Matthew Perry’s Autobiography: The Truth About His Drug Abuse and His Death

Matthew Perry, the beloved actor who played Chandler Bing in the hit sitcom F.R.I.E.N.D.S, died on Saturday night in an apparent drowning accident in the hot tub of his Los Angeles home. He was 54 years old. Police said they found numerous painkillers in his house.

Perry’s tragic death has shocked and saddened his fans, friends, and colleagues, who remembered him as a talented, funny, and kind person. But behind his charming smile and witty jokes, Perry had a long and painful struggle with drug addiction and alcoholism, which he candidly revealed in his memoir ‘Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing’, published last year.

The Big Terrible Thing

In his memoir, which he dedicated to “all of the sufferers out there”, Matthew Perry described his addiction as the “big terrible thing” in his life: “My addiction being my best friend and my punisher and my lover, all in one. My big terrible thing”. He wrote that he was scared to live alone because his “crazy brain” would find an excuse to drink and do drugs. He also wrote that he had lived half of his life in one form or another in a treatment center or sober living house.

Perry admitted that he had gone through detox dozens of times and spent millions of dollars in repeated attempts to get sober. He attended 6,000 AA meetings, went to rehab 15 times, was in detox 65 times, was on life support and spent between $7-$9 million trying to get clean. He also had several life-threatening health issues due to his substance abuse, such as pancreatitis, gastrointestinal bleeding, and a perforated bowel.

In one of the most harrowing episodes of his memoir, Perry recalled how he was rushed to the hospital for an emergency surgery after his colon burst due to opioid overuse. He went into a coma for two weeks and developed pneumonia after vomiting inside his lungs. He said that doctors gave him just a “2 percent chance to live” and that he was lucky to survive.

“It was almost certain at that point that I was going to die,” Perry wrote in his book. “Nobody ever thinks that something really bad is going to happen to them. Until it does. And nobody comes back from a perforated bowel, aspiration pneumonia, and an ECMO machine. Until somebody did. Me…I keep coming back to this singular, inescapable fact: I am alive.”

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The Rise and Fall of Matthew Perry

Matthew Perry’s addiction started when he was a teenager, influenced by his father’s drinking habits. He wrote that he would often ask himself “why was he alive?” and that he felt a “lurking loneliness” and a “yearning” for something outside of him to fix him.

He moved to Los Angeles to pursue his acting career and landed the role of Chandler Bing in F.R.I.E.N.D.S in 1994. The show became a huge success and made him a global star. But fame and fortune also brought more pressure and temptation for Perry, who turned to drugs and alcohol to cope with his anxiety and depression.

He wrote that his addiction trajectory could be tracked by his weight on the show: “When I’m carrying weight, it’s alcohol; when I’m skinny, it’s pills. When I have a goatee, it’s lots of pills.” He said that season 9 was the only season he was fully sober, which was also the time that he was nominated for an Emmy.

Perry confessed that he was addicted to Vicodin, methadone, amphetamines, and alcohol at different points of his life. He said that he would fake migraines or other pain and sit through MRIs with different doctors to get prescriptions for painkillers. He also said that he would go to open houses on Sundays and search the medicine cabinets of different homes for any pills he could find.

The Support of His Friends

Matthew’s addiction did not go unnoticed by his co-stars and friends on F.R.I.E.N.D.S. He wrote that Jennifer Aniston was the first one to approach him and tell him that they knew what was going on with him. Later, Courteney Cox, Matt LeBlanc, Lisa Kudrow, and David Schwimmer also confronted him and offered their support.

Perry said that he was grateful for their friendship and care, but also felt guilty for letting them down. He said that he tried to hide his addiction from them as much as possible, but sometimes he would show up on set high or drunk. He said that he regretted not being fully present during some of the best moments of his career.

Matthew Perry also thanked his fans for their love and loyalty, and said that he hoped that his memoir would help others who were suffering from addiction. He said that he wanted to share his story to inspire and encourage others to seek help and recovery. He said that he was not ashamed of his past, but proud of his journey.

“I should be dead,” Perry wrote in the prologue of his memoir. “But I’m not. I’m here. And I’m telling you this story. Not because I want sympathy or pity or attention. But because I want you to know that you are not alone. That there is hope. That there is a way out. That there is a big beautiful thing waiting for you on the other side of the big terrible thing.”