Why Jodie Sweetin Tried So Hard to Be 'Worse' Than Everyone Else After 'Full House' Ended

Following her career as a child star on the family sitcomFull House,Jodie Sweetin has been candid about her personal struggles, specifically addiction, that occurred after the show came to an end in 1995.

Sweetin recently opened up about the years following Full House‘s cancellation during the June 16 episode of actor Michael Rosenbaum‘s podcast,Inside of You. Sweetin, who began starring as Stephanie Tanner when she was just five, explained that she didn’t want her high school classmates to think she believed she was better than them. The mother of two said that she began to exhibit unsafe behaviors to show that she wasn’t conceited or pretentious.

“I had this weird, I’ll say, I had this, particularly after the show ended, like, in high school there was this strange feeling that I had, because everyone assumed I was quote unquote a TV star. So, like, you know the rumor before you would even start at a school was like, ‘Oh she’s a stuck up b—h,'” said Sweetin in the podcast interview. “I wanted to prove them wrong. So it was like, in order to make myself palatable and make other people feel like I wasn’t trying to be better than them, I would try to be worse than them. So like, ‘I don’t think I’m better than you. I’ll get more f–ked up.'”

The actress, who reprised her role as Stephanie in the 2016 five-season Netflix reboot Fuller House, said she continued to act this way until she was in her “mid-30s.” According to Sweetin, she ended up making “a mess of relationships” and got “involved with really severely toxic, scary people.”

“You keep going, and then that becomes who you are, you know. I spent most of my life through my, probably, mid-30s being like, ‘Do you love me? Do you love me?'” recalled Sweetin while recording the Inside of You episode.

Jodie Sweetin Discussed Her Decision to Be Sober in 2021

Sweetin discussed her decision to get sober in a 2021 episode ofSteve-O‘s podcast,Steve-O’s Wild Ride!. Sweetin, now 44, said that she didn’t believe she would have lived to see her 30th birthday.

“The fact that I made it out of the situations that I often put myself in, in one piece, is pretty remarkable. I count my blessings, for sure,” said Sweetin.

She also said that she “stopped drinking and using drugs” around 2009, but “had relapsed after [she] got in a car accident,” which resulted in a broken arm and an injured neck, in 2011. Sweetin said that she began taking the muscle relaxer carisoprodol and began using it “inappropriately.” She clarified that her issues with carisoprodol only “lasted a month” before she chose to stay abstinent from drugs and alcohol again.