With her career suffering a number of setbacks, and her weight battle resulting in not one but two extreme surgeries, Kate DeAraugo hit rock bottom in 2015. The singer was caught driving under the influence of drugs and was forced to admit she was an addict.
‘I basically lost the plot and went into hiding,’ she told radio hosts Kyle Sandilands and Jackie O of her career crumbling. ‘Drugs, depression, the lot.’
Since that fateful night, the once bubbly blonde has taken a step back from the spotlight, and has focused on rebuilding herself one step at a time.
A far cry from the height of her fame, Kate, 31, now works as a back-up vocalist with James Southwell’s band and seems to have found solace in the tight- knit group, looking happy and content as she hits the stage and gets back to her musical roots.
‘I was just a country girl who didn’t know much about anything, I just knew I loved to sing,’ Kate says of her ascent to stardom.
Having taken the first tentative steps back into the music biz, Kate’s health appears to be back on track too, with the singer looking happy and healthy as she posed in a bikini – something she once thought she’d never do!
‘I’ve never worn a bikini – I’ve bought a few but I’ve never put them on!’ she said in 2015. ‘For most women, it’s an incredibly confronting thing to wear a bikini.’
The target of Kyle’s infamous ‘tuckshop lady arms’ comment, Kate has always been open about her weight struggles. In 2012 she competed on reality weight- loss show Excess Baggage, before undergoing full-body liposuction and a subsequent gastric sleeve procedure. As a result, the reality star almost halved her weight, dropping from 127kg to a svelte 66kg.
‘I’m always dieting. It’s always been up and down but… I really lost the plot and I just ate myself into a mess,’ she said.
The singer also revealed to a women’s magazine: ‘I’m amazingly happy with how much weight I’ve lost.’
For the full story, see this week’s New Idea – out now.
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