Matthew Perry Admitted Getting High on Ketamine Was Like 'Being Hit in Head With Giant Happiness Shovel' — a Year Before His Death From the Drug
Matthew Perry described his experience with and addiction to ketamine in great detail just one year before his passing.
Tormented Matthew Perry used vivid details to describe how he felt while high on ketamine just one year before three massive doses of the horse tranquilizer killed him aged 54.
RadarOnline.com can reveal the late Friends star, who passed away from an overdose of the deadly anesthetic in October 2023, detailed his experience with and addiction to the dissociative drug in his 2022 memoir Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing – the release of which sparked global press interviews in which the junkie insisted he was clean.
Perry described taking ketamine in his book as giving him a heroin-style comforting high comparable to "being hit in the head with a giant happy shovel".
He added he found the drug so moreish it should have been named in his honor – but then claimed the "hangover" from it was so "rough" it outweighed the shovel", and said he decided "ketamine was not for me".
Perry, who would have turned 55 on August 19, compared the high from ketamine to "being hit in the head with a giant happy shovel" in his 2022 memoir Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.
The fallen Friends actor also compared taking ketamine to a "giant exhale" that left him feeling like a "f---ing pincushion".
He wrote in Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing: "Ketamine felt like a giant exhale.
"They'd bring me into a room, sit me down, put headphones on me so I would listen to music, blindfold me, and put an IV in."
According to Perry, who underwent regular ketamine infusion therapy sessions to treat his depression in the months leading up to his death, he would receive a “smidge” of the anti-anxiety drug Ativan and then a drip of ketamine every hour.
He would hallucinate during the sessions – and by the end of sessions would be when he felt like a "f---ing pincushion".
The Chandler Bing actor continued: "As I lay there in the pitch dark, listening to Bon Iver, I would disassociate, see things – I'd been in therapy for so long that I wasn't even freaked out by this.
"Oh, there's a horse over there? Fine – might as well be... As the music played and K ran through me, it all became about ego, and the death of ego."
Perry was found unresponsive in his hot tub at his Los Angeles home in October 2023.
Perry added: "And I often thought that I was dying during that hour.
"Oh, I thought, this is what happens when you die. Yet I would continually sign up for this s--- because it was something different, and anything different is good."
As RadarOnline.com reported, Perry – who would have celebrated his 55th birthday on August 19 – ultimately passed away from a ketamine overdose on October 28, 2023 while in the hot tub at his Pacific Palisades mansion.
Five individuals were arrested last week in connection with the Friends star's drug overdose death, and it was revealed Perry was buying and taking illegal doses of the substance on top of the doses he received during his regular ketamine infusion therapy sessions.
The fallen Friends star began taking illicit doses of the drug on top of his regular ketamine infusion therapy sessions before his overdose death.
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U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada confirmed five arrests were made in connection with the actor's death during a press conference on August 15.
He revealed Perry’s assistant, two doctors and two drug dealers were taken into custody as part of the "broad underground criminal network" accused of "taking advantage" of the A-lister before his death.
Estrada said: "This network included a live-in assistant, various go-betweens, two medical doctors and a major source of drug supply known as 'The Ketamine Queen'.
"These defendants took advantage of Mr. Perry's addiction issues to enrich themselves. They knew what they were doing was wrong. They knew what they were doing was risking great danger to Mr. Perry, but they did it anyway."
The five Hollywood drug ring players have since been identified as doctors Salvador Plascencia, 42, and Mark Chavez, 54, as well as Perry's former live-in assistant Kenneth Iwamasa, 59.
Suspected drug dealers Eric Flemming, 54, and Jasveen Sangha, 41 – also known as 'The Ketamine Queen' – were also arrested and taken into custody.
Five suspected drug pushers were arrested on August 15 in connection with Perry's overdose death.
Iwamasa has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute ketamine, and Fleming has pleaded guilty to distributing ketamine resulting in death.
Chavez has also agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to distribute the drug.
Plasencia and Sangha, the two main targets of investigation, have pleaded not guilty to multiple felony counts.
Perry's still-grieving family also released a statement after last week's spate of arrests, writing: "We were and still are heartbroken by Matthew's death, but it has helped to know law enforcement has taken his case very seriously.
"We look forward to justice taking its course."
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