
GOT a story? RING The Sun on 0207 782 4104 or WHATSAPP on 07423720250 or EMAIL exclusive@the-sun.co.uk