Back in October 2004, Tatum O'Neal was a sobriety success story, having written a successful memoir after apparently conquering a drug addiction so intense that it made Stevie Nicks's habit look pithy. But as the NY Post reports, O'Neal was arrested by the NYPD last night while allegedly buying crack and cocaine just blocks away from her luxury apartment in Manhattan's Lower East Side. When she was busted, the actress supposedly claimed she was pulling a Mendes and researching a bit for an upcoming junkie role. Apparently, her research was tres Method — she was even carrying a crack pipe on her (but it was "clean!", she said). Even more embarrassing? She reached for the age-old and very dusty "Don't you know who I am?" in an attempt to get the cops to look the other way. But the cops didn't bite, and O'Neal, along with her dealer, were taken to the clink. After the jump, we scoured her memoir of recovery to figure out why she may have gone back to the "glamorous" world of drugs.

Could it be that she missed the orgies? When she spoke to Dateline four years ago, she described her junkie lifestyle as "glamorous":

We checked into the Plaza Athenee with Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider...One night we all smoked opium and hash. I sank into bed, dizzy from the drugs. When I raised my head, a very confusing scene was taking place...Melanie [Griffith], Maria...and a hairdresser were tangled up together. As an added sordid touch, one of the women was apparently menstruating — something I was to young to have experienced myself — and there was a lot of blood.

Along with bloody orgies, it seems part of the "glamour" nose candy can add to your life includes vomiting and shrinking down to a toothpick!

When I got a bit chubby, by Hollywood and Farrah [Fawcett]-comparison standards....I learned that cocaine was good for weight loss...between doing coke and throwing up, the pounds started started melting off me effortlessly. I found that coke made me feel so much better.

Yup, after reading a few of these excerpts, we do have some sympathy for O'Neal and her need to return to the late-night bender excursions in the bright light of summer evening. We can only hope for her sake it isn't that time of the month while she's tapping her anxious foot on that jail cell floor — misty, menstrual blood-coloured memories may make that itch even worse.

• SOURCES: TATUM O'NEAL BUSTED FOR COKE & CRACK [NY Post]
• A PAPER LIFE [Google Books]
• TATUM O'NEAL SHARES SURVIVAL STORY [MSNBC]

Tags: drugs | farrah fawcett | griffin o'neal | john mcenroe | marlon brando | melanie griffith | paper moon | ryan o'neal | tatum o'neal | we are all on drugs