Selma Blair Reveals Drinking At Age 7 & Admits She Would Not Have 'Survived Childhood' Without Alcohol

[Warning: Potentially Triggering Content]

Selma Blair is opening up about the adversities she’s faced in life — and we’re shocked at her experiences and heartened by her resiliency.

The 49-year-old actress has a new memoir named Mean Baby that is due to be released next week, and in it, she reveals some of the heartbreaking ups and downs of her childhood and early life.

In an excerpt from the book and an interview with People, the Cruel Intentions star opens up about her long battle with alcohol addiction that began when she was just 7 years old. She also reveals other traumatic incidents in the book, including being the victim of sexual assault.

Explaining how alcoholism defined her life from a very, very young age, the star told the mag (below):

“I don’t know if I would’ve survived childhood without alcoholism. That’s why it’s such a problem for a lot of people. It really is a huge comfort, a huge relief in the beginning. Maybe even the first few years for me because I did start really young with that as a comfort, as my coping mechanism.”

Then, in an excerpt from Mean Baby that was published by the news org, Blair’s writing details the start of her long road with alcoholism:

“The first time I got drunk it was a revelation. I always liked Passover. As I took small sips of the Manischewitz I was allowed throughout the seder a light flooded through me, filling me up with the warmth of God. But the year I was seven, when we basically had Manischewitz on tap and no one was paying attention to my consumption level, I put it together: the feeling was not God but fermentation. I thought ‘Well this is a huge disappointment, but since it turns out I can get the warmth of the Lord from a bottle, thank God there’s one right here.’ I got drunk that night. Very drunk. Eventually, I was put in my sister Katie’s bed with her. In the morning, I didn’t remember how I’d gotten there.”

Wow.

The actress continues, revealing that she would stealth away alcohol whenever she could:

“[I would take] just quick sips whenever my anxiety would alight. I usually barely even got tipsy. I became an expert alcoholic, adept at hiding my secret.”

By her 20s, Blair writes, her alcohol abuse had escalated. And at one point, during a boozy college spring break trip, she writes that she was raped:

“I don’t know if both of them raped me. One of them definitely did. I made myself small and quiet and waited for it to be over. I wish I could say what happened to me that night was an anomaly, but it wasn’t. I have been raped, multiple times, because I was too drunk to say the words ‘Please. Stop.’ Only that one time was violent. I came out of each event quiet and ashamed.”

So, so sad. The Sweetest Thing star told People that she’s never spoken out about experiencing the rapes, other than to work through them in private with therapists.

However, the experience became a key part of Mean Baby.

She explained to the outlet:

“Writing that stopped me dead in my tracks. My sense of trauma was bigger than I knew. I did not realize that assault was so central in my life. I had so much shame and blame. I’m grateful I felt safe enough to put it on the page. And then can work on it with a therapist and with other writing, and really relieve that burden of shame on myself.”

Thankfully, the Legally Blonde actress has been sober since 2016. Along with her own journey, she now hopes her blunt and candid reveals in Mean Baby can help others struggling with similar demons. She told the mag:

“It’s a lot. I wrote the book for my son, and for people trying to find the deepest hole to crawl into until the pain passes. … I’m in a good place. I cannot believe all this happened in my life, and I’m still here and I’m OK.”

And we are so thankful for that! Mean Baby hits the shelves next Tuesday, BTW.

[Image via MEGA/WENN]