09/01/2026
One of the hardest parts of being sober while working in animal rescue is learning how to feel everything I used to drink away.
For years, my way of managing my mental health was to stay as busy as possible. Keep moving. Keep helping. Keep myself from sitting still long enough to acknowledge what I was carrying.
Then, in the evenings, I drank. đź’”
For a while, I convinced myself that it worked. Until it didn’t.
The last five years of my drinking weren’t about having fun. I was using alcohol to medicate my pain. Some days, I drank to feel something. Other days, I drank so I wouldn’t have to feel anything at all. It had become the only way I knew how to deal with my emotions.
You occasionally see heartbreaking things on my social media, but there is so much you never see. The suffering. The situations we can’t fix. The animals we can’t get to in time. I tried to protect my followers from the worst of it, but I still carried it home.
And I didn’t know how to put it down.
Getting sober meant I had to begin learning how to process all of that. In many ways, it felt like starting over. The sadness didn’t disappear when I stopped drinking. I had to learn how to live with it without losing myself in it.
I’m still learning.
Today, I try to slow down and acknowledge what I’m feeling. I talk with people who understand this work. I ask for help. I’m learning that caring deeply about animals doesn’t mean I have to carry every painful experience alone.
I’m not writing this because I want anyone to feel sorry for me. I’m writing it because someone reading this may recognize their own evenings, their own exhaustion, or their own reasons for reaching for a drink.
I want you to know there are other ways to cope. There is support. You don’t have to wait until everything falls apart to deserve help.
Addiction exists within the animal welfare community, and we don’t talk about it nearly enough. We spend so much time trying to save lives that sometimes we struggle to admit when we need help ourselves.
I want to help change that. My goal is to keep this conversation open and help connect people in our field with assistance, understanding, and support.
The people caring for these animals deserve care, too. That includes you. ❤️
My DMs are always open if you need to talk.
