Matthew Perry Was 'Desperate for a Solution' to Addiction, Talked of Getting Married and Having Kids Before His Death

Matthew Perry had his sights set on starting a new life just before his tragic death.

In a sit-down interview with Savannah Guthrie on the Today show, the actor's mom Suzanne Morrison said that her son — who died at age 54 on Oct. 28, 2023 from the acute effects of ketamine — was "so desperate for a solution" after he had battled addiction for decades.

"He talked about, 'It's time for me to have a wife and it's time for me to have children and I want that,'" Suzanne told Guthrie during an interview with her husband Keith Morrison and their daughters Caitlin, Emily and Madeline.

"A dog running around the house" was another part of the dream that her son shared with her, Suzanne said.

"But he didn't appreciate the frightening aspect of this medication," she said, referring to the ketamine infusion therapy he was undergoing at the time of his death as a means of treating his depression.

According to the autopsy, which PEOPLE obtained at the time, the Friends star had reportedly been clean for 19 months. Five people have since been charged in connection with his death, including two doctors, Jasveen Sangha, who is known as "The Ketamine Queen," and his personal live-in assistant, who allegedly "repeatedly" injected him with ketamine "without medical training."

Following his death, Perry's family started the Matthew Perry Foundation, and have since started the Matthew Perry Foundation of Canada, both of which work to help those struggling with addiction, which the family says is what Perry was most passionate about.

"I think his biggest drive to be sober was when someone came and asked him for help, he would drop everything and do it," Perry's sister Emily Morrison told Guthrie on Today.

"No matter where he was in life. he wanted to be physically and mentally okay in order to help people when they needed it."

His impact on the community was felt particularly after his death.

"After he died, that was, by and large, the only thing people came up to me and would say... They said the only reason they were sober was because of him and because of what he did to help them," his sister Madeline Morrison said. "He would pay for them to go to rehab."

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. 

For this week's cover story, Keith, 77, opened up to PEOPLE about his stepson's final days, during which he "seemed to be so at peace."

"He kept reaching out to embrace his family members. He hadn't been the sort of person who'd call up and say, ‘Gosh, I love you. I miss you.’ But he was doing that all the time," the Dateline correspondent said.

"You get a sense that he, I don't know whether he had a premonition, or he had kind of accepted the inevitability he wasn't going to be living as long as some people, and he wanted to embrace those who mattered to him."