Nicole Richie is one Hollywood party girl who no longer parties, said Katie Mulloy in In Style UK. The 29-year-old adoptive daughter of singer Lionel Richie spent her early 20s headed down the same troubled path as her best friends at the time, Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan. In 2003, Richie was busted for heroin possession, and three years later had a brief stay in jail for driving down the wrong side of a Los Angeles freeway while high on painkillers. But whereas Hilton and Lohan got stuck in a loop of rehab, relapses, and arrests, Richie broke the cycle by taking a hard look within.
“Even when I was going through my tough time, that was a situation that I created,” she says. “I’ve always taken responsibility for my actions, whether they’re good or bad.” Now a mother of two, Richie refuses to blame her past troubles on her friends or her privileged upbringing. “People ask me if I blame Hollywood or my parents. I don’t blame my parents. It had nothing to do with them. I created it, and I got myself through it with the help of a lot of great people.”
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