Ashley Roberts, best known as one-fifth of the Pussycat Dolls, has revealed for the first time the details of her decades-long battle with prescription drug dependence.
The hidden struggle that began in her teenage years and shadowed her rise to global pop fame.
Now 42, the pop star described how her addiction to the anti-anxiety medication Xanax began during high school, part of a long trajectory of self-soothing with substances.
Even as a child, she turned to over-the-counter sleep aids like NyQuil. In adulthood, Lexapro followed, and then Xanax became a near-daily crutch.
‘I was so young and I didn’t have the knowledge I have now,’ Roberts reflected in a new interview with The Times.
‘Xanax is addictive. For me, for decades I was just leaning on what I could get to help me crash out. My brain just wouldn’t shut off and my anxiety was too intense.’
Discovered in Los Angeles by Pussycat Dolls founder Robin Antin, she joined the group in 2003 at just 22. Their 2005 debut album PCD became a multi-platinum global hit, propelling them onto a relentless international tour schedule.
‘There were no discussions around, “How is your mental health?”‘ Roberts said. ‘I remember once we were in three countries in one day. Eventually, my body just got to the point of shutdown. I was really, really sick.’
The breaking point came in London, nearly five years after the band’s meteoric rise.
Roberts was admitted to hospital with suspected neurological damage and medics feared she’d suffered a brain aneurysm. It was later diagnosed as extreme stress, exhaustion, and burnout, worsened by chronic sleep deprivation, poor nutrition, and unmanaged anxiety.
Despite the crisis, she remained locked into performance-mode: ‘I remember saying [in the hospital], “I need to get on a flight to Germany. I’ve got a show to do. You gotta give me something.” That was the mentality.’
When she finally left the group in 2010, Roberts’s body was in turmoil: she had shingles across her face, eczema covering her legs, a stomach ulcer, and a collapsed immune system.
‘An acupuncturist told me then, “If you don’t scream, your body’s gonna scream for you,”‘ she recalled.
While Roberts avoids placing blame directly on the male-dominated music industry, her story lays bare the punishing realities of commercial pop at the time – a culture that encouraged silence, competition, and constant productivity.
‘There was also this feeling that we could be replaced in some way,’ she said, ‘But also there was my own drive, growing up as a dance competitor. So it was a combination of the two.’
Now living a more grounded life, Roberts credits breathwork (a therapeutic practice of conscious breathing) with helping her finally break free from dependency and reconnect with her body.
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