Vicky Pattison has admitted she once feared she was going to become an alcoholic like her father, as she opened up about her “complicated” relationship with booze.
The reality star explained that there had been times in her life when she had been “exactly like” her dad, despite not wanting to follow in his footsteps.
In an interview with The Times magazine, the 34-year-old admitted she drank “dangerous” amounts of alcohol after finding fame on Geordie Shore.
Vicky said she feels “sick to her stomach” re-watching clips from the MTV show, and that she “didn’t like who it made me become.”
“I believed I was my father’s daughter, so it was going to happen sooner or later and didn’t really matter when,” she told The Times.
“Loads of people on the show had a really nice time and became funny and silly and then stopped. That was never me. I don’t have an off switch and I was never a nice drunk.”
Vicky added that she “did not blame” the Geordie Shore producers, but at the young age of 22, she didn’t have the skills to “navigate being surrounded by that much alcohol.”
Vicky was suspended from Geordie Shore after she was arrested in 2013, after throwing a shoe inside a bar, which injured two people.
She later returned to the show for two more seasons, but finally quit in 2014.
The TV star recalled being used “as a human walking stick” by her father John, and said that as he got older, his drinking became worse.
“When you grow up with something, you just think it’s normal,” she said. “I thought all houses were loud. Dad used to fall over an awful lot.”
“The boys didn’t want to knock on my door because dad could be scary. I didn’t want to be like him. But at points, I’ve been exactly like him.”
“The idea that alcoholism was some kind of gene frightened me and made me think I had no option but to go the same way. I saw I needed to take steps to change things,” she explained.
Vicky said that she wants to be a mother, and hopes that her new Channel 4 documentary ‘Vicky Pattison: My Dad, Alcohol and Me’ will shine a light on the lives of alcoholics and their children.
“I didn’t understand and I used to get mad – mad at my dad and mad at myself – because I’d see myself destroying everything I’d prayed for and I couldn’t stop,” she said.
The reality star previously claimed that she wouldn’t have children, and stated the real reason was that she “had all my dad’s issues and hang-ups and addictions, and I was so frightened my children would end up like me: broken.”
Vicky told that she maintains a “complicated” relationship with alcohol, but is adamant that she is not an alcoholic herself.
“It’s a slippery slope from being social to being dependent to being addicted,” she said.
“I’ve danced with that my whole adult life. But I am aware I have the potential to turn into someone I don’t want to be and have a life I don’t want to have.”
“My dad’s never wanted anything more than a drink. But I do want things,” she explained.
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Vicky shared her cover photo for The Times magazine on Instagram, and teased her new documentary.
She wrote, “I made this documentary to bring more sunlight to alcoholism and breakdown the stigma surrounding it.”
“I myself have never had a healthy relationship with alcohol- but I am trying to be better, trying to stop my destructive patterns and hopefully have a life filled with things I love and people that love me. Rather than the really dark alternative I’d convinced myself was waiting for me 🥺.”
Vicky Pattison: My Dad, Alcohol and Me is due to air on Channel 4 on August 2 a 10pm.
