Former NBA champion Lamar Odom sheds light on addiction, recovery, and spiritual discovery in a candid new documentary on Netflix. Debuting on March 31, “Untold: The Death & Life of Lamar Odom” provides unvarnished details about his near-fatal overdose in a Nevada brothel in 2015. The 46-year-old former Laker shares startling accounts of his battle with drugs, his high-profile marriage, and his brush with death.
In 2009, while at the pinnacle of his career with the Los Angeles Lakers, Odom married Khloé Kardashian. He freely acknowledges that he embraced the Kardashian lifestyle and the celebrity status that came with it. However, within a few years, a deepening addiction to cocaine and crack cocaine caused his life to spiral. He admitted to freebasing the drug, a method that results in a more potent and hazardous high.
In the documentary, Khloé discloses how she unintentionally became an “enabler,” often finding him in hotel rooms and alleyways. Drug paraphernalia, including spoons and tinfoil, became a common sight in their home. At just 24 years old, Khloé felt trapped, as Lamar suggested that losing him would mean losing everything. To protect his reputation, she spent years concealing his addiction from the public.
Before his near-fatal overdose, Khloé organized a professional intervention. She was advised to give Lamar a three-month deadline to enter rehab or face divorce. When confronted, Lamar chose his addiction. Khloé recalls him requesting a swift divorce, stating, “All I want is my passport.”
Despite the ultimatum, Khloé rushed to his bedside just weeks later when he was found unconscious at a Nevada brothel.
Lamar sustained severe medical trauma following the incident, suffering six heart attacks and twelve strokes before falling into a coma. Doctors informed his family that his survival through the first night was a miracle. Upon waking, Odom required intensive rehabilitation to relearn how to walk, speak, and perform basic tasks. Khloé remained by his side at Cedars-Sinai Hospital daily for four months to support his recovery.
“I was such an enabler without knowing I was an enabler. I just felt such a responsibility to cover this up, hold it together, and protect him,” Khloé Kardashian shared, reflecting on the weight of managing his secret addiction.