Michael Douglas has been opening up lately about the repercussions of his son Cameron’s drug addiction while promoting Cameron’s new memoir, “Long Way Home.” In a new interview with Diane Sawyer on ABC’s Nightline, Michael discussed ways he internalized blame over his son’s battle with addiction.
“You rack your brain,” Michael said. “You take it personally in the beginning, you start blaming yourself. My career came before my family. My marriage was not great, and so you do hide yourself in your work. I should have focused more on my family. But that’s hard to say when you’re in the midst of your career, when you are in your own mind stepping out of your father’s shadow, trying to create a life of your own.”
Two-time Oscar-winner Michael Douglas, 75, is the son of 102-year-old Hollywood legend Kirk Douglas. Cameron, 40, recalled it being strange to grow up “seeing your father and grandfather as giants projected on screens and billboards.”
“How do you compete with Kirk Douglas? How do you live in Michael Douglas’ shadow?” Cameron questioned.
‘This huge storm has passed’: Michael Douglas opens up about son Cameron overcoming addiction
At one point, Cameron said he was injecting liquid cocaine into his bloodstream every few hours, often pushing himself close to overdosing. He said “probably the lowest point” was robbing an elderly woman working at a motel, who only had $20. He had been in and out of rehab 11 times before hitting his mid-20s.
Cameron was sentenced to nearly a decade in prison in 2010. He was initially sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty in connection with selling methamphetamine from a high-end Manhattan hotel in July 2009.
The judge added 4.5 years to the sentence after it was discovered that Cameron smuggled drugs into prison. He was released in 2016 and entered a halfway house before a judge told him in 2017 he could go to Los Angeles to pursue an acting career.
Michael said he always had hope for Cameron’s recovery, but didn’t think he’d make it out alive.
Cameron and Michael Douglas at a screening for "The Kominsky Method" on Nov. 10, 2018. (Photo: Jerod Harris/Getty Images)
“We had reached a point where I thought I was going to lose him, based on everything I’d seen,” Michael added. “And (I) was not willing to emotionally commit anymore. At what point do you protect yourself or your other loved ones around you before you get dragged into this and it falls apart? It destroys you.”
“Those words were heartbreaking to me,” Cameron recalled.
But Cameron added he doesn’t blame his parents. “There are millions and millions of kids way worse off than (I was),” he said.
Cameron now says he’s been clean of heroin and cocaine for 5 years. Does he worry about returning to old, destructive habits?
“Going back to a life of drug addiction is repulsive to me,” he said. “It’s always on my mind. If I know one thing about addiction, I know how crafty and sneaky it is. As soon as you lose sight of that, I think you’re in major danger.”
Contributing: Rasha Ali
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