Boston Radio: John Dennis Returns Monday To WEEI-FM

John Dennis

John Dennis, co-host of WEEI 93.7 FM morning-drive “Dennis & Callahan” program, said he plans to return to the airwaves Monday after three weeks of being treated for alcohol addiction.

Dennis last appeared on the station on April 13, the day of the Red Sox’ Fenway Park opener. He attended the game that day, but called in sick the next morning and has yet to return to work.

“The smartest thing I did was to come out of the alcoholic’s closet, to steal a phrase,” he told the Boston Herald Friday. “The thing that held me back, the thing I was most afraid of, was going public with this and hearing the response and the reaction, or the criticism, whatever. I didn’t know what to expect.”

Dennis said that when the news broke of his plan to enter rehab on April 16, “Over the course of the next few days . . . on Twitter I had over 900 tweets at me, and 899 of them were saying, ‘We’re behind you,’ ‘Proud of you,’ ‘Fight the good fight.’ All those things. And one guy out of 900-plus said, ‘I hope you get AIDS and die in a house fire.’ While that seems a little harsh, one of 900 was remarkable.

Dennis said he spent two weeks undergoing in-patient treatment at McLean Ambulatory Treatment Center at Naukeag, located in Ashburnham. He said he is now attending an outpatient program at Emerson Hospital in Concord. He is completing his work week at Emerson and will continue with the program next week, he said, while returning to the morning-drive program he does with co-hosts Gerry Callahan and Kirk Minihane.