Brett Favre makes shocking admission about painkiller addiction
Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre said he contemplated suicide when giving up painkillers.
“I was as low as I possibly could be,” the former Green Bay Packers star said on an episode of his podcast, “Bolling with Favre,” with co-host Eric Bolling and guest Dr. Phil on Tuesday. “I said it’s one of two things — I die, or I flush these pills down the toilet. I sat by the toilet for two hours. Eventually, I dumped the pills in the toilet, flushed them and I almost wanted to kill myself because of doing that.
“I could not believe that I’ve actually done that, and I was so mad at myself because now what was I gonna do?”
Favre said that he started taking two pills a day, but teammates helped him get more and it came to a point where he was taking a month’s prescription in two days, which he called “crazy.” He had two seizures in 1995 after he increased his pill intake, and that’s when he came clean with his addiction and went to rehab for 75 days.
Favre explained what he went through.
“It was really not the way you want to come off of pain pills because it could kill you,” Favre said. “I shook with cold sweats and hot sweats. Every night at nine o’clock, I just shook because that was the exact time when I took them. No matter where I was or what I was doing, I would take them.”
A three-time NFL MVP, Favre was a six-time All-Pro selection, 11-time Pro Bowler, and he was a part of the league’s 90s All-Decade team, as well as the NFL’s 100th Anniversary All-Time team. Favre was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2016.
