Denise Richards has vowed to "always" be there for Charlie Sheen.
Denise Richards
The 44-year-old actress has daughters Sam, 11, and Lola, nine with her former husband - who announced on Tuesday (17.11.15) that he is HIV positive - and in an interview just days before, she insisted that she and Charlie are "at peace" after years of ups and downs.
Appearing on the podcast, 'Allegedly With Theo Von and Matthew Cole Weiss', Denise said: "[It's] up and down. I'm always here [for him,] but he's an addict. I believe we move past your s**t. Don't sweat the small stuff. For better or worse, he's going to be in my life for the rest of my life so I personally like to keep the peace."
Denise and Charlie fell in love and married during a sober period of his life and she admitted his relapse took a toll on their relationship.
She said: "Charlie, when I married him, he wasn't a bad boy. He was sober for almost four years. He was a very different person. His lifestyle was very, very different. He was a former bad boy, I guess.
"I have a lot of empathy for anyone that struggles with addiction. I'm not going to judge the choices they made under the influence. I can only judge the person I'm meeting and I think sometimes past experiences make who you are so I just went off the person I had met and gotten to know and fell in love with. He was very different."
Denise also claimed that her relationship with Charlie adversely affected her career as many people in Hollywood took his side when they split.
She said: "I was surprised how much that affected me work wise...I was perceived as being a lunatic and crazy. There are people that have [since] come up to me and apologised for drinking the Kool-Aid...It was hard."
In his 'TODAY' interview on Tuesday, when he revealed he was diagnosed four years ago, Charlie said that Denise and ex-wife Brooke Mueller have been aware of his illness for some time.
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