Mariano Vivanco for Harper’s Bazaar
From the outside, it looks like Demi Moore has it all.
She’s an actress, a producer, a mother of three and so much more. However, the 56-year-old star’s road to success wasn’t an easy one.
Moore opened up about the obstacles she’s overcome in life for Harper’s Bazaar’s October issue.
According to the magazine, Moore experienced a “nomadic childhood”—one in which she traveled across the country with her parents and her brother. The painful experiences started at an early age. At one point during the interview, Moore recalled rushing to revive her mother after an overdose.
“The next thing I remember is using my fingers, the small fingers of a child, to dig the pills my mother had tried to swallow out of her mouth while my father held it open and told me what to do,” she said. “Something very deep inside me shifted then, and it never shifted back. My childhood was over.”
Per the publication, Moore’s mother sometimes took her to an apartment in West Hollywood to escape the alcoholism of her father, who Moore later learned wasn’t her biological parent. It was here that she met Nastassja Kinski. As she wrote in her new memoir, Inside Out, Moore helped Kinski run lines for her audition.
“She had this sense of herself that I so wanted,” she stated, per Harper’s Bazaar. “Even though I didn’t know what it was. To me, she represented a sense of freedom that I couldn’t even fathom. It was a sense of belonging. [And I felt] if I could fit there, then it would mean it’s okay that I’m here…that it’s okay that I was born.”
According to The New York Times, Moore also revealed in the book that she was raped at age 15.
At age 16, Moore met her first husband, Freddy. They married two years later but eventually divorced. Meanwhile, her star was rising. She appeared on General Hospital and landed roles in films like Blame It on Rio. Moore than married Bruce Willis in 1987. Over the course of their marriage, they welcomed three children together. She also starred in films like Ghost, Indecent Proposal, Striptease and G.I. Jane. After more than a decade of marriage, the celebrity couple split.
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Moore then went on to date Ashton Kutcher. The two frequently made headlines, particularly over their 15-year age difference. According to The New York Times, Moore became pregnant with a girl during their time together. She intended to name the child Chaplin Ray; however, she lost the baby six months into her pregnancy. Per the newspaper, Moore started drinking after she lost the child.
The stars married in 2005. According to The New York Times, Moore and Kutcher pursued fertility treatments during their marriage. However, per the newspaper, her drinking worsened and she was abusing Vicodin.
Kutcher filed for divorce in 2012 and it was finalized in 2013. Kutcher is now married to Mila Kunis.
After seeing her health and relationship with her daughters deteriorate, Moore sought help. Per the newspaper, she ended up going to rehab for trauma, codependency and substance abuse and sought help for her health issues. She also started to rebuild her relationships with her children.
Mariano Vivanco for Harper’s Bazaar
Moore opened up about this difficult time in her life to Harper’s Bazaar.
“In retrospect, what I realized is that when I opened the door [again], it was just giving my power away,” she said when speaking about her battle with sobriety. She then added, “I guess I would think of it like this: It was really important to me to have natural childbirth because I didn’t want to miss a moment. And with that I experienced pain. So part of being sober is, I don’t want to miss a moment of life, of that texture, even if that means being in—some pain.”
However, everything she has experienced in life has led her to where she is today. As she put it, “Learning that I’m okay with just me was a great gift I was able to give myself.”
Fans can read Moore’s interview with The New York Times today and pick up the October issue of Harper’s Bazaar starting Sept. 24.
Moore’s memoir, Inside Out, also hits bookshelves Sept. 24.