It’s a frightening time for young celebrities, as an epidemic of addiction and substance abuse is claiming lives in Hollywood at an astonishing rate.
Over the course of the past year, a number of promising lives have been lost or forever changed by opioids and other prescription pills, and it seems that there’s no solution to the problem in sight.
In July, Demi Lovato’s near-fatal overdose left fans praying for the singer’s recovery.
(Lovato recently celebrated 90 days of sobriety.)
The death of Mac Miller in September stunned the hip-hop world and left many of his fellow artists thinking twice about lyrics and lifestyles that glorify substance abuse.
One such artist is Lil Xan.
Xan is so steeped in modern hip-hop drug culture that his stage name is a reference to his former substance of choice.
The 23-year-old recently opened up to TMZ in a surprisingly candid new interview in which he discusses his conflicted feelings toward drugs and the music that glorifies them.
The rapper says he’s kicked his addiction to Xanax, but is still “weaning” himself away from other pills.
In the interview, Xan reveals that he sold drugs before making it big in music.
But he also insists he was a drug dealer with a conscience and quit dealing when the often-fatal Fentanyl hit the scene.
“My friends were taking it; they were puking. I was like I can’t … I’m out the game,” Xan says of his decision to retire from dealing and focus on music.
Xan says that like Demi, he’s capable of long periods of sobriety, but notes that he is currently off the wagon.
“I relapsed, and that’s common … Any other addict would understand that sh-t just happens,” he tells TMZ.
“You just relapse. You don’t want to. It’s a process. You need treatment and help, and sometimes that doesn’t even help.”
“It has to come from within. That’s what I’ve learned,” Xan says.
“I’ve gone periods of like six months clean of everything. And that was because of me. I wanted to be clean.”
When the interviewer states that Xan is “clean now,” he corrects her:
“I’m not completely clean. Off Xanax, yes, but I’m still weaning off Norcos [a brand of codeine-based painkiller],” he says.
Xan says he is currently not in rehab, but is living in seclusion “in the forest.”
He adds that he plans to remain in hiding until the release of his upcoming album, which he has described as a tribute to his “hero,” Mac Miller.
We wish Lil Xan all the best in his recovery.
