At 41, Ryan found himself in the darkest of places. After many years of abusing alcohol, “I was more depressed than I’d ever been, and wondering if I should just end things,” he recalls. 

“What stopped me was thinking about my daughter, and how unfair it would be for her to grow up without a father. I didn’t want her to ever have to ask who her dad was.”  With that, he had his last drink and reached out to his own father for help.  Within hours, he was on the phone with Renascent.

The move towards recovery was a long time coming. Ryan had been drinking since the end of high school, and in his late teens and early twenties, working in bars made heavy drinking feel normal. “I always knew in the back of my mind I had a problem,” he says, “but I was young, making money, and it just never felt like a priority to address.” Even as he built a career and worked a second job in the music industry, alcohol felt embedded in the culture. “In all settings, it was common for the workday to be followed by drinking,” he recalls.  “It just felt like ‘the way it was.’”

When he met the woman who would become his wife, Ryan hid how much he was drinking. “She thought I was an occasional drinker, like her,” he recalls.  “But in secret, I was actually drinking all day, every day.”

As time went on, life settled into a trajectory: “we bought a car, a house, planned on having a family,” Ryan says, “but in the background I was being completely irresponsible with my drinking, my finances, everything.

I was lying constantly and losing control over the lies.  I’d wake up every day with anxiety, then numb myself with alcohol.  The problem was, the thing that was ruining my life was also my coping mechanism.”

After one night of heavy drinking, Ryan fell and he woke up in the hospital 12 hours later. He’d collapsed, suffered a concussion, and spent weeks hospitalized with back injuries. It turned out to be a pivotal experience in more ways than one.

“While I was in the hospital, I couldn’t get ahead of the lies any longer,” he admits.  “Everything I’d been hiding came out, and I lost my wife’s trust.” He was eventually released from the hospital, only to return a short time later for care in the psychiatric unit. “I was having some pretty scary thoughts, and my family and friends were understandably concerned about me,” he says. “I was completely overwhelmed, and I had started to lose hope.”

When Ryan’s father connected him with Renascent, “he saved my life,” Ryan says. “And what I learned while at Renascent continues to keep me alive every single day. It’s a place where you don’t feel alienated telling your story, because you’re surrounded by people who’ve been where you are and made it out. They do a great job of preparing you for what comes after treatment, too.”

Nearly seventeen months into recovery, Ryan says his life today couldn’t be more different.  “I can look into the future again,” he shares. “I have an amazing relationship with my daughter, and I’m so grateful I was able to get help before she knew what was going on. All my other relationships have improved, too, and I’m studying to be an addictions counsellor. I have a home group and a sponsor, and I attend meetings regularly.

Sobriety has shown me my priorities in life: family. Health. Being present.”

Reflecting on his journey, Ryan doesn’t mince words. “It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” he admits. “But if you’re struggling, just know that hope is not lost, help is out there, and recovery does work.

Life can be so beautiful if you let it.”