Kelly Osbourne says rehab has made her a “better drug addict”

Kelly Osbourne was not impressed by the first of her seven rehab stays.

In the new documentary special TMZ investigates Matthew Perry and the secret celebrity drug ringthe reality star reflects on the shortcomings of the rehabilitation process when it comes to drug addiction. “The first rehab I went to was like a university where I learned how to be a better drug addict,” Osbourne says. “I learned so many tricks, so many things that I would never have thought of from my fellow addicts who were there.”

Osbourne, 39, recalls that part of the addicts' strategy for obtaining substances during rehab was to take advantage of their time in the facility — essentially offering them payment of the treatment center's fees as a bargaining chip. “People would threaten to leave until they got what they wanted, whether it was Ambien to help them sleep or Valium for their nerves. Somehow they got it,” she says. “They ended up giving them whatever they wanted.”

The Osbourne's star also makes disturbing allegations against “body brokers,” people who intentionally try to lure addicts into relapse so that treatment facilities can make more money from patients in rehab. “They sit outside AA meetings and look for weak and vulnerable people who they encourage to go and relapse so they can then get them back on their feet,” she says.

Upon hearing this claim, TMZ founder and host Harvey Levin responds in disbelief: “Rehab centers send people to AA meetings to trick them into using drugs again so they can go back to rehab? That's hard to believe.”

Osbourne insists: “I swear on everything that this is true. And it's heartbreaking.”

When Osbourne introduces herself in the doc, she mentions that she is on the road to recovery. “I'm not saying I'm recovered because I don't think I ever will be,” she says, “and it's something I have to work on every day.”

She also expresses extreme disapproval of the ketamine treatment for addiction that the late Matthew Perry received in the final chapter of his life. “It's crazy what happened with that ketamine treatment,” Osbourne says. “I'm so, so, so against it. If you're addicted, that kind of treatment doesn't work for you. It's not a quick fix. It's not going to take you to the gates of hell and make you see yourself and come back to earth as a reborn human being.”

Osbourne explains that her own experience with addiction began when she had her tonsils removed at age 13. “They gave me a drug that made me feel okay, that I belonged, like it was giving me a big, warm hug for the first time in my life,” she says. “It was the answer to what I was looking for. And I didn't know it at the time, but what I was looking for was numbness. It started with the drug for having my tonsils removed, and then I figured out how to get that drug whenever I wanted. And that was through doctors. I didn't have any illegal drug dealers on the street. All of my drug dealers were doctors. Every single time.”

The reality personality says she never had any problems getting medication from doctors. “I was also a very good actress – I would fake a lot of pain and I mean, I learned at a very young age how to get what I wanted from them,” she recalls. “I would say I was in pain and they would just write me a prescription.”

Osbourne quickly figured out which doctors were best for getting prescriptions quickly. “If I wanted an Adderall doctor, I knew who to talk to; if it was about opiates, I also knew which people in Hollywood to go to to find out who their new 'rock doc' was,” she says. “At one point, I had six different doctors. And I had them in New York, LA and London, so when I ran out, I could call others to get new medication.”

Osbourne also says Perry played a key role in her rehab experience. “I was 19 years old and in rehab for the first time and I just wanted to walk,” she recalls. “He saw that I was struggling, came up to me and gave me a chip that said, 'Just three minutes.' And he told me, 'If you can last three minutes, you can get through anything.' That chip got me through that day, which then got me through the next day, which then got me through the next day. And I'll never forget that moment.”