Tara Conner: I'm an Alcoholic

Tara Conner has admitted that she is an alcoholic, according to a report online by People Magazine. Miss USA was allowed to keep her crown when she agreed to enter rehab. Now she's put and seeking to rebuild her bruised image as a pure and wholesome beauty queen. The blonde bombshell tells the weekly entertainment magazine that she is "a completely different person" since going through rehab. "My life has completely changed," she said Friday. "I'm a completely different person out of rehab. Before I entered rehab I hardly knew who I was. I felt like I was floating and I just needed someone to pull me down." It sounds as if her 31-day stint in rehab may have provided some enlightenment. "I didn't think I had any kind of issue going into rehab. I even said, 'I'll get some free therapy,' or something like that – and that was so ridiculous," says Conner. "But I've realized I do have an issue. I suffer from the disease of alcoholism and addiction. And if there's anything that I want people to know it's the severity of this disease and what it can do to people." TMZ.Com notes that the reformed party girl admits she started boozing at the age of 14, but now she's come to terms with the fact that she has "an issue." Despite the mess she made for herself, she says, "I would not change my past, because it gave me my future."