FOR years, he was beloved by sitcom fans around the world as one of the iconic stars of Friends, but now Matthew Perry is revealing the painful details of his prescription pill addiction, which threatened to derail his acting career.
In a recent interview with GQ magazine, Perry shared that during the height of his fame, he was taking up to 55 pills a day, as well as abusing alcohol. He also admitted that he would steal pills from other peoples’ medicine cabinets, banking on the fact that “no one would think that Chandler from Friends would steal from them”.
His addiction was exacerbated by low self-esteem, which caused him to sabotage most of the relationships in his life, including several high profile romances with fellow celebrities, because he felt that he “would never be [good] enough for them”.
His wake up call came in 2018 when he was hospitalised with a ruptured colon, and had to endure multiple surgeries and be fitted with a colostomy bag, and later an ileostomy bag in order to help his body regulate its waste. The shame and trauma of his addiction’s toll on his body sent him into rehab once again, but he managed to pull out of it, and has been sober for 18 months.
Perry is sharing his story in a new book, Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing, which talks about his journey into and out of addiction, and says he hopes it will help fellow addicts and their loved ones.