{"id":17919,"date":"2026-03-11T05:21:01","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T05:21:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/uncategorized\/dave-coulier-the-gift-of-sobriety\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T06:04:41","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T06:04:41","slug":"dave-coulier-the-gift-of-sobriety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/dave-coulier-the-gift-of-sobriety\/","title":{"rendered":"Dave Coulier: The Gift of Sobriety"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media-youtube-player\"><iframe class=\"media-youtube-player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_kDW4cgNEP8?autoplay=1&amp;mute=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>There is a common belief that comedians use humor to deal with or even cover up pain they can\u2019t otherwise process. That may be true in some cases. I\u2019ve known a few comics like that. But not me. I became a <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/wisdom-from-the-late-comedian-garry-shandling\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">comedian <\/a>because I loved to make people laugh. It made me feel good, and it made the audience feel good. That\u2019s a pretty great gig to have in life, a blessing I\u2019m grateful for every day.<\/p>\n<p>But I also fell in love with something else: drinking. I\u2019ve been sober now for two years and counting, two years in which I\u2019ve suffered three of the <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/better-living\/emotional-and-mental-health\/honoring-the-process-of-grief-and-loss\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">most devastating losses of my life<\/a> in quick succession. How did I survive those blows to the heart without alcohol? That\u2019s what I\u2019m here to talk about.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"image\" style=\"float: right;\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" size-full wp-image-86651\" src=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/gp_oct_nov2022_coverembed.jpg\" alt=\"Dave Coulier on the cover of the Sept-Oct Guideposts\" width=\"252\" height=\"324\" \/><figcaption>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <em>As seen in the Sept-Oct 2022<br \/>\n<\/em>Guideposts<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Back in the sixties, in St. Clair Shores, Michigan\u2014a town north of Detroit along Lake St. Clair, right across from Canada, near what we Michiganders call the thumb (if you think of the state as a left-handed mitten)\u2014drinking was just a part of life. Growing up in \u201cHockeytown,\u201d we kids would play in a <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/prayer\/true-stories-of-answered-prayer\/a-hockey-players-prayer\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">hockey game<\/a>, then go out for pizza afterward, the parents knocking back pitchers of beer. No one objected when they poured us a little glass. <em>Wow, cool, <\/em>we thought. <em>We\u2019re just like the grown-ups.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Eight or nine years old and <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/too-young-to-be-an-alcoholic\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">we\u2019d pour ourselves<\/a> a gin and Squirt at a wedding reception, so much Squirt in there you could hardly taste the gin. No one said, \u201cHey, what are you kids doing here at the bar?\u201d No one even objected. As far as I could tell, drunks were funny. A source of laughter.<\/p>\n<p>I used to love watching actor Foster Brooks do his drunken act on <em>The Tonight Show <\/em>or with Dean Martin, inviting Martin to join his own version of A.A. called Alcoholics Unanimous. Who knew they performed completely sober? Nobody can act that perfectly drunk if they\u2019re actually intoxicated, except for maybe W. C. Fields.<\/p>\n<p>I went to Catholic schools all the way through high school and, like a good Michigander, played on the hockey team. Win or lose, we\u2019d celebrate with <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/4-tips-to-help-protect-your-kids-from-drugs\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">some drinking<\/a> while the adults looked the other way. In a big Catholic family like mine, when all the aunts and uncles and cousins got together, they told jokes\u2014and drank, my uncle Dick doing a killer Rodney Dangerfield, complete with the tie tugging and other tics. He had it down cold, even the material.<\/p>\n<p>My family was tight-knit and supportive, in part I think because of my younger brother, Dan, who struggled with <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/coping-with-illness\/do-you-know-someone-living-with-mental-illness\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">mental illness<\/a>. Dan was the funniest person I\u2019ve ever known. We started doing impressions when we were kids, trading funny voices back and forth from our bunk beds each night. He had this laugh that was so pure and infectious. I sometimes think it was his laugh that ignited in me the desire to <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/a-creative-leap-of-faith\/\">make people laugh<\/a>. I loved to make Dan laugh.<\/p>\n<p>I had two buddies who were really funny. From fifth grade on, the three of us would get up at hockey banquets and do impressions and jokes. I sharpened my comedic skills in high school. I started working in comedy clubs at age 19 and moved to Los Angeles. Drugs were rampant back then. I was never a druggie though. Just liked to drink. It never seemed to get in the way of things. I worked hard.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/comic-michael-colyar-on-how-his-mother\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Comedians <\/a>are basically writers. Storytellers. Every joke is a story. A lot happens before you actually get in front of the mic. You write and refine your material, try it out, refine it some more until you get that magic you want: laughter.<\/p>\n<p>I moved up in the business. I was a writer, actor, director and eventually a star on a hit television series, your classic highly functional \u201cfriendly\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/hope-for-alcohol-addiction-knowing-the\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">alcoholic<\/a>. I\u2019d gotten my pilot\u2019s license as a teenager, and I even got my instrument rating in L.A.\u2014careful to take a three-day hiatus from the sauce before I ever flew. Didn\u2019t that mean I could control it? What was so alcoholic about that?<\/p>\n<p>Bob Saget was a close pal even before we worked together in <em>Full House. <\/em>I slept on the couch at his apartment in L.A. during the struggling years when I was looking for a place to live. We made each other laugh, trying out jokes on each other. When he was cast as <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/entertainment\/movies-and-tv\/13-greatest-tv-dads-of-all-time\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the dad in <\/a><em><a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/entertainment\/movies-and-tv\/13-greatest-tv-dads-of-all-time\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Full House<\/a> <\/em>with me as his helpful buddy, it was such a gift, running for almost 200 episodes.<\/p>\n<p>I liked to say it was a show about \u201ca G-rated <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/delilah-has-love-to-spare\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dysfunctional family<\/a>,\u201d but offstage, off camera, there was nothing dysfunctional about us. There was support, love, affection, respect. If I saw any pictures of myself at an afterparty, I looked happy. The last guy standing. I was the \u201cfinal, final\u201d guy. Drunk but happy. Making everybody laugh.<\/p>\n<p>When did I cross that line from life-of-the-party drunk to out-of-control <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/how-recovery-from-alcohol-addiction-impacts-relationships\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">alcoholic<\/a>? When did I see that I was paying a price for this? About five years ago, I started to see the red flags. I wasn\u2019t remembering things. Blacking out, falling. \u201cI\u2019m really worried about you,\u201d my wife, Melissa, would say. By then, we\u2019d been together for more than a decade, and she knew me better than anyone.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCome on,\u201d I\u2019d say, \u201cI\u2019ve been doing this my whole life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYeah,\u201d she\u2019d say, \u201cthat\u2019s what I\u2019m worried about.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I loved booze. But it had stopped loving me back.<\/p>\n<p>One day, staying at a friend\u2019s house in Arizona\u2014Melissa wasn\u2019t there\u2014I fell during a drunken stupor. I took a picture of myself, my face a bloody mess. \u201cYou\u2019re going to have to show Melissa this,\u201d my friend said, \u201cbefore she sees you.\u201d I texted it to her, then got her on the phone. <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/she-asked-god-for-help-with-her-husbands-addiction\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">I heard her crying<\/a>. That\u2019s when I knew: <em>I have a problem. A real problem.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Christmas and New Year\u2019s were coming up. All those parties. I\u2019d wait till the end of the year and start 2020 sober. The drinking would be over on January 1. Never again. Not a drop. \u201cYeah, sure,\u201d I could hear people say. \u201cWe\u2019ll believe it when we see it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In my mind, I heard that old W. C. Fields line: \u201cNow don\u2019t say you can\u2019t swear off drinking. It\u2019s easy. I\u2019ve done it a thousand times.\u201d Yet I was determined, as determined as I had ever been about anything. <em>No. More. Alcohol. <\/em>I\u2019d promised Melissa. How hard could it actually be when I was that committed?<\/p>\n<p><em>Hard. <\/em>One of the <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/how-this-country-music-singer-overcame-alcohol-addiction\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">hardest things I\u2019d ever done<\/a>, my body in torment, completely cold turkey. I trembled. I sweat. I knew the only thing that would make me feel better was a drink. But only for the short term. This was long-term. Not till March did I share the news on Instagram. Letting the world know. No secrets. Dave Coulier was sober now.<\/p>\n<p>As painful proof of my past, I shared that photo of me looking like all hell. If I fell again, it wasn\u2019t going to be because I was drunk. Clumsy maybe or from an accidental stick or puck during pickup hockey, but not stumbling drunk.<\/p>\n<p>I couldn\u2019t have done it without the support of Melissa and friends like Bob. I also called on something deeper, a part of me that had almost gone dormant, a faith from within, my <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/prayer\/inspirational-prayers\/need-love\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">spiritual DNA<\/a>. It was always there, that inner fire\u2014ready to keep me warm, give me light\u2014but I\u2019d almost forgotten. I began throwing logs on that fire, keeping those spiritual flames burning, a blaze that cast far more light than alcohol ever did, a healing, life-renewing light.<\/p>\n<p>Melissa and I had moved back to Michigan, to be closer to family. My mom had passed, but my brother, Dan, was living with and helping take care of Dad, who wasn\u2019t doing so well. Dan was incredibly funny, funnier and more talented than me. And suffering for all those years from <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/better-living\/emotional-and-mental-health\/10-inspiring-stories-about-managing-mental-illness\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">mental illness<\/a>. Each day was a battle for him. I knew the darkness that was always at the edge of that wonderful laugh.<\/p>\n<p>I was the one who found him. In the basement of the house where we\u2019d grown up, Dad\u2019s house. It shocked me like nothing I ever knew could. Life gone, dead. I called 911, but it was too late. Had there been anything more I could have done? It\u2019s the first thing a person asks as the guilt closes in.<\/p>\n<p>I wondered how I should share the news. <em><a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/prayer\/prayers-for-strength\/prayers-for-comfort-after-a-death-by-suicide\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Death by suicide<\/a>. <\/em>I had come out about my drinking. I would be honest with this. On social media, I posted a picture of Dan and me in Western costume with Mom, taken a couple years before. And <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/coping-with-illness\/talking-with-love-and-understanding-about-suicide\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">told the truth<\/a>. In sharing, I could only hope that others, people whose families had such tragic stories, would know they weren\u2019t alone.<\/p>\n<p>I would not have had the courage to say all that if I hadn\u2019t been sober. The pain, at times, was unbearable. Drinking would have buried the pain. But it also would have buried the love. That grief, that pain, is the price we pay for love. It drove me to call on that fire of faith more than ever.<\/p>\n<p>It was shortly after my father went into assisted living that a second blow came, one I could not have imagined. Bob Saget\u2019s death. My mind recoiled. It simply wasn\u2019t possible. He was out on the road, doing comedy. We\u2019d just been texting each other that day, sharing jokes and making each other laugh. I\u2019d told him to have a great show.<\/p>\n<p>Later that night, he died in his hotel room of head trauma. He\u2019d hit his head before going to bed. He died in his sleep, which can happen if a concussion causes bleeding in the brain. Bob probably thought it was nothing. He was just looking forward to his next show.<\/p>\n<p>John Stamos was the one who called and told me that Bob was gone. The shock, the horror of it, was immense. For too many years, decades of drinking, I had<a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/5-key-steps-to-staying-sober-during-a-crisis\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> sheltered myself from addressing sorrow<\/a> like this. Not now. I felt pain as I never had before, and I had to deal with it on many levels: psychologically, emotionally, spiritually. But I felt human too, more human than I had ever realized.<\/p>\n<p>Was I angry at God? You bet. \u201cWhy am I getting punched in the face like this?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n<p>I think the answer was that I was finally ready for it, finally in a place no matter how painful that I could deal with it honestly, feel not just the hurt but the love without the haze of alcohol. The pain was a gift. But, boy, did I ever pick a time to get sober.<\/p>\n<p>I was talking to God. Not ignoring him. Not running away from faith any more than running away from the pain. I would look at the sky and go, \u201cHey, is it my turn? Are you kidding me?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I would hear, \u201cOf course, I\u2019m kidding you. You\u2019re a comedian.\u201d I needed this. I would laugh, cry, get angry and feel the loss, truly feel it. This is what being human is. <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/addiction-and-recovery\/why-acceptance-is-a-big-part-of-recovery\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">This is what sober is<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>God wasn\u2019t done with me. My father was dying. A person who had been there every day that I\u2019d been alive. I held my dad\u2019s hand at the assisted living facility, Melissa by my side. He was in hospice care\u2014the final part of his journey here on Earth.<\/p>\n<p>I looked into his eyes and told him <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/entertainment\/music\/guideposts-classics-tennessee-ernie-ford-honors-father\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">how proud I was that he was my father<\/a>. He was a blue-collar guy who put all four of his kids through private school. He sacrificed. He loved us. And now I told him how much I loved him.<\/p>\n<p>Afterward, I felt this huge opening up, a new perspective, a whole new appreciation for the smallest things in life. I could lie on the grass and look at the sky, the way I did as a kid, and gaze at the clouds with wonder.<\/p>\n<p>You realize how short life is and <a href=\"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/health-and-wellness\/life-advice\/finding-life-purpose\/make-the-most-of-your-gift\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">how precious it is<\/a>. How beautiful. And, yes, how funny. That\u2019s one big way we deal with it all. Humor as salvation.<\/p>\n<p>I still love to make people laugh, to connect with audiences I usually don\u2019t know and make them feel something. It\u2019s the most genuine thing I know. I help them feel human, and whether they realize it or not, they make me feel human too.<\/p>\n<p><em>For more inspiring stories, subscribe to <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.shopguideposts.org\/magazines\/guideposts-magazine.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Guideposts Magazine<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There is a common belief that comedians use humor to deal with or even cover up pain they can\u2019t otherwise process. That may be true in some cases. I\u2019ve known a few comics like that. But not me. I became a comedian because I loved to make people laugh. It made me feel good, and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27640,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[193,192,136],"tags":[194,74,171,166,79,196,80],"ppma_author":[1757],"class_list":["post-17919","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-addiction-and-recovery","category-health-and-wellness","category-positive-living","tag-addiction","tag-dogs","tag-earth-angel","tag-grief","tag-healing","tag-recovery","tag-stories-of-hope"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.6 (Yoast SEO v27.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Dave Coulier: The Gift of Sobriety - Guideposts Articles<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Dave Coulier: The Gift of Sobriety\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There is a common belief that comedians use humor to deal with or even cover up pain they can\u2019t otherwise process. 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