Monday, 26 April 2010

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Loose Women's Denise Welch: I took cocaine in Corrie toilets

Depressed actress turned to the drug

Denise Welch played barmaid Natalie Barnes in Corrie from 1997 to 2000

Denise Welch has revealed she snorted cocaine in between filming scenes for Coronation Street.

The Loose Women host, 51, used the drug when she developed depression after the birth of her eldest son Matthew in 1989.

Denise, who played barmaid Natalie Barnes, once even snuck off set to get her fix in a loo.

'I took the wrap to the toilets, cut up a line with a credit card, pressed a finger against one nostril and inhaled through a rolled-up note,' she says in her autobiography Pulling Myself Together.

'It was my lowest moment. I'd reached a point where I felt taking cocaine was the only way I could survive.

'I was suffering crippling depression and I'd made myself believe coke was the only thing that could make me cope.'

Denise, who first tried coke in her twenties, managed to kick the habit in 2001, when she welcomed her second child Louis.

Pulling Myself Together will be released on 29 April by Sidgwick & Jackson.