a born-again Christian, and in several interviews, she stated that she would not play any more sexualized roles. Simultaneously, she renounced her stage name Vanity and reverted to Denise Matthews. She traveled extensively throughout the South with her friend/agent Benjamin Jimerson-Phillips, giving her testimony of conversion to Christianity. In 1994, Matthews was hospitalized for three months for near-fatal kidney failure from a drug overdose. She recalled later that after being rushed to the hospital, doctors said she had three days to live while on life support. She explained that Jesus appeared to her at this time and spoke to her, saying that if she promised to abandon her Vanity persona, he would save her. Upon her recovery, Matthews ended her performing career by cutting off all ties with Hollywood and shunning her former life in show business. She devoted herself to being a born-again Christian. In 1995, she said, "When I came to the Lord Jesus Christ, I threw out about 1,000 tapes of mine— every interview, every tape, every video, everything." Jimerson-Phillips stated: "I was there at her apartment at The Grand in Sherman Oaks, when she just started dumping things down the incinerator. I grabbed some of the items including a painting titled Tailspin, by famed artist Olivia; a cassette hand painted by Prince of unreleased music; and an assortment of other items I didn't want to see go into the trash. I even had to go down to the office and ask them to retrieve her gold album she had thrown away." After a kidney transplant in 1997, Matthews dedicated the rest of her life full-time to Christ. She made speaking engagements at churches worldwide and she headed Pure Hearts Ministries in Fremont, California. In 2010, Matthews released her autobiography, Blame It On Vanity: Hollywood, Hell and Heaven. Illness and death Due to kidney problems from her 10-year cocaine addiction, Matthews had to undergo 20 minutes of peritoneal dialysis five times a day. Matthews underwent a kidney transplant in 1997, but her health worsened in 2015 after she was diagnosed with sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis. Matthews died in a Fremont, California, hospital on February 15, 2016, from kidney failure, aged 57. She left much of her estate to her church. A dying wish of hers was to have her ashes scattered over the coast of Hawaii, and for her loved ones to celebrate her life with festivities and