Beneath sparkling chandeliers hanging in the famed Rainbow Room, as a gala crowd dotted with rock stars sat around white-clothed dinner tables, Ringo Starr stood at a podium and described what it felt like to be 30 years sober.
With wife Barbara Bach Starkey — herself a recovering alcoholic — at his side, the former Beatle described what it took for him to get help and called for more resources and acceptance for the treatment movement that saved their lives.
“I was living my life so great,” Ringo said at the recent fundraiser for the addiction advocacy nonprofit Facing Addiction with NCADD . “I was one of those really nice pass-out, blackout drunks. Anyway, I came to one night and … out of a blackout, I came to the next day and I had done a lot of damage. I was about to lose the love of my life, Barbara, and everything else. It was my moment.”
