PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Rep. Patrick Kennedy said yesterday that he was feeling good after nearly a month in drug rehabilitation and realizes he can no longer take any “mood-altering” substance.

The six-term congressman checked into a rehabilitation clinic on May 5, one day after a middle-of-the-night car crash near the U.S. Capitol that he said he could not remember.

Mr. Kennedy said he wasn’t drinking that night but had taken “the prescribed amount” of Phenergan, an antinausea drug, and Ambien, a sleep medication. He said yesterday, in his first public appearance since leaving the clinic, that he would continue treatment for addiction and now understands that he can’t take anything considered “mood-altering.”

“I can tell you today, I feel confident about my health, positive about my future, and passionate about my work representing the people of Rhode Island,” the Rhode Island Democrat said in a speech at Brown University on the future of mental health care and addiction treatment.

Mr. Kennedy was released from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., on Friday. He also had been treated at the clinic over the Christmas holidays.

He called the accident “a wake-up call” and said he was grateful he did not hurt anyone.

The experience “has reaffirmed for me that the challenge of mental illness is a part of everyone’s experience – whether it has touched an individual, a friend, or family member,” he said. He said he received “an outpouring of support” while he was at the clinic. “Congressman Kennedy’s doctors are encouraged by his progress,” the clinic said in a statement released by Mr. Kennedy’s office.