How to Address Doubts About Matthew Perry's Passing Without Feeling Guilty

Listen: There Were Some ... Circumstances

The opening lines to the prologue of Matthew Perry’s memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, are haunting today in a way they were not on October 27, 2023.

Hi, my name is Matthew, although you may know me by another name. My friends call me Matty, and I should be dead. If you like, you can consider what you are about to hear to be a message from the beyond. My beyond.

Perry died on October 28th. Any message we might hear from his book is from beyond the grave. The words add to the sadness as if they were some sort of accidental forecast; a predictive warning for what we’re all experiencing today.

As the reports of his death began to hit our social media newsfeeds, each news outlet trying their best to be the first to report the news, our phones dinged and buzzed in our pockets with the sad headlines something along the lines of: “Matthew Perry, dead at age 54.”

It’s the ultimate clickbait line. It’s not fake news. It’s a fact that is also shocking. They want us to be shocked.

The shock compounds the sadness whenever a young celebrity passes away. We want to ask the same questions we always do when someone dies. How did Matthew Perry die, exactly? Or, if a person was of emotional importance to us, we might ask why they died.

The initial reports tell us. He drowned. He was found “unresponsive” in his hot tub.

Wait … In his own hot tub?

Our emotions are joined by our inquisitive intellect, demanding answers. How did Matthew Perry drown in his own hot tub? Was someone else involved?

The articles continue to answer the questions for us. He was alone. No foul play is suspected.

Alone.

In his book, Perry told us that being alone was the one thing in the world which scared him more than anyone else.

Being alone.

This was because it was when he was alone that he’d be most compelled to use drugs and alcohol.

Ah...

Your mind does its best to put pieces together. It makes sense now. He must have relapsed. Nobody just drowns in their own hot tub. Were drugs found near where Matthew Perry died?

The news articles push back.

No drugs were found on the scene. There were prescription medications in the home. A toxicology report will be conducted.

Your brain pushes back. Well, mine did anyway, having read his memoir.

Um, you know where you get prescription medications? At the drug store. Those are drugs. And Perry didn’t use needles or cocaine. It wasn’t like that for him. Matthew Perry was addicted to opioids. Prescription pain medications.

Could I be any more skeptical?

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We shouldn’t speculate about someone’s death, right? I mean, it’s unfair to make inquisitive accusations; to point fingers and make assumptions about what happened, right? I’m a jerk for doing this, right?

Before I go too much further it seems worth mentioning that on a biological level, wanting to know why a person died, particularly at a young age, is important. It’s an instinctual question. When we have the answer, it might mean we have the information needed to ensure our own survival in similar circumstances.

Even if this wasn’t the case, there are a couple other reasons we might rationalize our desire for the whole story. For starters, I think if Perry himself were standing with us as we asked our questions, he’d be the first to say, “Of course you have some doubts!” Or would it be, “Of course you have some doubts!” Or, maybe, “Of course you have some doubts!” It’s difficult to know which word Perry would have chosen to emphasize.

Anyone who read his memoir would understand that while he hit a strong period of sobriety, addicts are constantly fighting to avoid … the next time. He wanted us to understand this. We got the sense he was resigned to the lifelong battle and set his expectations for his own sobriety low.

Second, I’m not looking at the situation with judgmental eyes. I’m sad we’ve lost Matthew Perry. We need more comedic figures in the world. Not fewer. He made me smile and laugh, and I’m grateful for the work he blessed us with while he was walking this planet with us. I have no desire to point an accusing finger at him or people who battle the same disease.

For those readers of mine who might not be familiar with who Matthew Perry was (and I know there are a few of you out there), he played Chandler Bing on Friends, a television show that ran on NBC from 1994 to 2004. The show propelled 6 actors, Perry among them, to mega-stardom. It was a generational hit.

My generation.

It was no secret Perry dealt with drug and alcohol addiction. Viewers could see its effect on him from season to season as his weight fluctuated before our eyes. His book told us his story. By his own account, Perry spent more than $7 million on therapy to try and overcome his addiction.

$7 million.

He eventually suffered a ruptured bowel in 2018. It brought him to the brink of death and prompted his "I should be dead" remark I quoted at the beginning of this article.

I’ve been researching addiction in recent weeks. My interest is due to a current project I’m working on, an eBook about how I overcame my compulsive behavior in relation to pornography. When I did, after decades of trying and failing to stop using it, it was almost a cold-turkey kind of cessation¹.

I struggled with whether or not to call myself addicted to porn. I just wasn’t sure it met certain criteria, and I want to be sure of what I’m saying. To educate myself I’ve read several books on sexual addiction. One about brain chemistry and the endocrine system and have begun to interview experts on the topic. I’ve learned me some stuff.

Numerous factors contribute to individuals developing addiction to their particular substances or behaviors. I’m not here today to discuss all of them. But I do want to focus on two which are largely related to each other.

The first is a sense of abandonment.

It often appears that fathers have a significant influence in creating this sense of abandonment in individuals who battle addiction. Such was the case with Perry. His parents divorced when he was quite young - before 1st grade - with his father leaving for Hollywood for work². In the years Perry should have been developing his relationship with his father, daddy wasn’t there. You may have heard people say something like, “addicts try to fill a God-shaped hole with something else.” Well, in the case of Matthew Perry, it was a father-shaped hole.

Matthew would reunite with his father, John, when the younger Perry moved to Hollywood to live with him in his mid-teens. According to Matthew, John was a terrific father, albeit later than he would have liked. The damage was done, and abandonment issues lingered. The seeds of chemical dependency had been sown, and the pressures of Hollywood watered them.

Another aspect that addicts grapple with is the conviction that deep down, they are inherently flawed individuals. Essentially, they perceive themselves as being bad. Goodness has eluded them.

It’s a feeling of shame, one that keeps people withdrawn to themselves when they’re using. At least that’s how it was for me when I was giving into my compulsive behaviors. I was always alone. When I was, and when I was facing the urge to use pornography, I berated myself for it. Surely if I was a good person, a better person, I wouldn’t be fighting the urge to use pornography. I hated those feelings. I just wanted them to go away.

Hey, you know what does feel good? An orgasm. Yeah, we’ll just replace these feelings of self-defeat with the orgasm. That’s what we’ll do. Just this one last time.

It was a cycle.

As previously stated, Perry's fear of solitude stemmed from the need to confront his own thoughts. Prescription drugs and alcohol made him feel better³. I wonder if his cycle or the cycle of addicts was like what I faced.

This is part of what I was researching.

As I learned the particulars of addiction I was hit with a sobering thought (pun not intended, but really applicable.) I’d heard this message of “you’re bad at your core” before.

I grew up in the evangelical Christian community. My particular denomination was one that fit a category known as a “holiness” denomination. We really had a thing about “sin.” Sin was our problem. It was the problem we had to solve. We were sinners, and thus, not good enough for God.

The way out was to confess your sin, receive forgiveness and go on into your life not sinning. There’s a whole of of theology to flesh out here, several millennia-worth as a matter of fact. You’ll be happy to know I’m not going to do that, save one thing.

I was taught growing up that it was my job to explain to people, nonbelievers, that they were doomed because they were not good enough for God. They had to understand they were, at their core, not good people. You know, not until we confessed, God waved his magic wand of righteous forgiveness over us and presto-change-o, we were suddenly good enough.

I did the whole confession thing … the whole receiving of forgiveness. All of it. But I found that I kept sinning. I understood viewing pornography to be a part of the sin issue. For me it felt like the only issue. My religious experience in relation to porn was a cycle. Sin. Pray/confess/start over. Sin again… repeat.

I’ve moved past this, personally. It’s what my eBook is about.

As I learned that addicts are plagued with a belief that they’re bad at their core, it hit me that maybe my faith community might have been part of the problem. The initial message delivered in my faith community's gospel presentation was, "You have inherent moral imperfections." Translation: You are morally bad from the get-go, a bad person at your core.

So, on the off chance my faith community has been a part of perpetuating the idea that a person begins as a “not good” person, one of the foundational aspects prodding people towards addiction of any sort … well then, I’m out.

Might we instead begin with, “You are a good person?” I mean, if we look at the creation story shared by the Abrahamic faith traditions, that’s where it begins! God made us and declared it to be good.

The popular argument in opposition to this perspective goes something along the lines of, “Yeah, but when Adam and Eve ate the fruit, everything changed. We are cursed with the result of their action! That’s why we have the propensity to sin!”

Really?

Even if I took the story of Adam and Eve as historical fact (I don’t), this doesn’t explain why those two took the action they did. If they took a bite of that fruit, it wasn’t because they had an innate propensity towards bad, sinful decisions. God had declared them good. Not perfect, but good.

I know, I hear you … “Um, Jeff … you’ve gotten really off-track here. What does this have to do with Matthew Perry’s death?”

Fair question.

You’ll recall in “the fall” portion of the creation story, there was this voice which prompted Eve to take the action she did. A talking snake convinced her she wasn’t good enough, and that the fruit would make her better, more like God.

You’re not good enough.

Sound familiar?

We still tell people they’re not good enough. Sometimes this is on purpose, but often it’s unintentional. It’s an accidental subliminal message we get from those we most want to love and accept us. For Perry, it was his father leaving his family at a young age. Little Matthew couldn’t understand why his dad wasn’t content to stay with him and his mother, instead flying off to Hollywood to find what he needed. Matthew was constantly trying to prove himself worthy after that point. Who was he trying to prove it to?

Anyone.

For me, it was the theology of my church. And it wasn’t just about the sin either. As I moved into my 20’s and started trying to have a career, I believed I had to do some sort of great thing to prove God was part of my life. Something where I could point straight to heaven and show just how special I was because of what Jesus had done in me.

It didn’t go well.

At the moment I type this, it’s less than 48 hours since Perry took his last breath. There’s a chance his drowning was a freak accident of some kind. The toxicology report may come back and tell us nothing more than he ate too much peanut butter the day before.

The best case scenario of “he only drowned” is still on the table. I, uh, guess that’s what we’re hoping for?

Weird thing to hope for.

But here’s how I’ll remember Matthew Perry-

Obviously, he was Chandler Bing on Friends. But he said that’s not what he wanted to be remembered for. So, I won’t.

What I’ll remember you for, Matty (can I call you that?), is your willingness to share your story. Your willingness to lay it all out there for us to see. I’ll remember your … how did you put it? Oh, yes! Your “message [to me] from the beyond.”

I’ll be grateful for the fact that I never felt abandoned in my life. I’ll tell my parents often that I know how lucky I was to be loved by both of them, particularly in my younger years.

Oh, and I’ll do my absolute best to make sure people know I believe they are good, right down to their core.

So, as we await the final word on what might have caused Matthew to drown in his hot tub, I think it’s okay to speculate. It’s our natural response. We want answers for confusing questions. “Why did a 54-year-old guy die in his hot tub?” fits the definition for me.

As long as the speculation leads to introspection, not judgement.

1. If you define “cold-turkey” as just dropping a behavior never to do it again, my experience was, technically, the opposite of cold turkey. But (spoiler alert) it ended quickly once I learned how to understand and control my hormones.

2. Matthew’s father, John Bennett Perry was “The Old Spice Man” in the 1980’s and had a modest career in tinsel-town. Here he is at the :08 second mark of the 1986 commercial. You can see the resemblance to his son.

3. When it comes to drugs, I’ve only had this experience once. I was having some back pain during a somewhat stressful time in my life. To help alleviate the pain my wife gave me one of her prescription pills, a Percocet. I don’t remember what malady she’d had them for. At any rate, the pill helped. Not only that, as I lay in bed late at night, I also was able to see a solution to all my other stress-inducing problems. I don’t know if it was because I’d only taken one pill or what, but I was somehow able to recognize in the midst of my sudden attitude change that I was a little bit high. It was weird that in that moment I was able to understand that if my life was more difficult, I might have found drugs an easy way to help those feelings go away. Fortunately, I had a pretty good life.