Cara Delevingne Says Drugs Made Her Feel ‘Invincible’, But Were Also Wearing Her Down

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Cara Delevingne has always danced to her own tune, so it may have been easy to forget the infamous airport photos that surfaced last September. She was spotted outside Los Angeles International Airport, looking like she’d just been dragged through a dumpster fire. That’s putting it lightly. But those photos were actually part of a big wake-up call for the Carnival Row actress. She finally realized she needed help and joined a 12-step program to save her life. “I was not okay,” she told Vogue in an exclusive interview.

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Infamous Paparazzi Airport Photos Were a Catalyst and Wake-Up Call for Delevingne

The Sun published the LAX airport photos with a caption calling Delevingne “confused & disheveled.” While some tabloids are notorious for reading too far into situations, the publication stated that her “worried family” were “preparing for an intervention.”

As it turns out, the “intervention” part was true. The Suicide Squad actress had allegedly been thrown off Jay Z’s jet and was wandering about looking strung out. She was shoeless, bruised, her hair was a mess, and her eyes had massive circles, pronounced by an eerily sunken and unhappy face that was huffing cigarettes.

Ironically, she was also rocking a “Britney” t-shirt. It was the only thing that made the embarrassing scene somewhat comical. As if it was some terrible homage to celebrities who have been caught in their worst moments.

But it wasn’t a joke. It was tragic. Cara Delevingne’s own mother, Pandora, has had a lifelong struggle with heroin addiction while also suffering from depression. Addiction and mental health are no joking matters. And they are afflictions that far too many humans suffer from.

Speaking with Vogue, Cara Delevingne explained what was going on in the airport photos. She’d been struggling with depression and, instead of trying to heal it, chose to mask it with endless self-destruction. “The way that I was living was not sustainable,” she told Vogue.

Cara Delevingne Had Been Struggling With Substance Abuse Since Age 7

Part of the hedonism was Delevingne’s way of escaping emotional pain. By May of 2020, she’d broken up with her girlfriend of two years. Then came the 2-year-long societal COVID nightmare. And then her grandmother, Jane Sheffield, passed away in April 2022. Delevingne recalled attending the Met Gala two weeks later, getting blackout drunk at an afterparty, and appearing at Sheffield’s funeral the next morning. And so on, and so on.

On top of all the partying, Delevingne had also been abusing alcohol since age 7, had been prescribed sleeping pills at age 10 for insomnia, and suffered from a movement coordination disorder called dyspraxia. She also suffers from psoriasis, which is an autoimmune disease where the body’s cells attack themselves. It results in flaky skin patches, or “plaques.” Stress can make it worse.

She Said Drugs Made Her Feel “Invincible,” But They Were Also Wearing Her Down

And then came the overbearing thought that she was about to turn 30. Delevingne partied for 3 weeks in Ibiza and then through herself a blowout Alice in Wonderland themed 30th birthday bash.

“I told myself, I should be having such a good time. I’ve got all my friends here. I need to be enjoying this. The house I was staying in had a tower and I would just kind of lock myself in it instead. I barely left the room,” said Delevingne.

Then the Planet Sex star flew from Europe to Burning Man. For anyone unfamiliar, it’s a massive annual “anything goes” party that happens every September in Nevada’s Black Rock desert.

“There’s an element of feeling invincible when I’m on drugs,” she told Vogue. “I put myself in danger in those moments because I don’t care about my life.”

Cara Delevingne Says She’s “Grateful” for the Embarrassing Pictures

By the time the airport photos came out, Delevingne had every reason to be strung out. Granted, she had put herself in those…er… socks. Remember, there were no shoes.

“I hadn’t slept. I was not okay,” Delevingne told Vogue. “It’s heartbreaking because I thought I was having fun, but at some point, it was like, Okay, I don’t look well… You know, sometimes you need a reality check, so in a way those pictures were something to be grateful for.”

“It was scary, we were longing for something to change, but you can’t project that onto someone else,” Delevingne’s aunt, Melinda Stevens, told Vogue. “There were plans to do something about it, a lot of coordinating with her sisters and closest friends. We spent a lot of time with each other that summer, and it was reaching a pitch.”

After she saw the embarrassing airport pictures, Delevingne decided to reach out. It was her rock-bottom moment. Prior to the publicity nightmare, she’d thought about it but couldn’t conjure up the courage.

“I love my friends so much, but it felt like a lot of the time, they were shallow relationships only because I wasn’t able to be honest about the things I was going through,” she said. “I didn’t want to burden anyone. It was also like, What if people leave?”

She Asked for Help Last September and Entered Rehab

That all changed in September.

“From September, I just needed support. I needed to start reaching out,” said Delevingne. “And my old friends I’ve known since I was 13, they all came over and we started crying. They looked at me and said, ‘You deserve a chance to have joy.’ ”

While Delevingne had dabbled in all sorts of therapies over the years, this time she chose to commit to something more permanent. She checked herself into rehab and then went into a 12-step program.

“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,” she told Vogue. “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.”

Delevingne Is Still in the 12-Step Program and Practices Meditation, Mindful Eating

Delevingne has been focused on her health above all else. In addition to the 12-step program, she says she’s practicing yoga, meditation, and eating three meals daily. She’s also participating in weekly therapy session.

“This process obviously has its ups and downs, but I’ve started realizing so much,” said Delevingne. “People want my story to be this after-school special where I just say, ‘Oh look, I was an addict, and now I’m sober and that’s it.’ And it’s not as simple as that. It doesn’t happen overnight…. Of course, I want things to be instant—I think this generation especially, we want things to happen quickly—but I’ve had to dig deeper.”

And in some weird, fateful way, for once the paparazzi may have played a part in bettering someone’s life. Cara Delevingne called that her “wake-up call.”

“I’ve had interventions of a sort, but I wasn’t ready,” she told Vogue. “That’s the problem. If you’re not face-first on the floor and ready to get up again, you won’t. At that point, I really was.”

If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA’s National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

Read More: Tom Arnold Issued Warning to Chris Farley: ‘You Can’t Be Super Fat and Do Drugs’

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