Actress Denise Richards says she used a children’s book on addiction to help explain the erratic behavior of her ex-husband Charlie Sheen to their children.

“I did have to have a conversation with them about addiction and got a book to read to them, because I was just lying to them so much and covering up and telling lies, and it was just getting too confusing,” Richards said on the “Today” show yesterday.

The actress said while she tried to shield her two daughters — Sam, 7, and Lola, 6 — from media coverage of their father’s partying ways, they would still “hear things, through other kids.

“They are so young,” Richards, 40, said of her daughters. “I think they did comprehend some of it. And as they get older, they’ll learn more as needed, but I told them enough for them to make sense of some things that were going on.”

Richards, who was married to Sheen from 2002 to 2006, said the Sheen she sees portrayed in the media “is not the person that I met and fell in love with. The man I fell in love with is very compassionate, humble and has a very wonderful heart.

“I still care very much for him and want him well. He’s a survivor. If anyone can pull themselves together, it’s Charlie,” she said.