In this gripping June 1991 broadcast from The Dini Petty Show, Kitty Dukakis—wife of 1988 Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis—delivers an astonishingly raw and unfiltered look at her journey through recovery. Celebrating one year of hard-won sobriety while promoting her confessional memoir Now You Know, the 54-year-old steps far outside the typical, manicured boundaries expected of a political spouse to tell the absolute, harrowing truth about her past.
With the sting of the 1988 election loss two and a half years behind her, Dukakis openly recounts the devastating rock bottom that saw her cycle through four separate rehabilitation centers in a mere six months. She details her severe dependence on a cocktail of amphetamines, Valium, and Xanax, and her desperate descent into consuming household rubbing alcohol and hairspray to escape her psychological pain. The interview sheds vital light on her underlying, long-untreated bipolar disorder, tracking her struggles all the way back to her mother’s 1950s medicine cabinet when her addiction first took root at age 19.
Host Dini Petty pushes past standard talking points, asking direct questions about whether Michael Dukakis ever considered leaving the marriage. Kitty’s answers cut through traditional political damage control, shedding light on the immense strain placed on partners and defying the statistic that husbands of alcoholic women almost always walk away. She further reflects on the dark realities of political life, admitting that winning the presidency would have made her recovery impossible, famously describing the position of a political wife as akin to an “unwanted pregnancy” within the campaign machine.
Following Kitty Dukakis passing in March 2025 at the age of 82, this historic conversation stands as an incredibly poignant testament to her early advocacy for mental health transparency. Unseen since its original CTV broadcast, this master tape has been optimized and preserved via the official archive of The Dini Petty Show, safeguarding a vital cross-section of political and cultural television history.
Episodes Available for Licensing
Found 1 episodes
Search: "Kitty Dukakis"