The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City offered an intimate moment between Mary Cosby and her son, Robert Jr., as he came clean about his substance abuse and mental health struggles.
“I’m taking Xanax,” Robert Jr., 21, said during the Wednesday, November 27, episode of RHOSLC. “I just take half to chill me out and then I had an Adderall to balance out the Xanax.”
Mary, 52, asked her son if he was “unhappy,” Robert Jr. explained that sometimes he feels like “life is just chicken unseasoned.”
“When I get high, it’s like adding seasoning to it,” he explained, revealing that this has been going on since he was 16 years old. Mary listened to her son through tears.
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“At first, I was like, ‘I’m going to just stick to natural stuff.’ Then, I went to a party, and someone gave me Xanax,” he recalled. “I started buying it. Then, I started doing Xanax with Acid and then Molly with Xanax. I really like Xanax so I mix it with everything. Xanax and cocaine.”
Robert Jr. continued, “You know the regular 30mg Oxys? I noticed … this was. like, a turning point for me. I was taking 10 at once and I couldn’t even feel it.”
Mary started crying, telling her son that she would never “judge” him.
“I can try and help you but you have to help yourself because I am not going to support it,” she said. “Do you accept that you’re having a problem?”
Mary shares Robert Jr. with husband Robert Cosby. In her confessional, she offered viewers insight into her son’s life — and how he’s changed.
“Robert was, like, the perfect child. He was very good in school, he got straight As. All the way up until he graduated,” she recalled. “When he set his mind to do something, he did it. He was, like, our prize. Very smart, very advanced. That’s the Robert I know. That’s the Robert I’m trying to reach.”
Mary said she was “disappointed” in herself. “I feel like I let him down somewhere,” she added, explaining that she thought he was only using marijuana. “I trusted him in my mind, thinking that’s where he would stop. I was clearly wrong. I missed the mark.”
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Robert Jr. also told Mary that “wanted to die” at one point in his life and Mary was the “only reason” he didn’t commit suicide.
“I just felt like a stain,” he said. “I just felt like this world wasn’t for me.”
Days before Wednesday’s RHOSLC episode aired, Mary offered an update on Robert Jr. while chatting with Us Weekly exclusively.
“He’s steady, which I think is good,” she shared. “It’s a heavy topic. But for me, because it all just came at once on me and I didn’t expect it, but I’m taking it day by day.”
The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City airs on Bravo Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET.
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org.
If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).
