For most of my life, I felt like I was walking with a shadow behind me — the kind that grows from childhood wounds, broken trust, and a home shaped by alcohol.
I told myself I’d never become what hurt me…
But the truth is, pain you don’t heal eventually grows roots.
I fell into addiction.
I hurt people who loved me.
I hurt myself.
And the worst part was the shame — the feeling that I had become the very thing I promised I wouldn’t be.
But grace has a way of reaching you in the moments when you think you’re beyond saving.
Recovery wasn’t a single moment. It was years of choosing differently — choosing honesty, choosing courage, choosing to believe that Jesus still had something good for me.
Today I live a life I never thought possible.
I’m present.
I’m sober.
I’m building the kind of home I once only wished existed.
And I’m grateful — not because the journey was easy, but because the story didn’t end where I thought it would.
The Staple Jar Project is my reminder that every life has pages worth sharing.
Maybe yours is one of them.