Nick Lachey drowned his divorce sorrows in sauce

Oct 13, 2006, 14:12 GMT

Nick Lachey says he hit the bottle after splitting from Jessica Simpson.

The former 98 Degrees frontman denies he became an alcoholic but says he did "drown his sorrows" when his now ex-wife told him she wanted a divorce last December.

He confessed to US chat show host David Letterman: "I definitely think you go through different phases and there's certainly a phase of, 'Oh, I don't care about anything - I'm going to throw myself into a little bit of booze and kind of numb the pain.'

"I went through a little bit of that and came out on the other side and still have some sobriety left."

Nick - who is now dating MTV presenter Vanessa Minnillo - also revealed he blames reality show 'Newlyweds' for the breakdown of his marriage.

He said: "It was among the dumber ideas I think I've ever seen executed in

history. For a while, I think we actually enjoyed doing the show. It was just so invasive that it became a problem."

Nick added: "It's one of those things where I think until you get enough hindsight and enough clarity and perspective, I don't think you can really know what happened, but, I certainly think it was probably a factor."

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