BEFORE THE STORY
Preface
Some stories are written because they are easy to tell. Others are written because they are necessary.
Some stories are difficult to tell because they are deeply personal, and this is one of them.
From the Bottom to Grace was not written simply to tell the story of addiction. It was written because I believe there is a person behind every struggle, a heart behind every mistake, and a story behind every label.
When someone has struggled with addiction, it can become easy for everyone around them to see only the addiction.
But that is never the whole story.
LOOKING BEYOND THE STRUGGLE
Before addiction became part of her story, she was a daughter, a sister, a cousin, and a person with hopes, questions, faith, fears, and dreams of her own.
I knew her before addiction became part of her life, and that memory has shaped the way I tell her story.
I watched her grow up as our family changed over the years. I saw some people make choices that led them into difficult places, and I have watched others continue to struggle there.
That perspective matters to me because addiction never affects one person alone. It reaches into families and relationships, touching everyone who watches someone they love struggle to find a way back.
WHAT I BELIEVE
A person's worst chapter does not have to become their entire story.
That is one of the reasons I wanted to write this book.
I wanted to keep the person beneath the struggle in view.
I also wanted to acknowledge the damage addiction can cause without allowing it to have the final word.
Most of all, I wanted to tell what can happen when someone who has spent years searching for relief finally discovers where that search needs to lead.
GRACE
Grace does not erase the past. Grace changes what the past gets to mean.
For years, she searched for something that might quiet the pain inside her. She surrendered herself to things that could never provide what she truly needed.
But God saw something different.
He saw a worshipper.
He saw the person underneath the addiction.
He saw who she could become when she turned her heart toward Him.
She did not have to become someone completely different.
She needed to discover the One who was worthy of her surrender.
That is the heart of this book.
This story does not glorify addiction or minimize its consequences.
Instead, it acknowledges the damage addiction can cause while pointing toward redemption and grace.
At its heart, this is a story of redemption, grace, and the hope that God can reach a life that once seemed completely lost.
If you are reading this because addiction has touched your life, I hope you see more than the darkness.
If you are reading because someone you love is struggling, I hope you remember that their struggle is not the whole person.
And if you are reading because you need to know whether grace can reach someone at the bottom, I hope these pages give you reason to believe that it can.
The story is not about how far she fell.
The story is about the God who was still there when she turned around.