Rodin Eckenroth/FilmMagic(LOS ANGELES) — In a wide-ranging interview with ABC News’ Michael Strahan that aired today on Good Morning America, Charlie Sheen opened up about his public meltdown, and his diagnosis of HIV, the disease that causes AIDS.
“I feel like I’m carrying the torch for a lot of folks out there that are suffering from the same thing,” the former Two and a Half Men star explained.
“The day I was diagnosed, I immediately wanted to eat a bullet,” Sheen admitted. “But my mom was there, I wouldn’t do that in front of her, or let her find me to clean up that mess.”
“But then, something else came over me. They gave me a handful of pills and said, ‘You can go home now, and you’re going to live,'” Sheen said.
“If I was there with, you know, brain cancer or, or, a stomach thing, or some meningitis,” Sheen added, “We wouldn’t be sitting here right now.”
Sheen said he is “grateful” for the health care he has received since being diagnosed with the disease that effects more than 1.2 million people in the U.S., according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“I’m so grateful for what was available when it happened,” Sheen said, “and even more grateful for what’s available right now, when I’m, I’m in the middle of it, you know?”
Sheen added that some days, “are better than others,” but allows, “most days are pretty frickin’ cool.”
Sheen said that he has been a part of a Food and Drug Administration Study for a new HIV treatment, “a medication for a drug called PRO-140.” Sheen added the treatment is in the “late stages” of its trial, and, “very close to being approved.”
“It’s not this hideous cocktail that, that, that leads to so many side effects and, and just, just so much disdain, you know, emotionally and physically. It’s one shot a week, and there’s no side effects,” Sheen said.
The Major League actor went public with his HIV diagnosis in November 2015, four years after he was first diagnosed. Currently, he told Strahan that he feels “really good.”
After a four year film hiatus, Sheen will appear in Mad Families, a comedy about three families from different backgrounds forced to spend a vacation together.
The movie debuts on the streaming service Crackle on Thursday.
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