Pooja Bhatt celebrates 8 years of being ‘sober,’ reflects on addiction's true opposite

Mumbai, Dec 23 Actor-filmmaker Pooja Bhatt celebrated eight years of sobriety after quitting alcohol.

The actress took to social media to share her journey, expressing that the opposite of addiction is not just sobriety but connection.

On Monday, Pooja posted a candid photo of herself with the caption, “8 years sober today. Gratitude. Gravitas. Grace. 'You’re not alone, we love you' has to be at every level of how we respond to addicts socially, politically, and individually. For one hundred years now, we’ve been singing war songs about addicts. I think all along we should have been singing love songs to them… because the opposite of addiction is not sobriety. The opposite of addiction is connection." – Johann Hari #onestepatatime #onedayatatime #sobrietyrocks #soberissexy #soberliving #8yearssober #gratitude #gravitas #grace #johannhari #lostconnections #poojabhatt.

The ‘Dil Hai Ki Manta Nahin’ actress gave up alcohol around 2016. Pooja Bhatt, daughter of filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt, has been candid about her struggles with alcohol. She had previously shared that she decided to quit drinking after realizing she had fallen into the "trap of addiction" and understood that the only way to break free was to acknowledge it to herself.

During her stint on the reality show “Bigg Boss OTT 2," the 'Sadak' actress admitted she had a drinking problem, which prompted her to acknowledge her addiction and make the decision to quit.

Pooja also pointed out how women often don’t have the same freedom as men to openly discuss addiction in society.

She said on the show, “Society gives a license to men, and thus they can openly speak about being addicted and recovering from alcoholism. However, women don't openly drink, and so they don't openly recover. I used to drink openly, so when I thought of recovering from alcoholism, I realized that why should I recover in the closet? People used to call me an alcoholic, but then I said, ‘I'm a recovering alcoholic.”