Even an eight-month jail sentence can’t get in the middle of the “Jersey Shore” family bond.
In an interview with Us Weekly published on Friday, Ronnie Ortiz-Magro said he’s in touch with Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino on a daily basis while he serves time for tax evasion.
“We talk every day through email. He’s doing great,” Ortiz-Magro, 33, said of his castmate. “He still has his positive attitude. He still sounds like he swallowed a book of poetry.”
During their time on the MTV reality show, cameras have captured 36-year-old Sorrentino’s journey to sobriety, which included two stints of rehab a few years ago for prescription drug abuse. And Ortiz-Magro, a father of one, has followed his lead in getting help.
He entered rehab for alcohol abuse and depression for about a month, ending his stint on Feb. 10.
“Mike definitely pushed me to get healthy. Just him being around was definitely an inspiration,” he said. “When you’re the way I was – just depressed, always angry, resentful and just regretful was a big thing – you look at him and you’re like, ‘I want that. I want to be positive.’”
He told the magazine at the time that “eventually, all the bad decisions I was making were going to lead me to places that I didn’t want to be. I wanted to be led to the place that I am now – that’s happy, healthy and the best role model for my daughter.”
He shares his 10-month-old daughter, Ariana Sky, with on-again, off-again girlfriend Jen Harley.
Ortiz-Magro said that Sorrentino was also there for him while he and Harley were enduring nasty drama involving police that partially played out on social media and on “Jersey Shore: Family Vacation.”
“Mike was one of the ones that was actually there for me throughout the whole process,” he said. “Everything that has happened over the last year … he would always hit me up.”