Dennis Quaid reveals 'white light' moment that drove him to rehab

Dennis Quaid, 69, talks cocaine addiction as he reveals ‘white light’ moment that drove him to rehab and how his Christian faith helped him ‘fill the hole’

Dennis Quaid has lifted the curtain on his past cocaine addiction – and the ‘white light’ moment that drove him to seek treatment in 1990.

Amid his movie stardom in the 1980s, he found himself in the grip of a spiraling drug problem that landed him in the rehab he calls ‘cocaine school.’

In search of a way to ‘fill the hole’ left by drugs, Dennis explored a variety of religious texts before returning to the Christian faith of his upbringing.

Now the 69-year-old, who married his fourth wife Laura three years ago, has declared that he is ‘the happiest I’ve ever been.’

Covering the latest issue of People, the Postcards From The Edge star said: ‘I’m grateful to still be here, I’m grateful to be alive really every day.’

Throwback: Dennis Quaid has lifted the curtain on his past cocaine addiction, which reached its nadir in the 1980s; pictured 1984

‘Happiest I’ve ever been’: Covering the latest issue of People, the Postcards From The Edge star said: ‘I’m grateful to still be here, I’m grateful to be alive really every day’

Dennis enjoyed his first flush of celebrity in 1979 when he appeared in his breakout movie Breaking Away, a coming-of-age film about recent high school graduates.

As he moved into the 1980s, he rose to prominence through such pictures as The Right Stuff, The Big Easy and Great Balls Of Fire!

However, the drug-fueled whirl of the era’s showbiz milieu was evidently impossible to resist for Dennis, who plunged into a cocaine addiction.

Explaining that drugs were included on ‘some movie budgets,’ Dennis once said: ‘You know, I was doing cocaine pretty much on a daily basis during the 80s.’

He told Megyn Kelly during her stint on the Today show: ‘I spent many, many nights screaming at God to take this away from me. I’ll never do it again, because I’ve only got an hour before I’ve gotta be at work.’ 

During an interview with Larry King on CNN decades ago, Dennis claimed that ‘cocaine at that time was considered harmless.’

He recalled reading doctors in magazines ‘saying, it is not addicting. It is just – alcohol is worse. So I think we all fell into that. But that’s not the way it was.’

Now, in People, he looked back on the moment he decided to stop, sharing: ‘I remember going home and having kind of a white light experience that I saw myself either dead or in jail or losing everything I had, and I didn’t want that.’

At the piano: As he moved into the 1980s, he rose to prominence through such films as The Right Stuff, The Big Easy and Great Balls Of Fire! (pictured)

Coming out of it: Dennis is pictured in 1990, the year he went to the rehab he calls ‘cocaine school’ and successfully got clean and sober

Dennis revealed: ‘I was in a band and we got a record gig…. They broke up the night they got it, and they broke up because of me, because I was not reliable.’

He checked into rehab and reconnected to Christianity, on the grounds that addicts fall back on the drugs ‘to fill a hole inside us. When you’re done with the addiction, you need something to fill that hole, something that really works, right?’

The year he sobered up, 1990, he attempted to reassure his mother Juanita by penning the Christian song On My Way To Heaven.

His aim in writing the musical number was ‘to let her know I was okay, because I wasn’t okay before then,’ Dennis explained.

In his post-cocaine quest to find religion, Dennis initially sampled multiple options, poring through the Bhagavad Gita and the Koran.

However, it was ultimately the Christian faith he was reared on that managed to provide him the solace he needed in the absence of drugs. 

‘That’s when I started developing a personal relationship. Before that, I didn’t have one, even though I grew up as a Christian,’ he shared.

While promoting his new album Fallen: A Gospel Record For Sinners, Dennis looked back at the religious music from his childhood.

Duo: Dennis is married to his fourth wife Laura Savoie, a relationship that has hit the headlines for years on account of her being 39 years younger than he; pictured last month in Italy

‘I grew up at the Baptist church; I love the hymns that I remember from being a kid. The songs are self-reflective and self-examining, not churchy. All of us have a relationship with God, whether you’re a Christian or not,’ he said.

Reflecting on the ‘struggle’ of addiction, he said: ‘We’re all looking for the joy of life, and drugs give that to you and alcohol and whatever it is for anybody give that to you really quick. Then they’re fun and then they’re fun with problems, and then they’re just problems after a while.’

He mused: ‘That’s really what we’re looking for, the joy of life, which is our gift, actually, the relationship with God that we all have. It’s at the bottom of it, the joy of being alive’ – which he got ‘back to’ by sobering up.

Dennis is married to his fourth wife Laura Savoie, a relationship that has hit the headlines on account of her being 39 years younger than he.

He has previously been married to Carrie actress PJ Soles, rom com star Meg Ryan and Texas realtor Kimberly Buffington.

His eldest son Jack Quaid, whom he shares with Meg, is 31 years old, which makes him senior to his latest stepmother.

Kimberly and Dennis, who went through multiple splits and reconciliations before their final divorce, share 15-year-old twins Zoe and Thomas.

Dennis announced late in 2019 that he had gotten engaged to Laura – and then over the summer of 2020 they eloped in Santa Barbara.

Throwback: He has previously been married to Carrie actress PJ Soles, rom com star Meg Ryan and Texas realtor Kimberly Buffington; he is pictured with Meg in 1996

They had initially planned a full wedding in Hawaii and although that idea was scrapped by the coronavirus pandemic they tied the knot in 2020 anyway.

‘I didn’t go out looking for an age gap or someone really younger than me,’ he insisted to the Guardian during their engagement.

‘I met her at a business event and then the relationship developed. You have no control over who you fall in love with,’ he argued. 

‘I don’t fall in love easy. But I can’t let what a few people think control all that. I’ve been married three times and this is the final one, I know it is. I feel like I have a real partner in life,’ said the The Parent Trap actor.

After the wedding, he told the Today show with his signature grin that ‘there’s 30-something years between us and we just don’t even notice it. You know, it’s, we – never related to someone in my life better than we do.’

He added: ‘It’s just, we have such a great relationship and, you know, love finds a way wherever it is, and you never know when love is coming who that’s gonna be and you have no control over it and we just couldn’t be happier.’

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