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'Bachelorette's alcoholism: Meredith Phillips reveals struggle with alcohol

By KATE STANTON, UPI.com
Meredith Phillips, with the man she became engaged to on 'The Bachelorette,' Ian McKee. Their relationship ended soon after the show. (UPI Photo/Laura Cavanaugh)
Meredith Phillips, with the man she became engaged to on 'The Bachelorette,' Ian McKee. Their relationship ended soon after the show. (UPI Photo/Laura Cavanaugh) | License Photo

The 39-year-old star of "The Bachelorette's" second season opens up about her alcohol abuse in a new issue of People magazine, set to hit stands Friday.

Meredith Phillips admits to binge drinking heavily in college, but her 2005 breakup with "Bachelorette" contestant Ian McKee, her father's death in 2009 and her mother's bout with cancer really contributed to her downward spiral.

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“My lowest point was when I realized my mother was in a hospital bed dying of cancer and I was at her house, drinking myself to death,” she tells the magazine. “I just didn’t care.”

"For years I'd wake up every day feeling like I was hit by a truck," Phillips says. "But I realized I was going to kill myself."

"There wasn't another path for me other than to stop," she adds.

At her worst, the 2004 "Bachelorette" says she drank 20 bottles of wine each week.

Phillips, who first appeared on Bob Guiney's season of "The Bachelor," knows that she still has "a lot of healing to do, but says she's "feeling better every day."

“It’s not fun to start over again at 39 ... but life is short. And I have a second chance."

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