Elton John admitted he “wants to die a natural death” in a heartbreaking admission during his addiction battle. The Crocodile Rock hitmaker was addicted to “drugs, alcohol, food and sex” during his darkest days, and in 1990 he decided to get help and checked himself into a treatment centre.

In his 2019 autobiography Me, Elton, now 78, shared the letter he wrote to cocaine from the Lutheran Hospital in Park Ridge, Illinois, while he was being treated there for addiction. In it, he penned: “You have been my w***e. You have kept me from any sort of spirituality and you have kept me from finding out who I really am.

“I don’t want you and I to share the same grave. I want to die a natural death when I go, at peace with myself. I want to live the rest of my life being honest and facing the consequences rather than hiding behind my celebrity status.”

He concluded: “I feel as though, after sixteen years with you, I was dead anyway.”

Elton was in a relationship with his partner Hugh Williams at the time. The pair met in the eighties and embarked on a journey of drug use together, but one day Hugh decided he was sick of the lifestyle and checked himself into rehab – prompting Elton to later do the same.

But it wasn’t an easy decision, Elton admitted to the Daily Mail: “I went ballistic, screaming, shouting, saying the most hurtful things I could think of. Afterwards, I holed up alone in a rented house in London for two weeks, snorting cocaine and drinking whisky.”

Thankfully, Elton was eventually able to see that he too needed help, and despite a “tough” first few days in rehab, he learned how to work a washing machine and clean his own room after decades of having people around to do it for him.

Elton spent six weeks in rehab and now he “can’t bear being anywhere near” people who are using drugs. He admitted: “I just leave – because, quite frankly, it’s a drug that makes people act like a*******s. I wish I’d realised that 45 years ago.”