Former Full House actress Jodie Sweetin has shared a remarkably candid account of her first encounter with alcohol, revealing it occurred when she was just 14 years old at her co-star's wedding.
A Wedding and a First Taste
The 43-year-old actress, best known for playing Stephanie Tanner in the beloved sitcom, disclosed these personal details during an appearance on The Skinny Confidential podcast. She described attending Candace Cameron Bure's wedding in 1996 as the setting for her initial experience with drinking.
'Well, the first time I ever drank, I was like 14… and it was at Candace's wedding, and I was just a blackout drinker,' Sweetin admitted openly. She characterised the experience as 'awful, ugly, and embarrassing,' adding that 'my mother was horrified.'
Sweetin recalled the mechanics of that fateful evening: 'I was at the table, and I was drinking, and — I was across the room from my mom. So they would pour a glass of wine… and then they'd get around to pouring more, and I was like, "I'll take a little more, please."'
The Beginning of a Party Lifestyle
Despite feeling 'horrified the next day' and acknowledging the experience was terrible, something significant shifted for the young actress. 'I was like, "Ooh, that was fun,"' she remembered, noting this moment marked the beginning of years embracing a party lifestyle.
The pattern quickly established itself. 'I'd say around 15, 16, I knew that I drank and partied in a way that my friends did not,' Sweetin shared. 'They were like, "What, bro? Settle down." I would be like, "Okay, well, now I've got to go find somebody that I can do these drugs with." Or, you know, it was like finding different people that didn't make you feel so bad about what you were doing.'
Her struggles with substance abuse became more severe after Full House concluded its original run in 1995. The LA-born star turned to alcohol as an antidote to boredom and loneliness, eventually progressing to cocaine, crystal meth, and ecstasy.
The Road to Recovery
Sweetin reflected on how her fame complicated her addiction journey. 'I always say, I would have struggled with addiction issues regardless of being on TV or not,' she stated. 'And to be fair, that gave me some of the ability to be able to find treatment and find help in ways that I might not have had I not worked as a child. But it's very hard [when] you have to make all your mistakes publicly.'
Her path to sobriety proved challenging with multiple setbacks. 'I had gone to treatment in my 20s, and then I had kids, and then I got sober, and then I drank again and then I got sober,' she explained.
The actress has now achieved significant milestones in her recovery. 'It's been 16 years since I've drank alcohol and 13 years since I relapsed on meds with a car accident that I was in,' Sweetin revealed, highlighting her hard-won progress against addiction.
