‘I Put Myself in Danger’: Cara Delevingne Talks Getting Sober After Worrying Airport Paparazzi Photos
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Cara Delevingne revealed she has been sober for several months after checking herself into a rehab facility late last year following an intense period of working and partying. “All I knew, is if I was continuing to go down the road I was, I would either end up dead or like, doing something really, really stupid,” Delevingne told Vogue. “And I think that was really scary.”
The interview found Delevingne opening up about a set of striking paparazzi shots from last September, in which the actress was spotted shoeless at the Van Nuys Airport in Los Angeles, looking disheveled and acting erratically. Those photos were the culmination of a tumultuous year that included a lot of work on her docuseries, Planet Sex, the death of her grandmother, a characteristically overstuffed social calendar, and a particularly hedonistic summer as she celebrated her 30th birthday. Those celebrations included a three-week stay in Ibiza, followed by a trip to Nevada for Burning Man.
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“There’s an element of feeling invincible when I’m on drugs,” she said. “I put myself in danger in those moments because I don’t care about my life.” She remembered being covered in bruises at Burning Man, adding, “I would climb anything and jump off stuff…it felt feral. It’s a scary thing to the people around you who love you.”
Fueling everything was Delevingne’s own history of alcohol and substance misuse, which she discussed, noting the first time she drank too much was at a family wedding when she was seven. She also spoke about the history of addiction in her family, especially her mother’s own substance abuse issues.
“For a long time, I didn’t really put myself in her shoes,” Delevingne said. “I just needed someone to be angry at, and I was angry at her, but it wasn’t her fault…. The way that addiction took my mother from me was brutal, and it was brutal for her too.”
The Van Nuys Airport photos were taken not long after Burning Man. And not long after that, a bunch of old friends rallied to Delevingne’s side. By the end of the year, she’d checked herself into rehab.
“Before I was always into the quick fix of healing, going to a weeklong retreat or to a course for trauma, say, and that helped for a minute, but it didn’t ever really get to the nitty-gritty, the deeper stuff,” Delevingne said. “This time, I realized that 12-step treatment was the best thing, and it was about not being ashamed of that. The community made a huge difference. The opposite of addiction is connection, and I really found that in 12-step.”
In a video accompanying the profile, Delevingne elaborated further, discussing how she preferred the term “healing” over “recovery” because you’re “constantly doing it.” She added, “Your life can change, if you give yourself a chance to really be who you are and sit in that uncomfortability, because, my God, it’s uncomfortable! But it gets better—and it’s worth it.”
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