I do not remember the exact day it all fell apart. It rarely works that way: more often the ground leaves you slowly, centimetre by centimetre, until one day you are at the bottom and realize how far you have fallen.
First I denied it. Then I was angry. Then for a long time I pretended I was coping. The hardest part was not the fall, but the admission — out loud, to myself — that I could not go on like this.
My children were near and infinitely far away the whole time. I had no right to pull them into my darkness, but it was the thought of them that kept me from disappearing entirely.
Recovery turned out to be a craft, not a flash of light. Every day, the same simple acts: get up, do not lie to yourself, take the next small step. Dull, invisible, and the only thing that holds.
I am on the way now. I do not promise a neat ending and I am not asking for applause. I am simply walking home — to my children, to myself — and I decided to tell it honestly. Maybe it helps someone begin their own first morning.