Jane Lynch is reflecting on her long-time battle with alcohol addiction, specifically her relapse five years ago.
The 61-year-old actress described feeling “a kind of magical lifting of my compulsion to drink” in her 30s before she returned to drinking, only to experience a similar feeling six months after she relapsed.
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“[It was] like the sober fairy said, ‘OK, I’m giving you one more chance.’ And it was over. Five o’clock would come and I didn’t notice it,” Lynch told The Guardian, adding that she felt “ashamed.”
“The first time you [have a drink], it’s like: ‘Ah, I found it. I feel happy in my body, this feeling of bliss. No one can say anything to me that would make me upset or feel badly about myself right now,'” she explained.
The former “Glee” star expressed how every time she picked up a bottle, she was flushed with that same feeling, which ultimately led to her detriment.
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“And then maybe the next time you drink, you get it again. Before you know it, it’s not doing it for you. So for the most part, when I was in the throes of addiction, it wasn’t working,” the actress recalled.
Lynch’s drinking habits quickly became a coping mechanism to avoid answering difficult questions in her mind.
“You end up chasing [that feeling]. And then if you’re not chasing that, what are you doing? Who are you? You have to really face this emptiness,” she told the British news outlet.
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Although the “Hollywood Game Night” host accomplished many opportunities as a functioning alcoholic, she credited her success to sobriety, after joining Alcoholics Anonymous.
“I felt sorry for people who weren’t alcoholics. I just loved AA, It was very much a gift. It was almost like I was struck sober,” Lynch noted.
