This memoir made me incredibly sad. The timing of this read also affected me. I had just started the book when I heard that five people were charged in the death of Matthew Perry. So, as I was reading the book, I was also reading the updates on who and why people were charged.
It is pretty remarkable that Matthew lived as long as he did, despite his tragic death at such a young age (54). It's astounding to me that people who take really good care of their bodies by exercising regularly, eating healthy, not smoking or drinking alcohol, can immediately die when out on a run at age 27, and yet people who abuse their bodies to an extreme can rebound again and again. What Matthew did to his body for decades is positively shocking. How do you star in a #1 rated TV series for 10 years, being so immersed in drugs and alcohol? It's truly unbelievable. Not too many other people could pull that off, if any. And how remarkable that five other actors could protect a colleague that was so messed up for those 10 years. There are not too many casts of any TV show or movie that would do that.
So many things made me sad: Matthew's perpetual sense of not being "enough"; his feeling of abandonment; his fear of ultimate rejection; his fear of not being loved; his relentless ambition for fame. So many people made me angry: The studio doctor who gave him Vicodin after his jet ski accident; the doctors and nurses who sold him thousands of opiates "under the table"; the countless healthcare providers that supplied Matthew with so many different drugs to keep him high, simply for profit. It's disgusting. Those people all deserve to be in prison. Anything for profit.
It's ironic that Matthew died from Ketamine. He talks about Ketamine in the book and states very clearly that, "Taking K is like being hit in the head with a giant happy shovel. But the hangover was rough and outweighed the shovel. Ketamine was not for me". He avoids Ketamine because of its effect on him, and yet he dies from it. Addiction is a powerful disease.
Matthew's story has stayed with me for days after finishing it. To be honest, the only reason I'm not giving it 5 stars is simply because he jumps around in his timeline of events, and repeats things in different parts of the book, which was confusing at times.
Wendy's Rating: ****
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