Milwaukee Journal Sentinel - Packer Plus
Painkillers made Favre suicidal in Super season
From an outsider’s perspective, Brett Favre was on top of the world.
The Green Bay Packers quarterback was the NFL MVP in three straight seasons from 1995-97 and won the Super Bowl on Jan. 26th, 1997. Everything isn’t always as it seems from the outside, though.
Favre said on his podcast, “Bolling with Favre,” he had been addicted to painkillers since 1994. He said he took some after a game against the Philadelphia Eagles that year and was hooked on them for years every day thereafter.
“You start learning to manipulate the system, and you become very good at it,” Favre said. “To a point where I was basically taking in two days a month’s prescription, which is crazy. It became constant at the end of the ’94 season.”
Favre said he had a seizure before a game during the 1995 season. He had another seizure at the end of that season while he was in the hospital for ankle surgery.
Favre went to a rehabilitation facility for 75 days in Topeka, Kansas, before the 1996 season. He said he was prescribed a non-addictive painkiller. He said he took 20 pills at once with intention of obtaining a buzz.
Favre had eight pills left at the end of the season. He said he was as depressed as ever. He made a decision that changed his life at his home in Mississippi.
“I said it’s one of two things,” Favre said. “I die, or I flush these pills down the toilet.”
Favre sat in the bathroom for two hours. He ultimately flushed them.
“I almost wanted to kill myself after doing that,” Favre said. “I could not believe that I had actually done that. I was so mad at myself because now what was I going to do?”
Favre had withdrawals every night at 9 p.m. for two weeks. The NFL Hall of Famer said the desire to take pills stuck with him for a few months. He said he also had an alcohol problem at the time, and he went back to rehab in Topeka for that issue.
Favre said he made a commitment to himself and his wife that he would change during his second stint in rehab. He did. He said he hasn’t had a drop of alcohol or taken any pain pills since 1998.