LOS ANGELES: Prince's former wife Mayte Garcia says she tried for years to dismiss the late pop icon's addiction to drugs, and believed him when he told her it was nothing.
In her memoir titled "The Most Beautiful: My Life With Prince", the 43-year-old, who was married to the singer in the 1990s, has written about concerning red flags throughout her relationship with the music legend, including his addiction and secret overdoses.
Garcia insists she never once saw her ex-husband taking drugs other than vitamin B injections, but one day in 1994, she noticed he seemed "foggy", reports aceshowbiz.com.
"He sounded hollowed out and foggy, and that scared me a little. He didn't get sick very often. And this felt different. There were a few disturbing incidents that happened while we were together, and this is one of several occasions when he told me he was 'sick' or that he had a 'migraine'," she told Radar Online.
"Looking back, I can see it was something else. I didn't see it then. Maybe because I didn't want to."
Garcia revealed that just after she discovered she was pregnant with their son Amiir in 1996, Prince was rushed to the hospital after suffering an overdose. She said that a security guard "found him passed out. There was vomit on the floor".
A doctor told her they had pumped his stomach and gave him charcoal treatment, but Prince insisted he merely took aspirin with red wine.
Garcia says Prince refused to discuss the incident during their marriage, saying: "I accepted his word that it would never happen again."