I cannot even imagine what the last few months have been like for Chris Cornell’s widow Vicky Cornell. Her husband, Chris, was found in his hotel room after a gig in Detroit, where he hung himself, which was quickly ruled a suicide, Cornell's wife, Vicky rejected the ruling by law enforcement. She blamed the death on taking too much anti-anxiety medication, especially after her final conversation with Chris, where she said he didn't sound like himself, and sounded like he did when he was addicted to Oxycontin.
A toxicology report revealed the singer had Naloxone (Narcan), Butalbital (sedative), Lorazepam (Ativan), Pseudoephedrine (decongestant) and barbiturates in his system. Vicky appeared on Good Morning America on Wednesday morning in her first televised interview since Cornell's death.
She echoed her previous sentiment that Chris loved his life and lived for his children. “Our family was his everything. As soon as he got offstage, he was a dad, he was a regular dad.”
Vicky noted Chris became a different person after he was prescribed a drug to deal with a serious shoulder injury. “Approximately a year before he died, he was prescribed a benzodiazepine to help him sleep,” said Vicky. “He had torn his shoulder … the pain in the shoulder was waking him up at night and it was keeping him up.” She started seeing signs of addiction creep up again, noting a nine-day period he took 33 pills.
“He had really delayed speech. He was forgetful,” she remembered. “The brain of someone who has a substance use disorder is different from that of … someone who doesn’t … He relapsed.”
Chris has been sober since 2003. He reached out to a friend in March 2017, admitting his relapse. Two months later he would be found dead.
Vicky has decided her mission in life is now to make people aware of the troubles of addiction and try to get rid of the stigma that surrounds it. "You think addiction is a choice, and it’s not. I think that if there was less stigma around it, more people would speak up. My husband was the furthest thing from a rock star junkie. He just wasn’t. He was the best husband, the greatest father. I lost my soulmate and the love of my life.”
Watch the segment below.
A few months ago, Cornell's duaghter Toni performed Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” with the band One Republic in tribute to her father Chris, and her godfather, Chester Bennington.
