drug-free

Colton Haynes gets emotional celebrating three years of sobriety

 

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A post shared by Colton Haynes (@coltonlhaynes)

Actor Colton Haynes has posted a series of images to Instagram that most have taken to show him marking three years of being drink and drug-free. He can be seen welling up over a cake with the figure ‘3’ rising above it. One image shows the cake bearing a photo of Haynes as a child.

Haynes, 33, simply captioned the image: “🎂 3 🎂”

In March 2019, Haynes told Attitude magazine that he was six months clean, meaning he’d have stopped around this time in 2018. Before this, he’d been abusing substances for the previous decade. He said things really began to spiral out of control after he publicly came out in 2016.

“In 10 years, there were maybe 25 days I didn’t drink,” the actor said. “I remember when I started, it was a couple glasses of wine, and it regressed into really dark times.

“I used to blame it on my anxiety or depression issues, but really the root of all my problems was the alcohol and drugs.”

Related: Colton Haynes pays homage to Tom of Finland

He followed this on Instagram in August 2019 with a photo of himself from the year previously, when he was in hospital for treatment for his substance abuse.

“I no longer want to project a curated life. I get immense joy when someone comes up to me & says that my willingness to open up about depression, anxiety, alcoholism, & addiction has helped them in some way,” he said in the accompanying caption.

“I’m posting these photos to let y’all in on my truth. I’m so grateful to be where I am now ( a year after these photos were taken) but man these times were dark. I’m a human being with flaws just like you. If ur in the middle of the dark times…I promise you it doesn’t have to last forever. Love y’all ❤️”

Haynes first found widespread fame in 2011 by playing the role of Jackson Whittemore in the MTV reboot of Teen Wolf, before a lead role in Arrow.

Last month, Deadline reported that Teen Wolf’s original creator, Jeff Davis, was working on a sequel movie featuring members of the original cast.

Haynes was among those to share the news on his social media, leading many to assume that he will be involved with forthcoming movie.

Related: 6 times Colton Haynes bared his soul & shared his secrets. It’s why we adore him.

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