THE HARDEST DAY — “The Day I Almost Left This World”

There’s a day in my life that still tastes like metal if I think about it too long.February 27, 2014.

People talk about “rock bottom” like it’s some poetic metaphor, something you hit and then bounce back from like a damn trampoline. But the truth is… rock bottom feels like nothing. It feels like numbness so deep it becomes its own kind of death.

On that day, I wasn’t drunk for fun.I wasn’t drinking socially.I wasn’t even drinking to avoid pain anymore.

I was drinking because I was afraid of what would happen if I stopped.

The alcohol was my God — and I worshiped the silence it gave me.My life looked fine on the outside: nice house, nice car, business, friends.But inside, I was already gone.

My depression was winning.My addiction was running the show.And the demon in my head kept whispering the same quiet, convincing sentence:

“You will never know happiness. You were not built for peace.”

On that day, sitting alone in a closet with a gun in my hand, I believed it.

I wasn’t making a dramatic gesture.I wasn’t writing a note or calling for help.I didn’t want attention.I didn’t want saving.

I wanted out.Out of the panic.Out of the exhaustion.Out of the fear of what sobriety would force me to face.

People think getting sober is brave.But in that moment, sobriety was the thing that terrified me more than death.

I had been through hell before —I’d been beaten, shot, abandoned, terrified, and broken —but I still had fight.On this day, the fight was gone.I genuinely believed there was nothing left to live for.

My kids were struggling.My marriage was burnt to a crisp.My work was drowning me.My body was shutting down from liver disease I didn’t know I had.

I was tired.Deep-tired.Soul-tired.

And the world would have believed any story about why I left.They would’ve said “she survived so much,” or “she was always strong,” or “I never knew she was hurting.”Because that’s how depression works —It hides itself behind all the ways you learned to smile.

But somehow — and I still don’t know how — I put the gun down.Not because I had hope.I didn’t.Not because I suddenly loved myself.I didn’t.Not because I saw a future.I didn’t.

I put it down because something in me whispered,“You haven’t tried everything yet.”

And that was enough.Barely.But enough.

So I made the scariest decision of my life:I walked away from everything I knew and checked myself into a 30-day treatment center, even though I had no idea what would be waiting for me when I came out.

I thought the hard part was surviving the gun.It wasn’t.The hard part was the next 446 days of rebuilding a life from scratch:

• Liver failure

• Hepatitis C

• Divorce

• Moving twice

• Becoming a single mom

• Losing nearly everything

• Starting over financially

• Learning to feel again sober

But here’s the thing I didn’t realize back in that closet:

Sometimes you have to die inside to be reborn.Sometimes the part of you that wants to quit isn’t the real you —it’s the wounded version that needs to be released.

God wasn’t done with me.Life wasn’t done with me.And—most importantly—my story wasn’t done with me.

Now I get to help people.I get to share my story.I get to live fully.I get to love deeply.I get to do the impossible because I stopped believing I deserved to die.

And every time I tell this story, someone quietly reaches out and says,“I thought I was the only one.”

You’re not.You never were.And if you’re reading this —You’re not done either.