Former child actor Josh Peck revealed he became addicted to drugs and alcohol at the tender age of 17, during a recent episode of the “Cancelled with Tana Mongeau” podcast.
The star admitted his addiction spiraled out of control. He told Mongeau that he shed his extra weight believing it would make him feel better, but instead, he wound up finding comfort in getting drunk and high.
“I just spent four years being a total cliché,” he said on the podcast. “I think the most insidious or corrosive moment of my life was the first time I tried drugs and I was 17,” he said.
Before long, the Nickelodeon star, who played a lead role in “Drake & Josh,” became addicted, and his life began spiraling out of control.
Peck described the moment he realized he was relying on feeling high, to feel better about himself.
“I’m lying in bed that night and I realized what a great time I’d had that night. I felt charming, handsome, and I was having great conversations and talking to girls,” he told Mongeau.
There came a time when he realized the drugs and alcohol weren’t saving him, but by then, he was hopelessly addicted.
“But quickly, I was still plagued with the same thoughts and things that had plagued me my whole life. Dad issues, you name it,” he said.
The former child star also found himself wanting to make up for his lost teenage years while building his showbiz career and working on “Drake & Josh” from 2004 to 2007.
“I remember thinking, ‘Why would anyone ever want to feel any other way but this?’ And I took that deep breath I’d been seeking my whole life. Suddenly, I felt free,” the star recalled.
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Now that he’s 36 years old, the famous actor realizes the depths of his addiction and noted to Mongeau that he knows he substituted his addiction to food with another form of addiction, rather than truly healing himself.
“I can look back on that now and go, ‘Oof.’ That was the moment where I said, ‘Oh, this is who I am,’ and that sent me on a four-year vision quest that could have been really bad,” he said. (RELATED: ‘Hadn’t Even Had A Tummy Tuck Yet’: Famous Actor Says He Came ‘Close’ To Playing Lead In ‘Twilight’)
Peck successfully began living a sober lifestyle at the age of 21, and said he is grateful he was able to clean up his life before his addiction became worse.
“To be able to have gotten out of it at 21, I feel grateful. There were a lot of close calls,” he told Mongeau.
“I just felt like a cliché. And I was breaking my mom’s heart.”