Bachelor alum Ben Higgins is coming out with a new tell-all book that sheds light on his personal struggles.
And on Tuesday the 31-year-old reality TV staple revealed one of the darkest aspects of his life: at one point he was addicted to painkillers.
‘The final piece of my dark puzzle fell into place when I started to treat people like objects that existed for my pleasure,’ he wrote as he described using a woman only for sex. And he touched on the ‘shame and darkness’ he felt at the time.
His truth: Bachelor alum Ben Higgins is coming out with a new tell-all book that sheds light on his personal struggles
He first started using painkillers when he was playing football in high school. Higgins suffered a knee injury and needed surgery so he was prescribed painkillers.
Once he started taking the pills, he felt he could not stop.
And it made his world crumble.
He did not get into the college he wanted to. His pain was compounded when his girlfriend from high school cheated on him. And then his father became ill.
‘Getting off the painkillers became even more difficult when a different kind of pain hit,’ he wrote.
Recovered: And on Tuesday the 31-year-old reality TV staple revealed one of the darkest aspects of his life: at one point he was addicted to painkillers. Seen in 2016
And he said it changed his personality for the worse, often feeling selfish and ‘dark.’
‘The final piece of my dark puzzle fell into place when I started to treat people like objects that existed for my pleasure.’
In one part of the book he said he slept with a woman when high and did not show her enough respect, adding he treated like ‘an object for my pleasure.’
‘When it was over, I discarded her. I didn’t care about her story or her desire for a relationship that wasn’t just physical and lasted longer than one night. I didn’t care that I’d hurt her. All I cared about was myself,’ he wrote.
He was on the pills for a four month period.
He has come a long way: In high school he had heartache and his dad was sick; he said he got the pain pills after a knee injury
Then he woke up to reality.
‘When I made eye contact with myself, I felt like the devil himself was staring back at me,’ he said about looking in the mirror one day.
”Oh, God,’ I said out loud. ‘Who is this? This is not the man I ever wanted to be.”
Ben added, ‘I really meant the words, ‘Oh, God.’ It was the first prayer I’d prayed in a very long time — and maybe the most honest prayer I’d ever uttered. … I confessed to God how empty my life had become and how I did not want to stay on this path. ‘If you are real,’ I cried, ‘save me from myself.”
Family first: With Lauren Bushnell on After The Final Rose; host Chris Harrison is far right; seen in 2016
They meant well: Ben also shared that he fell for Lauren on the show, but when the fantasy dates ended and it was real life, things shifted; seen in 2016
The star also dipped into his previous dating life.
His first on screen girlfriend was Kaitlyn Bristowe whom he appeared with on The Bachelorette for season 11 in 2015. She dropped him after he admitted he feels like the outsider often.
‘Her rejection only confirmed my outsider feelings even more,’ he wrote.
‘A few months later the entire world (or at least the fans of the show) watched my moment of vulnerability play out, complete with added background music.
‘Then something very surprising happened. … My words must have connected with all the outsiders out there, because one person after another wrote to tell me that they, too, struggled with feeling unlovable.’
He then dated Lauren Bushnell on The Bachelor.
‘The fantasy level for those dates was off the charts,’ he shared.
‘As we got to know each other outside of the fantasy dates of The Bachelor, we both started to realize that this perfect fit wasn’t nearly as perfect as we once believed,’ he shared.
And they had to work hard ‘at even the basics of our relationship.’
‘At times we had trouble talking. … Something just felt off, not at all what two people who were supposed to be madly in love with each other should feel,’ he wrote. There was ‘tension and pain.’
Then came the spinoff Lauren: Happily Ever After? which had eight episodes.
‘The producers added the question mark because they sensed there was trouble in paradise. By the time Happily Ever After? came along, there wasn’t a lot of joy left in our relationship,’ Higgins wrote.
‘Neither of us was happy, but we were still doing our best to make the relationship work.’
They went to couple’s therapy and counseling.
‘Yet, no matter how many steps forward we took, it seemed something would hit us, and we’d be right back to confusion and doubt.
‘By the end we were barely speaking. The breakup itself came over the phone. If you wonder how you can end an engagement with a phone call, believe me when I say that both of us preferred it that way.
‘Neither of us needed another tortured, face-to-face conversation about our relationship,’ he wrote. ‘It was like our time on the show never really ended. At least, not the bad part. When the time came finally to throw in the towel, doing it in a phone call felt far healthier for both of us.’
Pause: Higgins says that it’s been ‘hard’ for his fiance Jess Clarke to deal with postponing their wedding; seen in 2020
And when he saw her in New York City just after the split, he avoided her: ‘Two days after ending an engagement with a woman I once thought I’d live happily ever after with, I was happier hiding behind a street corner in New York than making eye contact with her in a crosswalk.’
Now he is engaged to Jessica Clarke. ‘Outside of the television fantasy world, I no longer had any idea what a good date looked like, much less a perfect one like I’d want to arrange. And yet, I had met this amazing woman I couldn’t stop thinking about, and I didn’t know what to do. I felt like I’d set a certain standard on television, and I was sure she’d be disappointed if dating me outside of that world didn’t live up to it. That fear left me frozen.’
The duo pushed back their nuptials announcing their engagement in March of 2020 and later revealing they were waiting until they get married to go all the way.
Bad timing: The couple were engaged in March, just as the pandemic began to take hold; seen in 2020
And Ben is eager to get hitched telling People: ‘I mean, it’s been a year push back now. I’m making this commitment that I’ve been ready to make with her for a long time and it just keeps getting pushed back.’
Higgins said he’s being leaving the bulk of the planning to Jess, who he said is having a ‘hard’ time with all the uncertainty.
‘I think for Jessica it has been really hard,’ Higgins said. ‘I think the hard part is just having in the back of your head, like, ‘We could plan on this thing, and it could maybe not happen. It could be changed completely.’
‘That’s tough. It’s also trying to plan it so that grandparents can come, hopefully, and that way they can be there to celebrate with us. I think that’s the part that is the most stressful, just not knowing.’
Unlucky: ‘It hasn’t been ideal for us over the last year,’ Higgins admitted; seen in 2020
The pair are also ready to tie the knot so they can consummate the relationship, previously revealing their decision to wait until their wedding night to have sex.
‘It hasn’t been ideal for us over the last year,’ Higgins admitted.
‘Because obviously, like I said, plans have changed pretty drastically over the last year. This wasn’t a part of our plan, to wait for a year and a half. It had to happen due to COVID.’
The couple announced their engagement at the end of March, right as coronavirus lockdowns began to sink in as the new normal.
While they had originally planned on a fall 2020 wedding, they’re now aiming for November of this year.
During The Ben and Ashley I Almost Famous Podcast last July the Warsaw, Indiana native said: ‘We don’t have an exact date yet; we’re finalizing the location of it.’
‘But I do believe that it will be in November of 2021 that we will be getting married.’