The actress spent a few years away from Hollywood, working at a treatment center after her own struggles with substance abuse.

Jodie Sweetin got recognized while working ‘normal job’ at rehab center: ‘Are you the girl from Full House?’

The actress spent a few years away from Hollywood, working at a treatment center after her own struggles with substance abuse.

By Shania Russell

Shania Russell

Shania Russell is a news writer at *, *with five years of experience. Her work has previously appeared in SlashFilm and Paste Magazine.

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July 1, 2026 3:39 p.m. ET

Jodie Sweetin on May 20, 2026 in West Hollywood, California. Credit:

Presley Ann/Getty

- Jodie Sweetin recalls fans recognizing her while she worked a "normal job" at a rehab center.

- The* Full House* alum spent a few years away from Hollywood, working as a logistics coordinator at a treatment center.

- "People would be like, 'What are you doing here?,'" she recalled. "I was like, 'Working and paying my bills."

For some *Full House* fans, Jodie Sweetin will always be little Stephanie Tanner.

And while that makes for plenty of sweet interactions, the sitcom actress recently shared that it also led to some awkward encounters when she stepped away from Hollywood to work at a rehabilitation center.

Recounting that period of time on Tuesday's episode of the *Taboo's Comics & Kicks*, Sweetin told host Taboo that it was not hard to return to "civilian life" after her time on the show. "I've never had like an ego or a weird thing about it. I've always just been like, 'I just have a job that other people happen to watch," she explained. "But who I am as a person is no different than anybody else working any f-----g job. So for me, it was never a big deal."

She added that it was likely "harder" for the people who went to the facility for treatment and were thrown off to see someone they once watched on TV.

"Let me tell you, working in treatment, when people are detoxing and all of a sudden they're like, 'Are you the girl from *Full House*?,'" Sweetin recalled. "And you're like, 'Yeah, no, you're actually not tripping. I am.'"

Jodie Sweetin, Candace Cameron Bure and Bob Saget on 'Full House'.

ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

She continued, "People would be like, 'What are you doing here?' I was like, 'Working and paying my bills,' ... I'm just here to be a functioning human."

Sweetin, who has been very open about her own substance abuse struggles, started working as a logistics coordinator at a Los Angeles rehab center after going through a divorce and struggling to pay bills while raising two daughters.

"When I worked in a quote-unquote 'normal job,' and I had lost all my money and, you know, my parents were paying half my one-bedroom rent and I was driving an old piece of s--- car that my ex-husband's family had given me," she recalled. "A very normal, whatever life. I was making, you know, $2,200 a month trying to pay for everything with two kids."

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She added, "And I learned that in those situations, over that amount of time, that it didn't matter what I had or what I was doing, if I could just genuinely enjoy wherever it was that I was, I'd be fine."

Sweetin eventually returned to acting when *Full House *was rebooted for the Netflix sequel series, *Fuller House*. The series brought together original cast members Candace Cameron Bure, Andrea Barber, John Stamos, Bob Saget, David Coulier and Lori Loughlin. The reboot spanned 75 episodes before its 2020 conclusion. A couple years later, Sweetin launched the *Full House* reboot podcast, *How Rude, Tanneritos! *with Barber.

Michael Tullberg/Getty

As for her own struggles with substance abuse, Sweetin has been candid about her efforts to get sober after years of battling meth and cocaine addiction, in addition to alcoholism. Reflecting on her journey in a 2025 appearance on the *Barely Famous Podcast* with Kail Lowry, Sweetin said it was particularly challenging to deal with recovery as a public figure.

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"Because people know who you are, it never kind of goes away," she said at the time. "I always say, I would have struggled with addiction issues regardless of being on TV or not. And to be fair, that gave me some of the ability to be able to find treatment and find help in ways that I might not have had I not worked as a child."

She added, "But it's very hard [when] you have to make all your mistakes publicly."

Sweetin got sober in 2008, relapsed after a 2011 car accident, and has remained sober since then.

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