7 Addiction Memoirs: Books About Hitting Rock Bottom

By Margaret Bristol for Bookish

In the mid-1990s, Kristen Johnston was starring on the hit NBC series "3rd Rock from the Sun," alongside the revered John Lithgow and budding heartthrob Joseph Gordon-Levitt. She won two Emmy awards for her role, and the opportunities seemed endless as she snagged movie roles and endorsement deals. Meanwhile, she was struggling with an addiction to drugs and alcohol, which eventually led to a major health scare—a stomach ulcer that ruptured while she was on the toilet. She describes her rock-bottom moment in detail in her new memoir, "Guts: The Endless Follies and Tiny Triumphs of a Giant Disaster." Johnson was hospitalized, and entered rehab shortly after. She writes candidly about working toward sobriety—her story is her own, but it’s not unique. Take a look at these memoirists who bottomed out and lived to tell their tale.