Christopher Kennedy Lawford, an actor, author, and nephew of John F. Kennedy, died of a heart attack Tuesday. The 63-year-old, who became an advocate for sobriety after his own substance abuse issues, was in Vancouver, Canada. He was there working to open a recovery center, his cousin, former US Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy, tells the AP, adding Lawford's hot yoga habit "must have been too much for him at that point." TMZ reports Lawford was at a yoga studio at the time of the heart attack.
In addition to appearing on General Hospital, All My Children, and Frasier, per People, the oldest child of Patricia Kennedy also wrote several books, including 2005's Symptoms of Withdrawal. The AP reports that in that memoir, he wrote of what preceded his getting sober at age 30: mugging women for money, begging for change in Grand Central Station, and two arrests for possession. "There are many days when I wish I could take back and use my youth more appropriately," he said in 2005. "But all of that got me here. I can't ask for some of my life to be changed and still extract the understanding and the life that I have today." (More Kennedy family stories.)
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