Pete Davidson Recalls Taking Six Drugs at Once Before Rehab

Pete Davidson is opening up about the 2023 period when his substance use reached its lowest point — and how his mother’s fear ultimately pushed him toward rehab.

“It was K [ketamine]. I was getting liquid and cooking it,” Davidson, 32, told Variety on Wednesday, September 30, describing the drugs he used after portraying himself in the autobiographical Peacock series Bupkis. “And I would do acid and shrooms and whippets and smoke weed all day and eat pills every day.”

The actor left Saturday Night Live one year earlier, saying the show had given him structure and routine. While working on Bupkis, however, he said he was “constantly living” in his “own crap” and past trauma, turning to drugs as a way to numb the pain.

Davidson said his daily drug use became particularly frightening because he no longer experienced it as a typical high. “It got scary because I didn’t feel high,” he recalled. “I felt high when I wasn’t doing it, so I was like, this is a huge problem.”

Davidson has spoken openly about losing his father, Scott Davidson, a firefighter who died during the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in New York City. He said a deeply emotional conversation with his mother, Amy Davidson, became the moment that convinced him to get clean.

“She told me her biggest fear was waking up one day to see on the news that something bad had happened to me,” the comedian recalled. “I reached a point where I couldn’t do that to her anymore.”

Taking his mother’s concerns seriously, Pete stepped away from season 2 of Bupkis and admitted himself to rehab.

Davidson also acknowledged that he had contributed to the public scrutiny he disliked most. “I was part of the problem of what I hated the most, which was the invasiveness around my personal life,” he said. “I was just lobbing it up and continuing the narrative.”

Although his mother’s fears helped prompt his decision to enter rehab, Pete emphasized that he had already reached a point where he wanted to change his life.

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“When I turned 30 and I was there, it was a real low point. Nothing much was going on with my career and I was like, ‘This f***in’ sucks. I can’t do it anymore,’” he said, explaining why he ultimately chose sobriety for himself. “And it can’t be for anyone or for a job. You really have to want it, and when you’re done, you’re done.”

The How to Rob a Bank star said he is now sober, aside from having “four beers a year.”

“I don’t f*** with drugs anymore. It’s been two or three years from doing really hard stuff and about a year or more from weed,” Pete said. He added that cannabis was unexpectedly the most difficult substance for him to quit.

Fatherhood has become one of his strongest reasons for protecting his sobriety. Davidson said avoiding drugs is “easy” now “because I have a kid.”

“Anytime there’s ever a thought, I look at my phone background and go, ‘Oh yeah, no,’” Pete said, referring to his 9-month-old daughter, Scottie, whom he shares with his ex-girlfriend, Elsie Hewitt.

Pete named his daughter after his late father and said her arrival completely reshaped his priorities.

“Scottie is my whole life. I was living or dying on this business and what I thought people thought of me,” he admitted. “It was all validation and ‘If I do this, then I’ll do that.’ But as soon as I saw her for the first time, I was like, ‘Oh my God, none of this f***in’ matters at all. It’s a job.’”

Pete now views his career differently. “If I get to do cool stuff, great; if not, cool, I get to be home more with my kid,” he said.

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).