I’d prayed for something to interrupt the cycle we had been living in. When it finally happened, I realized answered prayers don’t always come wrapped the way we expect them to. The morning he left, I drove to the jail before he was transported. I waited for nearly three hours just to have a few minutes with him before the van arrived. While I waited, I sat with the woman who would be transporting him to rehab. She was kind. She wasn’t rushing us. She understood that this wasn’t just another transport. She was watching a husband and wife say goodbye. When Mason was finally released, there wasn’t much time. Maybe five minutes. In those Five minutes we were able to try to say everything that months of addiction had left unsaid. We talked about the boys. Our marriage. Our business. His addiction. My fears. The betrayal we’d both experienced in different ways. The pressure from family. The future we still hoped we might have. The truth is, there isn’t enough time to cover a marriage in five minutes. So we said none of that, in the end, all I could really say was, “I love you.” And… “Good luck.” I hugged him harder than I ever had before. I remember wondering what version of him I’d see when he came home. Then I wondered what version of me would still be waiting. I kissed him goodbye and watched him climb into the van. I didn’t wave. I just stood there. I watched until I couldn’t see it anymore. Even after the van disappeared, I stayed exactly where I was. Eventually, I got into my car and drove home. That drive felt longer than it really was. When I pulled into our driveway, the house felt different. The business had stopped. Our future suddenly felt uncertain. Our twins were too little to understand where Daddy had gone or why. For the first time in a very long time, there wasn’t another emergency to distract me. It was just me. And silence. Mason had left to begin facing his addiction. Without realizing it, I had been left behind to begin facing my own story. People would eventually hear about Mason’s fourth DUI. His addiction. His rehab. His recovery. But almost no one knew mine. That afternoon, I picked up a notebook. I wasn’t trying to write a book. I wasn’t planning on anyone else ever reading it. I just knew that if I wanted to understand how we got here… I first had to understand how I got here. So I started to look back..
