Please note: this story was published in 2009
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Amy Winehouse‘s ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil has described how he feared his wife was dying in his arms after a three-day drug binge.
Fielder-Civil, who was divorced from Winehouse on grounds of her adultery on July 16, told The Sun newspaper how Winehouse went into a seizure and briefly stopped breathing at a party at her home in Camden, north London.
He recalled: “She started having a fit on the bed. She slid down on to the floor before I could stop her. She started quivering again and it suddenly grew into what seemed like a full-blown epileptic fit.
“I was panicking. I didn’t know know how to help her. I was out of it on drugs as well – and was sobbing and crying out, ‘Amy!'”
Fielder-Civil described how he put the singer, who was cleared of assaulting a fan last Friday (July 24), into the recovery position and pulled her tongue out of her mouth to stop her biting it.
He added: “I knelt over her as she kept on fitting. But then suddenly she just passed out and stopped breathing. It was the most frightening thing I had ever seen. I felt sure I was watching her die right in front of me. I didn’t know what to do or how to save her. I held her to me – and I thought she was dying in my arms. But somehow I managed to open her mouth and breathe air down her throat.
“At first nothing happened. So I did it again. I was feeling for her pulse because I thought her heart might have stopped.
“Then she spluttered – and I saw her chest rise. I was still sobbing and panicking but I just felt this huge relief that she was alive.”
Fielder-Civil continued by describing how Winehouse, slipping in and out of consciousness, was unable to recognise him and called out for more drugs, before a friend called a taxi to take her to hospital, where she was placed on a drip.
Reflecting on Winehouse‘s troubled life since the success of her second album ‘Back To Black’ whose songs described a previous split with Fielder-Civil, her ex-husband said: “It’s just a shame because she’s very funny, very clever and she’s very loving. I can think of all these good points about her.
“But she just put everything going for her – all that talent and personality – and hid them behind drink and drugs.”
itn – Amy Winehouse: A generation mourns on MUZU.TV
itn – Amy’s Back to Black tops chart on MUZU.TV
