Christine Brown Reveals She Was ‘Addicted’ to Oxycodone After Knee Surgery

Sister Wives star Christine Brown got candid about a lot of topics in her new book — including an addiction to oxycodone that started after a knee surgery.

Brown, 53, revealed that she developed a dependency on the painkiller in 2016 after injuring her knee and undergoing surgery. “I had never taken oxycodone before — if something hurt, I took ibuprofen or aspirin,” she wrote in Sister Wife: A Memoir of Faith, Family, and Finding Freedom, which hit shelves Tuesday, September 2. With the surgery, I had already fixed the problem, and it hurt, so I took my meds.”

The TLC personality soon realized that the medication was extremely powerful.

“On the third day, after the surgery, I felt like I had the flu. I was achy from head to toe,” she recalled. “I took an oxycodone, and all the symptoms went away. Oh, I thought. I’m not taking this for my knee anymore. I’m taking it because I’m achy everywhere.”

Christine, who was then married to Kody Brown, recalled taking the drug before filming confessionals for Sister Wives.

“It gave me the best high I ever felt. I was on top of the world and I could accomplish everything!” she wrote. “I lived about two minutes away from the interview set, so I could take an oxycodone just before I left, drive to work before it hit and then feel great on set. Oxy made the set fine. I could do anything on oxy.”

It wasn’t long before she also noticed how bad she felt without the pills, writing, “About 45 minutes later, I would feel the low coming and I’d feel so sad. … All I could do
was think about the next hit and it was hours away.”

About two weeks after Christine started taking the pills, Janelle Brown’s daughter Maddie confronted her about her addiction. “You’re a mess. I miss you — we all miss you,” Christine recalled Maddie, 29, now saying. “We all need you back, so whatever you’re doing, figure it out.”

Maddie was on the verge of marrying her now-husband, Caleb Brush, and Christine decided to give up the drug ahead of the wedding. She confessed her addiction to Kody, 56, and broke the pills in half, giving half of them to daughter Aspyn, now 30, because she “knew it would be mortifying to have to ask her for more.”

After switching to the half dose, Christine stopped feeling high and was eventually able to stop taking oxycodone altogether.

“I never had the high again and I never had the low,” she wrote. “After about a week of that, Kody took all of the young girls out of town, and I spent the weekend in bed sobbing, watching Pretty Woman over and over and sobbing. I couldn’t handle my life, I couldn’t handle anything. My mom stayed with me and took care of me. At the end, I gave the rest of the oxycodone to my mom.”

Christine went on to say that she felt “unbalanced” for about six months after she quit taking the medication.

“I didn’t feel like me and all I wanted was oxycodone, I couldn’t get it and that made me angry,” she wrote, adding that “the memory of that high” still tempts her. “I knew I would never feel that high again. It was that fast to become addicted and then that long to find myself again.”

She credits Maddie’s confrontation with helping her find her way back to herself. “I don’t know if I would have been strong enough to get out of it if I hadn’t already discovered that I loved myself enough to want me back,” Christine recalled. “But my kids weren’t done with me.”

Sister Wife: A Memoir of Faith, Family, and Finding Freedom is out now.

If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).