James Irvin talks to TSN.ca about his battles with drug addiction and his return to the Octagon:

"The Anderson Silva fight, I have 25 stitches across my cheek from when he blasted me," the mixed martial arts fighter told The Canadian Press. "Every day when I look in the mirror, I have a clear reminder of what those drugs did to me and what lies ahead of me if I was ever to start using that garbage ever again."

"It wasn't until a time that I just stopped taking them that I realized I needed them just to keep on functioning," he said. "At that time I had become an addict and I was hooked on them.

"I needed to get caught," he said. "I needed to get in trouble for it and wake me up and get off of those things."

"I'm trying to get [reach out] to fighters, but it's kind of a taboo thing," said Irvin. "I don't think fighters want to talk about it. Fighters definitely don't want to admit that they have a problem with it when it's obvious they do because more and more fighters are getting caught with the stuff and getting caught with it in them."

Irvin returns to the UFC at UFC on Versus 1 against Alessio Sakara.