EXCLUSIVE: Elton John is Weeping Every Day Over How His Drug and Booze Addictions Have Taken Years From His Life — As Kids Worry He’s Close to Death

Sir Elton John weeps each day for the years his monster addictions to drugs and booze have slashed from his life after revealing his kids fear he's close to death.

The I'm Still Standing star has two young sons with husband David Furnish but has told pals he "wishes he'd never taken cocaine" after it led to a 20-year addiction to the drug, RadarOnline.com can reveal.

A showbiz source told us: "Elton wishes he could have those years back and wishes he'd never taken cocaine all those years ago.

"The drugs and booze have ravaged his body and he knows they've taken years from his life and those are years he could have spent with his sons and husband. He sheds tears for his poor choices each day."

He said welcoming his two children – sons Zachary, 13, and Elijah, 11 – with husband David Furnish was "the greatest thing I’ve ever done".

"For all the other people out there who are gay and have their own children, it's the greatest gift you could possibly have. I've never had a better gift in my life, and I wouldn't swap it for anything," he said.

But he added: "They think about my mortality. They worry about my mortality. Not so much David but me. So they want me to be around forever, and I would love to be around forever."

John, 77, has revealed he doesn't have long left and he's suffered from various health issues over the years including knee and hip replacements, surgery for prostate cancer, and most recently said he's almost blind following a severe eye infection.

The dad-of-two revealed: "On my gravestone, all I want it to say is, ‘he was a great dad'.

And he told how he became hooked on coke.

"I saw someone doing cocaine and I said, 'Well, what is he doing?' and he said, 'Well, it makes you feel free','' he confessed. "And I thought, 'Hmm', I was always on the outside looking in as far as, like, school and I was never a member of the gang, or whatever. So, I thought, 'I'm going to try that.'"

The drug quickly became his crutch.

"I liked it because I could talk," John continued. "I was very shy, so I thought, 'This is the drug that has opened me up. I can converse, I can be verbose.'"

However, his hard-partying lifestyle had begun to take its toll.

"This is how bleak it was: I'd stay up, I'd smoke joints, I'd drink a bottle of Johnnie Walker, and then I'd stay up for three days, and then I'd go to sleep for a day and half, get up, and because I was so hungry because I hadn't eaten anything," he said.

"I'd binge and have like three bacon sandwiches, a pot of ice cream and then I’d throw it up because I became bulimic and then go and do the whole thing all over again."

"I'm not being flippant when I say that, when I look back, I shudder at the behavior and what I was doing to myself," he added. On several occasions, he remembers being "very close" to death.

"I mean, I would have an epileptic seizure and turn blue, and people would find me on the floor and put me to bed, and then 40 minutes later, I'd be snorting another line."

It wasn't until his dear friend Ryan White passed away in April 1990 from AIDS that John realized his own addiction was out of hand.

"When he died, being there in Indianapolis," John said. "Coming back to the hotel and complaining about the wallpaper, the décor in the room, and thinking, 'You are the most ungrateful little b*****d. You complain about everything. This boy has never complained about contracting HIV and AIDS from a blood transfusion. He's never complained, he's only encouraged people...You are a piece of s8*t.' And that's what I felt about myself."

He was officially sober six months later. And, in tribute to his friend, John created the Elton John AIDS Foundation in 1992 in hopes of supporting innovative HIV prevention, education programs, and direct care for people living with the disease.