Doherty's mum "mortified" after confession

Pete Doherty's mother has spoken about the night she found out that the rocker was smoking heroin and crack cocaine.

Nurse Jackie "wanted to be sick" after finding out her son was addicted to class A drugs in 2003.

"The inevitable call came when I was on night duty," she recalled. "It was someone very close to Peter and the band, the Libertines, calling to tell me that he was way out of control, that someone now needed to take responsibility for him and his ever-increasing, drug-induced frenzies.

"We went to Peter's hotel and he eventually got around to asking why I was in London. I told him to be honest with me, that there was no point lying, and I asked him if he was injecting heroin.

"At first there was a weak denial - to himself, really, rather than to me. Then it all came out. He was smoking heroin and crack cocaine. I can't explain how I felt. I can't. I was mortified. I wanted to hit him. I wanted to be sick, to be deaf, to be struck down, to hold him, to cry out to God."

Jackie's book about the Babyshambles frontman, titled Pete Doherty: My Prodigal Son, is published next month.