Eminem marks 18 years of sobriety following his overdose in 2007.
Eminem's most recent accomplishment is a significant milestone in his recovery. The 15-time Grammy winner revealed he is commemorating 18 years of sobriety. He has been candid about his prior prescription medication addiction.
To commemorate the significant occasion, Eminem (born Marshall Bruce Mathers III) posted a zoomed-in image of himself held up a coin while sporting a graphic T-shirt on Instagram on April 20.
The coin's outer border stated, "To thine own self be true," and the Roman numerals for "unity, service, recovery" were inscribed in a triangle around the number 18.
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Eminem, 53, labeled the photo with the gold medal emoji "XVIII."
The rapper known as "The Real Slim Shady" previously talked about how his addiction to prescription medications, such as Vicodin, Valium, Ambien, and Xanax, began in the late 1990s and continued until roughly 2008, which caused a terrifying health concern.
“I got into this vicious cycle of, ‘I’m depressed so I need more pills,’” as per Us Weekly, Eminem stated this in his 2025 documentary Stans. “Then your tolerance gets so high that you end up overdosing."
"I woke up in the hospital, and I didn’t know what happened," he continued. "I woke up in the hospital with tubes in me and s--t and I couldn’t get up; I wanted to move.”
The "Mockingbird" hitmaker, who is the father of children Hailie Jade, 30, Alaina Marie, 33, and Stevie Laine, 24, with his ex-wife Kim Scott, said that upon returning home, he felt as though he "needed something" and was "gonna die" if he didn't make a change.
The rapper from "SteppingStone" also talked about how missing his oldest daughter's birthday celebration served as a wake-up call.
“I cried because it was like, ‘Oh my god, I missed that,’” Eminem added. “I kept saying to myself, ‘Do you want to f--king miss this again? Do you want to miss everything? If you can’t do it for yourself, you f--king p---y, at least do it for them.’”
Consequently, he remembered, “I realized I’m never doing this again.”
Furthermore, his previous drug usage had an impact on more than simply his family. The legendary musician admitted that he had to "relearn how to walk, talk, and for the most part had to relearn how to rap again" at the start of his sober journey.
“My writing had gotten terrible,” he stated in the document. “When I started to get it back, it was exciting. Because I felt it. It would be conversations, just having conversations with people or the TV.”
Additionally, he felt emboldened to put the stigma of his addiction behind him as he worked on his 2009 album Relapse, which described his experience with sobriety.
“It did something. It turned the light on,” Eminem revealed. “I realized I’m not embarrassed anymore about [sobriety]. I started treating sobriety like a superpower and I took pride in the fact that I was able to quit.”
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