Michael Douglas Refused Group Therapy for Son's Addiction

Michael Douglas has revealed that he declined to participate in group therapy sessions with his son Cameron during his struggles with drug addiction. The actor, 82, described his relationship with his eldest son, now 47, as having gone through a "really rough time."

Cameron Douglas battled drug abuse, including a heroin addiction in his twenties, and in 2010 was sentenced to five years in prison for federal drug trafficking and distribution charges. Michael Douglas funded his son's defense team but had been estranged from him for years and refused to write to him during his incarceration.

Douglas discussed his journey with his son in his newly released memoir, "One Helluva Ride." He stated that while he does "everything you can for your kids," he also lost a half-brother, Eric, to an overdose in 2004. He contrasted his approach with that of his own father, Kirk Douglas, who attended family therapy sessions for Eric's addiction.

"To watch your own father be in his eighties, dealing with group therapy sessions with his son?" Michael Douglas questioned in an interview with The Sunday Times. "I said I'm not going to do that. I said I'm not going to go into my seventies and eighties going to rehab sessions."

He added, "I love my kids, but you know, I have an entitlement to a right to live a life."

Douglas, who is now close to Cameron and has two younger children with his second wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones, also detailed past personal revelations in his memoir. He admitted to having an affair with his "Romancing the Stone" co-star Kathleen Turner while married to his first wife, Diandra Luker. He stated that his marriage was in a difficult place at the time, and both he and Luker were involved in extramarital affairs. Their marriage eventually ended in divorce in 2000, and Douglas married Zeta-Jones the same year.