Celebrity Big Brother’s Patsy Palmer returns to booze 25 years after quitting wild partying to go sober
The star previously opened up her all-night partying when she was filming EastEnders
CELEBRITY Big Brother contestant Patsy Palmer is back on the booze having previously ditched alcohol following her wild partying in the Nineties.
The EastEnders legend, 52, went sober in the early Noughties and even followed Alcoholics Anonymous’s 12 step plan, after admitting she started drinking at just eight-years-old.
But speaking before she entered the house tonight, the actress has revealed her penchant for wine, admitting she previously thought she would never be able to touch alcohol again.
Asked if she still isn’t drinking, Patsy said: “No, occasionally I’ll have a glass of wine, it doesn’t bother me, with food.
“I don’t do anything rigid anymore.
“I went through many years of following certain programs, which I think are great, I’m not saying anyone should do this because I think all of the programs for people are amazing, but I haven’t followed anything for as long, I’ve just found my own way in life and it should be about that.
“It should give every single individual a way to live their life, hopefully, whether they decide to continue with it forever or whether they decide to go find their own way and do what they want to do, that should be the goal.
Patsy, who’ll be going into the house alongside the likes of Mickey Rourke, Chesney Hawkes and Trisha Goddard, added: “There are some people I know who could never have a drop of alcohol ever again, I did think that would be the case for me because that’s what certain programs tell you, but I was never really a big drinker anyway.”
Patsy admitted to attending all-night parties during her early days in EastEnders, binging on drink, as well as taking cocaine and ecstasy.
Speaking in 2010, she said: “Quite often, I’d party all night and go into work the next morning, just grabbing sleep on the set whenever I could. I don’t know how I survived.”
But after becoming a mum and marrying second husband Richard Merkell in 2000, she went sober and attended treatment programs in order to stay on the wagon.
Patsy now lives in Los Angeles with her husband and their three children which she says is vital to her well-being, as she couldn’t live anyway where “it gets dark at 3pm again.”
It’s in America where her spiritual side has really blossomed.
So much so, she believes a factor behind her house not burning down during the LA fires, while her neighbours’ was torched, was because a local shop owner had loaned her two giant crystals which were placed inside during the inferno.
Patsy claims another big reason why she will remain across the pond is to escape people shouting out “Ricky!’ at her, a nod to her famous EastEnders screech at on-screen husband Ricky Butcher, played by Sid Owen.
Speaking to the We’re Not Getting Any Younger podcast, she added: “It does get to me. I could, but I don’t want to live here anymore and it is a lot for that reason.”
