Scrubbing Toilets Was a Sobering Experience for Naomi Campbell

Is a little toilet-scrubbing really all it took to get Naomi Campbell to give sobriety another shot? In a recent interview with W magazine, Naomi talked about the community service she was forced to do after being charged with felony assault for throwing her cell phone at her maid. She shared the diaries she’d written during that period.

“I find solace in sweeping,” wrote the supermodel, who famously left the last day of her community service wearing a stunning silver evening gown. “I have no other responsibility. I have no phone. I have the time to think. Just have, you know, peace. Two of the people in the room have never been on a plane. They ask me what it’s like, and I’m embarrassed to tell them I was on seven planes the week before alone. It’s so interesting to get to know so many different sorts of people … One co-worker tells me how he ended up here, basically because of alcohol. I bond with him, and I tell him I’m in recovery.”

Campbell opened up about her struggles with addiction. “I first sought treatment in 1999 and then went in and out of recovery,” she said. “I’d think I had things under control, but then I would relapse. I never really looked into myself, deep below the surface.”

“What I came to realise is that I had to surrender. I had to let something higher than me be in control of my destiny. You have to let yourself become vulnerable again … Some people can handle a drink or a line of cocaine, but I’ve finally come to realise that, for me, it’s all or nothing — and it has to be nothing. And my life has changed since.”