Buff Bagwell was able to stay looking jacked while he was on “the stuff.” A lot of it.
Bagwell recently spoke with Chris Van Vliet about his sobriety journey in recent years. The former WCW star was well-known for his impressive physique, which earned him nicknames like “Buff the Stuff” and “Buffzilla.” He told Van Vliet that his addiction to prescription pills really escalated in 1998 after he broke his neck. It initially started with getting medication for the pain, but soon spiraled out of control.
When asked how he maintained his physique despite the injury and addiction, Buff Bagwell shockingly said it was thanks in part to his diet. At the time, Bagwell estimates that he was taking more than 50 pills and washing them down with a case of beer each day.
“I’m going to say something that nobody’s going to believe,” Bagwell said. “But in the height of the best I ever looked, it was a case of beer a day, and 20 Lortabs, without exaggeration, 15 to 20 Lortabs, and 30 to 35 Somas every day of my life. We just—a bodybuilder makes a really good drug addict or a really bad one, however you want to look at that, but it’s very organized.
“I had severe sleep apnea, and I wouldn’t sleep good,” he continued. “So when I woke up in the morning, again, I don’t feel good. I deserve this. So I would have my first party. I would take five or 10 Lortabs tabs, and eight to 10 Somas, party one and I did that kind of party on an empty stomach three times a day.”
Buff Bagwell knew he had a problem, but multiple rehab stays didn’t work
Bagwell says he went to rehab “five or six” times before he got things under control. He wasn’t totally sober, he noted, but says he “got a little bit of grip with it.”
“It was the closest I got to being sober in 2012, but when I had that car wreck in 2020 and I really had hurt myself that I couldn’t fix it, I was angry,” Buff Bagwell explained. “I was so mad at myself that I couldn’t fix this problem. I’d had other wrecks and knocked my teeth out, but fixed it. I would have a bad injury, but I fixed it. I couldn’t fix this one, so I fixed it by fixing me. I got sober.”
Bagwell went through some rough years, but says he’s been sober for three years and five months. Bagwell considers August 27, 2022, to be his “sobriety birthday.”
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