Hugh Hefner's widow believes he was agoraphobic.
Hugh Hefner's widow Crystal says he didn't like leaving the Playboy Mansion
The media mogul passed away in 2017 at the age of 91 and Crystal Hefner - who he married in 2012, three years after she first became one of his girlfriends - has revealed how they rarely left the Playboy mansion but her spouse was able to "mask" his fear of going out in public thanks to his wealth and status.
She told You magazine: "The parties came to him, doctors came to him. He ate in the house. He never wanted to go to a restaurant.
"[I realised he was agoraphobic] and having all this money and power makes it easy for him to mask that – he would get very nervous whenever we would go out."
Crystal used to suggest they went to themed restaurants.
She explained: "He liked fried chicken, and he could watch the girls ride the mechanical bull, but he never really wanted to go."
And the blonde beauty suggested he was addicted to opiod painkiller Percocet.
She said: "He did have bad back pain, he wasn’t making that up. But the pills… there were a lot of them. To the point where he would nod off while he was trying to play cards with us."
The Playboy founded died at the Mansion two weeks after contracting sepsis and he had warned Crystal he didn't want to go to hospital.
She said: "I knew how much he hated the hospital. ‘He would say, 'Never take me to hospital, that’s where people go to die'."
Crystal herself never felt comfortable in the famous Los Angeles residence.
She said: "People think that the mansion is such an incredible place – and I did in the beginning. When you realise everything’s fake and it’s raining and it’s dripping inside and it’s just like… this place is gross.
"I felt like I had to be “on” all the time. For ten years – 24/7. That’s crazy."
The 37-year-old DJ stayed inside for weeks after her husband passed away and she has been unable to bring herself to visit his grave since his funeral.
She said: "I know that Hef was older but in some ways he felt eternal because he’d been 'older Hef' for so long."
Crystal still misses her late husband.
Asked if she misses him, she paused and said: "It sometimes feels like a dream, 'Did that really happen?'
"In a weird way, yes, then I think maybe the world could say the same thing – the people who knew who he was."
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