Entertainment
Bachelorette Alcoholism Battle: Meredith Phillips Now Five Months Sober
Meredith Phillips called the shots on ABC’s ‘The Bachelorette’ in 2004.
(Photo: Bob D’Amico, ABC)
Back in 2004, Meredith Phillips appeared to be the object of fantasy for many eligible bachelors vying for her attention in Season 2 of the reality TV show “The Bachelorette”.
Phillips is a model by profession and first entered the fray of reality TV as a contestant in the show “The Bachelor” in Season 4 of that show in 2003.
At the time, Phillips made it to the number three spot in the competition until she was eliminated. She returned to television the following year as the star of “The Bachelorette”. At the end of the show, she chose Ian McKee as her partner in life, but that romance, like many others on the show, was short-lived and the two broke up 13 months later in 2005. Somewhere along the line, her life got out of control.
Phillips admits that during her low-point she was drinking twenty bottles of wine a week and routinely falling unconscious due to alcohol consumption.
“For years I’d wake up every day feeling like I was hit by a truck,” she says. “But I realized I was going to kill myself. … There wasn’t another path for me other than to stop. … I’m finally starting to live my life again.”
She is now approximately five months sober and trying to maintain the new found balance in her life. She maintains her healthy lifestyle by dieting and exercise to manage the stress.
“I need to get back in the gym. I should really be taking better care of myself,” she says of wanting to lose an extra 10 pounds. “But I really can only focus on one thing at a time right now.”
At age 39, she believes she’s finally starting to live her life again.
On The Web:
http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20702473,00.html