Matthew Perry, the much-loved actor known for his role as Chandler Bing on the mega-series “Friends,” came very close to death and he has expressed deep gratitude to be alive.
Perry wrote a memoir entitled, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing” which is slated for release on November 1.
“I wanted to share when I was safe from going into the dark side of everything again,” Perry told People. “I had to wait until I was pretty safely sober — and away from the active disease of alcoholism and addiction — to write it all down. And the main thing was, I was pretty certain that it would help people.”
People revealed that in his memoir, Perry writes that he nearly died several years ago. He admitted at that time that he had a gastrointestinal perforation, according to People. But the reality is that the celebrity had actually battled for his life following his colon busting due to opioid overuse. He was in a coma for a couple of weeks, hospitalized for five months, and had to use a colostomy bag for nine months.
When he was in the coma, the doctors told his family that he had a 2 percent chance to live, according to what Perry wrote.
“I was put on a thing called an ECMO machine, which does all the breathing for your heart and your lungs. And that’s called a Hail Mary. No one survives that,” his memoir said.
At one point while he was on “Friends,” Perry was taking 55 Vicodin per day and weighed only 128 pounds.
“I didn’t know how to stop,” he noted. “If the police came over to my house and said, ‘If you drink tonight, we’re going to take you to jail,’ I’d start packing. I couldn’t stop because the disease and the addiction is progressive. So it gets worse and worse as you grow older.”
The actor has now had 14 stomach surgeries. “That’s a lot of reminders to stay sober,” he noted. “All I have to do is look down.”
“My therapist said, ‘The next time you think about taking Oxycontin, just think about having a colostomy bag for the rest of your life,'” he said. “And a little window opened and I crawled through it and I no longer want Oxycontin anymore.”
“I’m an extremely grateful guy. I’m grateful to be alive, that’s for sure. And that gives me the possibility to do anything,” Perry said.
