When it came to supporting Justin Bieber on his journey to sobriety, Hailey Bieber found herself in familiar territory.
In the 2020 YouTube docuseries Justin Bieber: Seasons, the pop star spoke candidly about overcoming battles with addiction to marijuana, alcohol, psychedelic mushrooms, pills and other drugs, saying they'd been "an escape" for him. Hailey is the daughter of actor Stephen Baldwin, who once struggled with a cocaine addiction. On a Nov. 10 episode of the VS Voices podcast, the Victoria's Secret model said her experience growing up with her father amid his substance abuse battle helped her prepare to support Justin with his.
"There's a lot of addiction that runs in our family, like, not even just my dad but a lot of other people on that side of my family struggled with a lot of different things," she said. "He was always just extremely open about why being sober worked for him and why he needed to be sober and what alcoholic behavior looks like, and where that comes out."
She continued, "Looking back on times of drug use and being in some dark spaces and having to kind of go back there and talk about it was extremely difficult. I was never somebody who struggled with any substances, but that's because I was so aware of it because of my dad. He had a really big issue with cocaine and I was like, I'm never trying it because I'm just so scared that if I try it one time, it might lead into something else."
On the podcast, Hailey confirmed that growing up around people in recovery gave her insight into supporting her husband on his journey to sobriety.
"I think even just the open dialogue of, 'Hey, where are you at with this?' Being able to be honest," she said. "I've had times where I would get nervous, like, [asking Justin], 'Are you OK to do this? Because you did have a time in your life where it was not OK for you and it was like, a dark time for you. But he has very, very good self-awareness when it comes to that and is very open about it and I think that is all I can really ask for."
On his docuseries, Justin recalled that he "decided" to stop abusing substances because he "felt like I was dying."
"My security and stuff would come into my room at night to check my pulse," he recalled. "People don't know how serious it got. It was legit crazy scary. I was waking up in the morning and the first thing I was doing was popping pills and smoking a blunt and starting my day. It just got scary. I basically said to myself, I'm like, 'God, if you're real, you get me through this season of stopping these pills and stuff, and if you do, I'll do the rest of the work.'"