I keep waiting for Charlie Sheen to walk in the door to my luxury rehab. As the days go by, I realize the likelihood of this happening decreases. I am currently 55 days into the living recovery program here at Seaside Palm Beach, a luxury rehab in Florida. While I’ve been here, the media has been all over Charlie Sheen and his public meltdown.
I have always been an avid watcher of Two and a Half Men. It probably goes without saying that I’m a huge Charlie Sheen fan, and therefore do not entirely disagree with his proclamation of his own tiger blood and DNA, but I also I agree with the rest of the world that he needs to get professional help. We all go through the denial stage of our addiction which is evident in Sheen’s confession that he is “tired of pretending [he’s] not special” and that he’s “tired of pretending [he’s] not a total bitchin’ rockstar from Mars.”
Being a patient in a luxury rehab, I can now see the clinical need for treatment is altogether true. The withdrawals are frighteningly painful and life-threatening to say the least. Withdrawals from one’s chronic alcohol abuse, alcohol use in massive self-sustaining quantities, can cause seizures (which is actually what landed me here: a seizure). Perhaps this isn’t true for celebrities, though, since Sheen is apparently “special,” having “cured [his substance abuse] with [his] own mind.”
If anyone was doubtful of Sheen’s addiction, they were convinced of it when they heard him bragging about his cocaine use: “I probably took more than anybody could survive. I was bangin’ seven-gram rocks and finishing them because that’s how I roll. Dying’s for amateurs.” Subsequently, he followed it up with the [admittedly comical] comment of “I am on a drug. It’s called Charlie Sheen. It’s not available because if you try it, you will die.”
I was simultaneously understanding and angry when I heard him say: “I’ll never be one of you” in reference to those who’ve been in an alcohol rehab. Like I said, I completely understand where he’s coming from with that; I was always one to declare that I wasn’t like those people in rehab, that I could quit drinking whenever I wanted. Only when I made the honest effort to quit, my body did not cooperate. But now that I am “one of them” per say, I was angered and insulted to hear the delusional words escape Sheen’s lips. I’ll get over this with help from my luxury alcohol rehab and my step work but for now, the words sting because of who they came from.
Like addicts pre-treatment, the blame is on everyone else but ourselves. Sheen blames the makers of Two and a Half Men for canceling an extremely successful show when, in reality, it was his own substance abuse that led to such a difficult decision. If he were willing to try it, he could really benefit from the individual and private – not to mention successful! – treatment that can be found in a living recovery luxury rehab like Seaside Palm Beach. Adonis DNA will only give him so many more years with deadly habits like his. I will miss the show and on principle, never watch it again if it does continue without Charlie Sheen. But at the same time, I think Sheen should discharge from his luxury celebrity rehab (his mind) and check-in to a much more accredited luxury rehab for the sake of his health, his children and his fans.
