In a sucker punch to Jennifer Aniston, Brad Pitt has reflected on his drug-damaged "drifter" lifestyle before he met Angelina Jolie and settled down with children. Pitt, 49, plays zombie-fighting family man Gerry Lane in his upcoming movie World War Z and told the June/July issue of Esquire of his relief that he turned his life around to become a father to six children.

"For a long time I thought I did too much damage - drug damage," he said. "I was a bit of a drifter. A guy who felt he grew up in something of a vacuum and wanted to see things, wanted to be inspired. I followed that other thing. I spent years ... off. But then I got burnt out and felt that I was wasting my opportunity." Pitt says he experienced an epiphany and made the decision not to squander his opportunities. "It was a feeling of, 'Get up.' Because otherwise, what's the point?" he added.

The remarks mirror a Parade magazine interview with Pitt in 2011, in which he said, "I spent the '90s trying to hide out. I started to get sick of myself sitting on a couch, holding a joint, hiding out. It started feeling pathetic. I think my marriage had something to do with it: trying to pretend the marriage was something that it wasn't." 

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In the latest interview, Pitt speaks of suffering from prosopagnosia that makes him unable to remember names or faces. "So many people hate me because they think I'm disrespecting them," he said. "So I swear to God, I took one year where I just said, 'This year, I'm just going to cop to it and say to people, "OK, where did we meet?"' But it just got worse. People were more offended."

The full interview will be available when the magazine hits newsstands on May 31.

Brad PittJennifer Aniston
Brad Pitt [L] Has Prevously Blamed His Marriage to Jennifer Aniston [R] On His Lack Of Ambition Throughout The 90s