WWE Hall Of Famer Brutus Beefcake Details Past Struggles With Opioid Addiction

WWE Hall of Famer Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake is one of the countless wrestlers that struggled with addiction to opiates over the course of his life. The hard-hitting history of professional wrestling is tragically packed with pain pills, and Beefcake credits his wife with keeping him on the straight and narrow for the past twelve years.

"She saved me," Beefcake confessed on "Stories with Brisco and Bradshaw" recently. "It's like I said in the Hall of Fame speech, she saved me. She did. She got me off opiates ... my best friends are all gone ... 20 guys, all gone from opiates." According to Beefcake, he's been sober for 12 years and "never went back" after 25 years of substance abuse. "I didn't take 'em every day," Beefcake admitted, "but we were on the road every day and wrestling every day, so if you got 'em, what are you gonna do? You're gonna take 'em."

Beefcake was infamously hooked on opioids after a parasailing accident left him with a broken face. Beefcake was hit in the face by the legs of a girl, a guest of B. Brian Blair, who was parasailing at the time. Beefcake was in charge of manning the line for the parasail, when he ended up in the water, caught between the boat and the girl. "At 35 miles it hit me so hard, it disintegrated my face," Beefcake once said of the accident. Doctors initially believed he'd never wrestle again, but Beefcake proved them wrong, continuing to wrestle for roughly 20 years and finally retiring in November 2015.

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Stories with Brisco and Bradshaw" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.