Thrown into the spotlight. Reporter so youre not high now. Nightline, lamar odom, the interview will be right back. Nightline, lamar odom, the interview, continues. Here now juju chang. This is the first time youve opened up with such a raw account of your struggles. Hopefully i can help some people. Its not a story just about the kardashians or drugs. Its really a story of triumph. Reporter for lamar odom, triumph on the court came naturally. He was a basketball virtuoso from an early age. A college phenom. 30 feet away, jumper in the air he got it reporter who became one of the nbas biggest superstars. Lamar odom. Reporter you could have been the best player of your generation. Probably so. Reporter he seemed to have it all. A booming career and a hit reality show with his famous wife khloe, part of the juggernaut kardashian clan. Reporter during that time when you were on those reality shows, were you hiding your drug use and sex addiction from khloe. Yeah. When youre married, you dont want your wife to know youre sniffing coke. Reporter sex, infidety and drugs. What was your drug of choice . Oh, cocaine. Reporter lamar was living a life full of dark secrets. How many women did you have sex with . I dont now. Jimmy you wrote 2,000. It was a lot. To put a number on it, that would be really narcissistic. Reporter how long do you think you were able to be faithful . Maybe months at a time. My marriage i was faithful for the first couple of years. Reporter it was a reckless path of selfdestruction that nearly cost him everything. Lamar odom is rushed to the hospital. On life support. Reporter the kardashians rushed to be at his bedside. He was knocking on deaths door. You had 12 seizures, six strokes. Can you fathom what youve been through . No, i really cant. My doctors say im a walking miracle. Reporter is your memory affectedpy t affected by the coma . Yeah. Reporter your bodys been through a lot. Ive played professional basketball since then. Reporter when was the last time you did cocaine . I cant even remember. I cant even remember. Its been a long time. Reporter so youre not high now. No, did i sniff cocaine before this interview . No. Theres no more coke in my system. Reporter how do i know youre telling the truth now . You will a you can do is believe me. If you dont, theres nothing i can do. Reporter you do still smoke weed. Yeah. Reporter when was the last time you smoked weed . Yesterday. Reporter now for the first time, lamar odom is sharing raw, intimate details about his triumphs and tragedies. You called the book from darkness to light. What does that mean . My grandmother always said what you do in the dark comes out in the light. Its dear to me. Reporter to understand lamar odom you need to go back to his childhood in queens, new york. His mother, kathy mercer was his guiding light. Unconditional love. Reporter his father joseph was a heroin addict. You wrote i didnt know it at the time, he was handing me a blueprint to follow and the things i hated him for i would become. Yeah. Reporter eventually, his mother left his father, she and a young lamar moved into his grandmothers house where they shared the same room. Are those some of your fondest memories . Yeah, waking up in the morning, smelling her breath. Sweet. Reporter when he was just 12 years old, that bright light dimmed. He remembers holding her hand as she lay dying of colon cancer. That was real hurtful. Reporter what happened to your heart that day . Well, it got heavy. Thats when i just kind of said like [ bleep ], really. It was one of the biggest mistakes of my life. Reporter despite his poor grades and dabbling in marijuana he became one of the most celebrated basketball players in the country. You are a hot commodity, as you say, women are throwing themselves as at you already. And yet you stick with your homeroom, high school sweetheart. What did she represent to you . Queens, my neighborhood high school. Even though the time apart, you know, i always felt connected to her. Reporter by the time he was 18, that girlfriend, liza, got pregnant. And destinys born. Yeah. Are. Reporter lamar jr. s born. Yeah. Time to be a man. Reporter what does that mean to you . Giving back, being accountable. Reporter he became a college hero for the university of rhode island, taking his school to the ncaa tournament with this buzzer beater. Lamar odom has won it for rhode island. I cant even compare it to anything. I was on top of the world that day. Reporter his dreams of reaching the nba well within reach. Lamar odom, from the university of rhode island. Looking forward to being an l. A. Clipper. Its going to be a great year. Cant wait to get to l. A. And start working out. I felt like i arrived. I just wish i had that moment with my mother. Reporter because on the outside youre on top of the world. And inside im hurt little boy still. Reporter but his memory blurred in a life of drugs and sex, thanks to a 63 Million Contract with the miami heat. He describes his first exposure to cocaine at the exclusive club in miami, he described having oral sex with a stranger. Like unleashing a demon. Reporter what candidate drug and sex do to you . I mean i want everything extreme. In extreme of course is too much. Reporter lamars drug use, a major hurdle between him and another pinnacle, the 2004 athens olympics. He already had two drug suspensions in the nba and had been smoking marijuana, qualifying for the olympics required a monitored urine sample. Lamars solution . A prosthetic penis. Me and my friend bought it, peed in it. Reporter clean urine. Yeah. Reporter and it worked . By any means necessary at that point. Reporter he was traded to the lakers, and liza got pregnant with their third child, jaden. But six months later, jaden was found dead in his crib from sudden infant death syndrome. When he passed i couldnt leave the hospital. I stayed there about three hours and sat with him. Reporter what was your reaction when your son died . Oh, shock. Crazy. Because i dont even think i still cried about that. Reporter he keeps his sons image close to his heart. What made you want to do a tattoo . Or something i cant forget. And s face every day. Yeah. Reporter still reeling from the loss of his son he eventually met the woman who changed his life forever. Khloe. Reporter you end up in a hotel room. Mmhm. Reporter and she refuses to have sex with you. Yeah, thats a true story. Reporter and you talk for five hours. Probably one of the first women who said no, im not going to have sex with you. Its crazy. Khloe has the same eyes as my mother. When i first met her, i was kind of put in a trance by that. I didnt really know who that was. Reporter they got engaged within a month of dating. Nine days later think were married. More than 3 Million People tuned in to watch their wedding on keeping up with the kardashians. You are husband and wife. Reporter tell me what it was like being on camera, keeping up with the kardashians, paparazzi reporter you did . Yeah. The red carpet is rolled out for you everywhere you go. Whats not to love about that . Reporter but lamar says he wasnt faithful to khloe, he would often pay strippers for sex. Why is that . Kind of like paying for privacy. Reporter khloe and her family declined to comment. During their marriage, he says his drug use became rampant. The book also describes an incident where youre in your man cave, and you basically have a freak out. You were on ecstasy and coke. I was sure that people were coming for me. You were paranoid. I took a golf club and swung away. I began smashing the walls to find them. I was going to expletive find you i scream. Khloe walks in, and you say to her, ill expletive kill you. You dont know what im capable of. Yeah, im pretty sure she had to be scared. Im thinking about it now, like i couldnt believe how i was treating that queen like that. Reporter do you feel like you owe her an apology . Yeah, her and her family. Reporter khloe filed for divorce after six years of marriage. She at that point kicked you to the curb. Yeah, she took care of me, in my house i had everything i wanted or needed. So it was like a kid being kicked out of his house. Reporter a 12 year old losing his mother to cancer. Again. Yeah. Reporter a heartbroken lamar was struggling to regain his nba glory, lamar hided to the love rank, a brothel near los angeles. Las vegas. You just wanted to escape. Yeah. Reporter he says he spent a long weekend there but just slept for most of it. On the fourth day he was found unconscious in his room. Blood coming out his nose. White stuff coming out of his mouth. Reporter by all rights, you took lethal doses of whatever substance it was. I didnt take drugs that night, that day. Reporter you dont have any memory of taking drugs. I didnt. Reporter you dont have much memory of any of it. Honest truth, i didnt take drugs that day. I didnt sniff cocaine that day or do anything else. Reporter how could it be that you didnt do drugs that night . Somebody may have slipped me something. Reporter you were drinks. I was drinks. Reporter conscious of that. But i know i didnt do drugs. Reporter he was rushed to Sunrise Hospital in a coma, 12 seizures and six strokes, his lungs collapsed, his kidneys ruptured. You write maybe i wanted that, but it wasnt important. Do you think sub consciously you wanted to end it all, to kill yourself . No. Hell no. Reporter hell no. I understand you cross that line theres no coming back. Up next, lamar desperately fighting his demons, trying to find a way out of addiction when we come back. That trap odors and release them back into the room. 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Reporter it was the fall of 2015, and lamar odoms estranged wife, Khloe Kardashian flew to his side as he lay on the precipice of death. Its horrible. Reporter khloe had taken control of all of lamars medical decisions. Lets me know i did something right. Reporter even kim kardashian, who was seven months pregnant was sleeping in your room. Yeah, that shows you the strength of their family. Reporter lamars two children and liza rushed to the hospital. His daughter destiny tells us they were prepared to say goodbye. How did you get the news of the incident . I think we found out from tmz actually, a family friend called us and was like, are you okay . Like heard lamars on life support. And were like, what . Reporter how does that hit you, though, to hear that thats how she heard and thats how she came . Thats [ bleep ]. I mean, thats [ bleep ] that she had to find out like that. Reporter what was it like seeing your father in that hospital room . Pretty traumatic. Thought it was going to be my last moments with him. I just told him that i need him to be here, to be present with me. And just to fight. Reporter he said sometime after hearing their voices he opened his eyes. They told me when i woke up, i was pulling the tubes out of my throat, and i get up and i cant walk, cant talk. Reporter you have to start all over again. [ bleep ] myself like a baby. There was a moment when lamar couldnt really express himself and couldnt really talk but he could hear what we were saying to him. And kanye thought we can cure him through music. We can get him to talk. He would go to the hospital and rap and sing, and i think lamar started to get his function back and started to talk once he started to listen to a lot of music. Youre doing so well good job reporter what was it like watching him fight back . It was amazing. Scary at first. But at least he was still alive. Still fighting. Thats all that matters. Reporter and even though you went through all that, it still took a while to convince you to go into rehab. What made you finally decide, okay. My daughter. Reporter do you remember what you said . I basically told him if he didnt go to rehab i wouldnt talk to him anymore. It was tough for the both of us. For the both of us. It was much needed. Im glad it happened. Im glad she pulled up the courage to tell her old man that. Reporter he spent 30 days in rehab at that casa palmera. Do you think 30 days is enough, though . It depends on what they do after rehab. Reporter because tmz had video of you collapsing in a nightclub. It was hot. Reporter you hadnt relapsed . No. When youre in the public eye, and you have an incident [ bleep ] is easy to believe. Reporter so you dont do drugs, but you drink still . I still have a beverage, even though thats not my drug of choice. Reporter and strip clubs . I enjoy a strip club. Reporter and yet youre a sex addict. Yeah. Reporter im just pointing that out. Mmhm. Reporter mmhm. Are you still in love with khloe . I mean you get married to someone after 30 days, i dont think that ever, you know what im saying, leave, but i try to be rational. Reporter thats a yes, isnt it . I just try to be rational. Reporter do you stay in touch . Ive spoken to her. Not too long ago. Reporter as for khloe, she recently addressed her relationship with lamar on the podcast divorce sucks. Every now and then theres no like issues. Bad blood. Theres no bad blood. It just didnt work out. And i think hes an incredible person. And i just want the best for him. But theres no negative anything. Reporter but, as lamar continues his recovery, its another woman paving the way. I would say every day is a step at a time. Just keep fighting. Like he did in the hospital. Every day is a new struggle, new chapter. Reporter do you forgive him . Yeah. You have to. In order to move on, just for yourself. You have to forgive. Reporter have you forgiven yourself . Really and truly . Or do you still beat yourself up . I think i still beat myself up. Reporter if somebody came to you with a reality show, would you do it . In a heartbeat. Reporter you would. There is a lot about being in the limelight, right . I dont think i can escape the limelight. Lets do it. [ sniffing ] come on. This summer, add a new member to the family. Hurry into the mercedesbenz summer event today for exceptional offers. Lease the glc 300 suv for just 419 a month at the mercedesbenz summer event. Going on now. Did you know you can save money by using dish soap to clean grease on more than dishes . Try dawn ultra. Dawn is for more than just dishes. With 3x more grease cleaning power per drop, it tackles tough grease on a variety of surfaces. Try dawn ultra. Depend® fitflex underwear for all day fun. Features maximum absorbency, ultra soft fabric and new beautiful designs for your best comfort and protection guaranteed. 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