Matthew Perry was much more than an addict. Don’t let his death overshadow that | Poorna Bell

My late husband Rob was a heroin addict, but that does not define who he was. And nor should it for the Friends actor

When I heard the news about Matthew Perry, there was a moment of quiet, of inner collapse, like the moment a souffle gives up on itself. I wasn't thinking about Friends, and without wanting to sound like an emotionless sociopath, it's rare for the death of a celebrity I don't know to prompt anything more in me than the sadness felt about the loss of any life.

But I was thinking about his life viewed through the lens of addiction, and what he carried with him, and how it never left him. How his friends and family must have felt, having wanted the best life for him, having been caught in the maelstrom of chaos only to see his life snuffed out at the age of just 54. It is a feeling that only those who live with addiction themselves, or who love those who do, will know.