Michael Stipe Quotes

I simply constructed a project to try to snap Kurt [Cobain] out of a frame of mind. I sent him a plane ticket and a driver, and he tacked the plane ticket to the wall in the bedroom and the driver sat outside the house for 10 hours. Kurt wouldn't come out and wouldn't answer the phone.

No one could reach Amy Winehouse before it was too late. Can anyone reach Washington before it's too late? Both addicted - same fate?

I think I've definitely had my rock bottom and I think that was probably right before I went into treatment where I said, 'I definitely need help.'

If I were to try to identify a turning point I'd say that was it - getting clean.

I was the one that put myself in rehab. I was the one that went to my parents and said, you know, 'I have a problem and I need to take care of it.'

If I have a problem, stuff's going through my head, I feel like using, I usually go and talk to my dad... I decided to get sober a lot younger than he did. He first tried to get sober when he was like 32, I believe.

Well, I'm still here. Didn't have to go to rehab, and I'm not broke.

My mother's suicide attempts were a way to release anxiety and get attention. Some of the attempts were drug reactions she didn't even remember later on.

Don't bother me while I'm eating, or when I'm coming out of the crackhouse or something. Just let me get going.

No one is immune from addiction; it afflicts people of all ages, races, classes, and professions.

Jimi was a good guy 'til he got into drugs. That's the way it is. I just tell it like it is.

I was really proactive in trying to heal my family. I wouldn't give up. My whole life was about trying to get my father healthier, and there were moments when he was healthier. Then someone would give him a drink. I always felt if he had one person in his life who supported his healthy side, he'd be on his way.

I know the type of demons they have to fight and I am going to help them, because it's the only way I can keep them from getting to my family. I have to clean up my friends because they are around my boys. It's upsetting.

If you've ever had anyone in your life who has been struggling with something, struggling with addiction or struggling with anything, and it's about the resilience of love and how much you're willing to struggle with somebody to preserve your relationship and to try to preserve them as a person.

I have female friends who work in all different mediums who I speak to at least once a week. It helps me so much to know that I'm not alone. I think that's the bare minimum you need to sustain yourself - some sort of context of other women making things.

Addiction is a hugely complex and destructive disease, and its impact can be simply devastating. All too often, lives and families can be shattered by it.

We need to do a much better job when people are addicted to take them through treatment and recovery.

I had two experiences. I had a wonderful experience in rehab, and I had a terrible experience in rehab. But, to be honest, in the end, it wasn't rehab that got me sober. It was just finally surrendering and saying, 'I don't want to do this anymore. I can't do this anymore. Somebody help me.'

If there's an addiction in the Clinton family, it's to problem solving.

I chose a rehab center for Nic that was recommended by a friend who had sent her son there. The program lasted 28 days, after which he relapsed. Over the next six years, he was admitted to six residential treatment programs and four outpatient programs. He would do better for a while, but then relapse. Each relapse was crushing.

So often we have this image of what drug addiction looks like, and it's not fun. Our loved ones who go down that path are in pain.

I think the hardest part for musicians is what a wide gulf of time there is between when you decide to sober up and when you have the ability to navigate being social and having relationships and being in a band and having friends while sober.

I came to understand that Nic on drugs was not the Nic I knew and trusted. Nic on drugs was somebody else. We were afraid of him.

LSU has a strong drug testing program and LSU went to great lengths to help me in my treatment and recovery.

You know you don't want to see somebody in that kind of position to the point where they're actually putting out a cry for help on social media. That's not a good place to be in.