The next article contains discussions of drug habit.

Stephanie Rose Bongiovi, Jon Bon Jovi’s eldest baby with spouse Dorothea Hurley, has lived largely away from the general public eye. Whereas she adopted in her well-known father’s footsteps within the leisure business, Stephanie determined to remain behind the scenes. As an alternative of stepping in entrance of the digital camera, she opted to work behind it as a digital camera operator. Stephanie is seemingly doing properly in her skilled and private lives, having develop into engaged in 2024 at age 30.

However the journey towards happiness was marked by some severe bumps within the street. Stephanie’s points with medicine throughout her school years caught the entire household off guard. In any case, the Bongiovis are well-known for his or her tight bond. “Our focus has all the time been household first,” Hurley informed Individuals in 2020, when the couple summoned their 4 kids to quarantine with them of their New Jersey dwelling in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. “We like one another. We spent a variety of time collectively.”

If the world was shocked to study Stephanie’s struggles, so have been her mother and father. Because of her robust basis, nonetheless, she was capable of transfer previous them and put her life again on observe. And regardless of the undesirable consideration she delivered to her household, Stephanie’s bond along with her father by no means misplaced energy. Jon was writing songs for his woman when she was little and continues to take action, revealing he penned “Kiss the Bride” for her marriage ceremony. Stephanie is fortunate in some ways, however her life may have turned out quite a bit in a different way.

On November 14, 2012, Stephanie Bongiovi was discovered unresponsive in a dorm at upstate New York’s Hamilton Faculty. Then 19 years previous, she was rushed to a neighborhood hospital for a suspected heroin overdose. “The worst cellphone name ever,” Jon Bon Jovi informed Katie Couric on “Katie” in 2013, 4 months after the incident. Regardless of the scare, Stephanie recovered and was discharged in full bodily well being. “She’s doing nice. I respect everyone’s ideas and prayers all through it,” Jon stated, stopping when his voice cracked as he held again tears.

The pop star beforehand admitted to being blindsided by his daughter’s points, noting he and his spouse noticed the indicators when it was too late. “I am shocked as a lot as the subsequent mother or father with this case and had no concept,” he informed the Related Press in December 2012 (by way of Us Weekly). Jon did not know when she began doing medicine or what prompted the problems, as Stephanie hadn’t beforehand proven any habit tendencies or been significantly within the get together life-style.

“Steph is a good child. Nice GPA. Cool school,” he stated, including, “Every little thing about it’s idyllic. She was doing nice. Then a sudden and steep decline.” However Stephanie’s overdose opened Jon’s eyes to a a lot wider challenge. “I can not recover from how many individuals I’ve met that stated, ‘My son, my daughter, my son, my …’ It is individuals I really like, admire, respect. It occurs to every kind of households throughout,” he informed Couric.

For those who or anybody is fighting habit points, assist is offered. Go to the Substance Abuse and Psychological Well being Providers Administration web site or contact SAMHSA’s Nationwide Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

When Stephanie Bongiovi got here to, she discovered not solely that she had suffered a drug overdose but in addition that she was dealing with prison prosecution due to it. After she was taken away in an ambulance, cops discovered a small quantity of heroin, marijuana, and drug paraphernalia within the dorm room, ensuing within the arrest of her fellow schoolmate Ian Grant, then 21. Stephanie was additionally later arrested, NBC Information reported. She and Grant have been charged with a number of drug-related offenses.

Nonetheless, all prices towards each college students have been dropped shortly after as a result of a New York regulation prevents prison prosecution of people that expertise an overdose and anybody who aids in calling for assist, TMZ reported. A number of months later, Jon Bon Jovi attended a ceremony in his native New Jersey when then-governor Chris Christie signed the same invoice into regulation. “I hope that Governor Christie’s actions right here will trigger different states to face up and to concentrate and in addition to comply with in his footsteps,” he stated, per Billboard.

Such legal guidelines are supposed to discourage individuals who witness others struggling a drug overdose from searching for medical consideration out of worry of authorized repercussions. Jon argued that these measures assist save lives. Following Stephanie’s overdose, he continued to assist her restoration and insisted that it wasn’t a life sentence. “You encompass them with greatest assist and love and transfer on, and that is the place we’re at with it,” he stated within the Related Press interview.

Jon Bon Jovi could also be a family identify, however his household is not. That is by design. Jon and Dorothea Hurley maintain their marriage away from the highlight, and so they labored onerous to present their kids the identical privilege. However Stephanie Bongiovi’s troubled life throughout her school years considerably prevented that. For years, Jon may hardly point out his daughter with out being requested in regards to the overdose. “[It was] a horrible velocity bump we obtained over,” he informed Individuals 4 years after the incident.

Hurley additionally appeared keen to place the problem to relaxation. “It occurs to a variety of households that you’d by no means know. We handled it as a household,” she stated. Jon and Hurley, who met as youngsters, did their greatest to present their youngsters a standard childhood, despite the fact that their father was one of many greatest names once they have been rising up within the ’90s and ’00s. “We by no means actually drag the children to issues,” she stated. “I by no means pointed on the TV and stated, ‘There’s Daddy!’ We attempt onerous simply to present our children a standard life.”

Jon credited his spouse for retaining the household grounded and away from the limelight. In Hurley’s thoughts, fame should not lengthen past the artist. “That is his life, not ours,” she stated. Even when inadvertently, she has achieved the identical for him. “She’s the one following me with the glue and the thread and needle, retaining all of it collectively,” he informed Individuals.