Mama June regrets spending $1M on cocaine: 'Stupidest thing Ive done'

May 2024 · 3 minute read

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“Mama June” Shannon regrets her big boo-boo.

The reality TV celebrity is getting real about her drug addiction, claiming the “stupidest thing” she’s ever done was spend more than $1 million on drugs.

“I don’t remember, like, a lot of that time frame. Just bits and pieces and stuff,” the now three years sober “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” star said of her years battling addiction in an interview with the Daily Mail. “But the biggest, stupidest thing I’ve done is spend that much money on drugs.”

She has admitted to becoming an addict during her relationship with then-boyfriend Geno Doak, and the couple was arrested in March 2019 for felony drug possession in Alabama.

They pleaded not guilty to possessing crack cocaine that October, and the pair later attended rehab before eventually breaking up in September 2021.

Shannon told the Daily Mail that the addiction mostly consisted of snorting cocaine until it damaged her vision and she switched to smoking crack.

The 43-year-old said she remembered saying to herself at the height of her substance abuse: “Girl, what the hell are you doing spending all that damn money?

“I say that a lot to my husband [Justin ‘Smallz’ Stroud],” she continued. “I would be like, ‘Man, why in the hell did I blow all that money?’ I am always thinking about that.”

“Mama June” Shannon and her daughter, Alana “Honey Boo Boo” Thompson, rose to fame on the TLC series “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.” Getty Images

Shannon claimed to have spent up to $3,000 a day on drugs during her addiction.

“I think about a lot of things I could do with that money,” Shannon admitted. “My husband tells me all the time that I can’t dwell on it.”

Shannon said she occasionally still feels bad about herself for the things she did in her darkest days.

Mama June is seen sneering in her mugshot following her arrest in March 2019. Macon County Sheriffs/ MEGA
Mama June and her husband, Justin Stroud. Tamara Beckwith

“Now I’ve gone back to being like penny-pinching, and Justin tells me I’m a money hoarder,” she added.

During her addiction, Shannon signed over full custody of her youngest daughter, Alana “Honey Boo Boo” Thompson, now 17, to her other daughter, Lauryn “Pumpkin” Efird, 23, and Lauryn’s husband, Joshua Efird.

Earlier this week, Shannon exclusively told Page Six about the surprisingly low price tag of her “extravagant” Florida wedding to Stroud.

Shannon visits “Extra” at Universal Studios Hollywood on Sept. 9, 2013. Getty Images for Extra

“And I’ll tell you like this, we paid $13,000. No lie,” she said while promoting her WE tv series “Mama June: Family Crisis.” 

“We had only 38 people at our wedding, and it was his family and my family only,” Shannon shared. “And we had an amazing wedding designer and she put together an extravagant wedding that looked like I paid $50,000.” 

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