[nututv]

Originally Posted by manaboutown

Sadly, he had some serious substance abuse issues.

Bourdain had been known for being an unrepentant drinker and smoker. In a nod to Bourdain's (at the time) two-pack-a-day cigarette habit, renowned chef Thomas Keller once served him a 20-course tasting menu which included a mid-meal "coffee and cigarette": a coffee custard infused with tobacco, together with a foie gras mousse.[84] Bourdain stopped cigarette smoking in the summer of 2007 because of the birth of his daughter.[85] He is also a former user of cocaine, heroin, and LSD. In Kitchen Confidential he wrote of his experience in a trendy SoHo restaurant in 1981: "We were high all the time, sneaking off to the walk-in refrigerator at every opportunity to 'conceptualize.' Hardly a decision was made without drugs. Cannabis, methaqualone, cocaine, LSD, psilocybin mushrooms soaked in honey and used to sweeten tea, secobarbital, tuinal, amphetamine, codeine and, increasingly, heroin, which we'd send a Spanish-speaking busboy over to Alphabet City to get."[86] In the same book, Bourdain frankly described his former addiction, including how he once resorted to selling his record collection on the street in order to raise enough money to purchase drugs.

He'd fought depression for a long time from what I've read. It's tough and obviously sometimes it wins. Selling your belongings for a fix, having a 2 pack a day smoking habit etc., well it has nothing to do with depression.