Yahoo Finance Dax Shepard reflects on his 'lowest point' of addiction, realizing fame wouldn't save him
Dax Shepard, who has been open about his recent drug relapse, is continuing to reflect on his sobriety journey, looking back on the "multiple" times he felt he hit rock bottom over the years.
"We do have this notion of a bottom, but (for) most of the recovering addicts I know, there's multiple, multiple bottoms," the actor, 46, told NBA star Blake Griffin in a Thursday episode of his podcast, "The Pursuit of Healthiness with Blake Griffin."
Shepard, who has struggled with addiction to alcohol and other drugs, reflected on a story he's previously shared about when he got drunk at an airport bar and realized his career successes weren't going to fix all his problems.
"I'm now famous. And I recognize I have every single thing I ever wanted," Shepard recalled. "I am at my lowest point emotionally. And something has got to be very broken about that if I have everything I said was going to make me feel good and I feel terrible."
He continued: "You're kind of justifying your misery because you don't have this thing. I had the luxury of getting all that and it wasn't. That's actually about the scariest place you can be. Cause I had been low like that before and I didn't have anything. So I was like, 'Oh, it's just, cause I don't have anything. If I get this, I won't feel this way.' Well, I got it and I still felt that way. And that's very scary."
Shepard also reflected on the "wreckage" he experienced in his career from an infamous 2004 appearance on "Late Night with Conan O'Brien."
Talk shows frequently conduct "pre-interviews" to set up talking points for the host to bring up on air. Shepard said he went through his while "blackout" drunk, then woke up in a hotel bed to security shaking him 20 minutes prior to his interview with O'Brien.
"I show up on the show, I don't know what he's talking about," Shepard said. "I can tell he's queuing me up for stories I've told, but I don't know any of the stories. So, I'm just doing what I can to be funny out there and I am a mess."
In the "Late Night" interview, Shepard noticeably slurred his words upon joining the stage before falling off the side of his chair, accidentally flipping the coffee table in front of him.
"You're paying for that table," O'Brien said as he helped him to his feet.
"Now, the audience dug it," Shepard told Griffin. "It was fine for the audience. But for him, what a disaster. I didn't know any of the stories. I broke a coffee table. So I was banned from that show for some years, until I got sober and I got myself back on it and now I’ve been on it a bazillion times, but that was probably the only career wreckage-y thing I did."
More: Dax Shepard says he's 'grateful' but conflicted over fans' response to his recent relapse
Shepard shared on a no-holds-barred episode of his "Armchair Expert" podcast in September that he had relapsed, explained he had previously taken prescription pain pills due to injuries from riding his motorcycle. But "for the last eight weeks maybe" he'd been "on them all day."
In the podcast, he said he was still proud to have been sober from alcohol and cocaine for 16 years and wanted to be honest about his journey in order to help others who may be struggling with addiction.
Earlier this year, he said he initially didn't want to go public with the relapse out of fear of losing his connection with people, but others pointed out that his honesty would help others going through similar situations.
"I get so much esteem out of being some whose vocally sober and I have people who write me on month one or on week two and I love that, that's my favorite thing about being in public," he told Ellen DeGeneres in January. "So I was just terrified I would lose that, I really cherish that."
Contributing: Rasha Ali
'I had all kinds of bizarre fears': Dax Shepard 'did not want to' go public with his relapse
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Dax Shepard on infamous Conan O'Brien interview, sobriety, addiction
