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Nicki Minaj was once prescribed Percocet for menstrual cramping. What she didn’t know was just how addictive the medication would be, leading her to popping pills long after the pain had gone.

The ‘Super Bass’ rapper was candid about her struggles during an interview with Vogue. She spoke about being grateful for how she handled the situation while acknowledging that addiction is something that never truly goes away.

“No one told me that this was a narcotic and this was addictive,” she said. “Luckily I was able to ground myself. But — once an addict, always an addict. I feel like if you’ve ever experienced addiction to anything, which I have, you always have to think twice and three times about the choices that you make.”

Minaj believes that substance abuse is particularly common among those in the public eye. “Look at some of our biggest celebrities,” she said. “They eventually either get laughed out of wanting to go outside anymore, like Michael Jackson, or criticised, like Whitney Houston, or they fight silent battles, like Prince.” She added, “These are some of the greatest of all time. And one day they decided, ‘You know what? I’d rather self-medicate and be in my own world.’”

The 42-year-old once denied using cocaine amid rumours she was taking drugs, claiming that she had “never, ever” taken the substance in her life. “That’s just never been my drug of choice,” she said on Instagram. “You would know, if you’re a fan of mine, that all you gotta do if you wanna know my drug of choice or my drugs of choice, just listen to my music, chile, ’cause it’s all right there.”

Minaj isn’t the only person in her family who has struggled with addiction. When she was a child, her father was addicted to crack cocaine, which started off with weed, then adding crack to weed, and then crack alone. In addition, he also drank a lot of alcohol and became aggressive, going as far as setting his house on fire with his wife inside.

“I think about watching my father go back and forth, and I just wish that at the time, I understood that he wasn’t doing it because he wanted to,” Minaj said. “I thought that he was making a conscious effort to be addicted to a drug that would have him steal his children’s video games and sell them for money.”

She continued, “Think about that — who would make a conscious effort to do that? Now I realise, those people weren’t making those choices because they wanted to hurt their family. Addiction took over their bodies and their lives. They were victims too.”

Her father, Robert Maraj, was killed in a hit-and-run accident in 2021, with the driver sentenced to one year in prison and a suspended license for six months.