From Darkness to Light: Kate's Journey of Redemption

In this powerful episode, we sit down with Kate, a woman who has transformed her life from the depths of addiction to a beacon of hope and purpose. Through raw honesty and unwavering faith in God, Kate shares her story of struggle, redemption, and the profound impact of finding her true calling.  Join us as we explore the challenges she faced, the pivotal moments that led to her transformation, and the inspiring message of hope she carries for anyone navigating their journey through darkness.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Hello, and welcome to Fire in Her Eyes. This is a podcast about women who persevered through pain to find peace and purpose. So if you're looking for a little inspiration and motivation to sustain you through difficult times, join us as we share stories of women who are empowered through pain and transform struggles into sweet success. I'm your host, Tanya Skronsky. There are moments in life when the darkness feels so heavy that we can't imagine our way out. But sometimes the very people who walk through the darkest valleys become the ones who shine the brightest light. Today I'm sitting with Kate, a woman whose journey is one of raw honesty, struggle, and the kind of redemption that can only come from deep faith and radical courage. Kate once lost her way. Addiction had its grip on her life, her identity, and her future. But in the midst of that pain, something shifted. A spark, a calling, a truth she couldn't ignore. She found her way back step by step. She found healing. She found purpose. She became an associate pastor, a wife, and a woman living with joy, clarity, and freedom. This is a story about falling, rising, and rediscovering who you are always meant to be. Kate, thank you for joining me today.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

Thank you so much, Tanya. That was a beautiful introduction.

SPEAKER_01 1:47

Can you take us back to who Kate was before the struggle? Your childhood, your early dreams, and your sense of self.

SPEAKER_00 1:57

Ah. Well, I would say that little Kate was one who did struggle and had a struggle with her identity. And I grew up in a family with a mom and a dad and a brother, and they loved hard and fought hard and were very encouraging and also really confrontational. Um it was a pretty intense household to grow up in. And so I think that I really always kind of struggled a little bit with um who I was and where I fit and what I was supposed to be doing with myself. And so I think I really always sought to develop intimate and meaningful friendships. And I had a lot of good friends, uh, but I really always felt a little bit lost, a little like I had no uh direction and purpose.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

So when did addiction first become a part of your story? And what do you remember most about those early moments of losing your footing?

SPEAKER_00 3:05

I would say that um I started to experiment in sixth grade. So I was about 12. Yeah, something somewhere around there. So sixth grade, I started to experiment a little a little bit and found that I really enjoyed the loss of control because I felt so anxious all the time about what people were thinking or where I fit in, or just fear of being uh foolish. And so I started to experiment in sixth grade, and I would say that by eighth grade I was pretty heavy into smoking weed and drinking with my friends, and through that time, the sixth, seven, eighth grade season, my parents were were fighting quite a bit, and it was pretty loud and aggressive and unresolved conflicts, and so I think that felt really good to kind of escape from some of that experience. And um I was always really friendly with everyone. I really love people, and I've always really loved people, and so I hung out with all the different groups of kids, so the jacks and the cheerleaders and the uh burnouts, and you know how it was. Um, I don't know if it's still like that. But I always hung out with everybody. But what I found was that um I was engaging in some pretty superficial relationship tendencies. So using drugs and alcohol really felt good because I could just forget about people pleasing and just kind of numb out. But I was also using drugs and alcohol at home. So I started with my brother and then some different groups of friends. So that's kind of how that began. And so I didn't really have a faith relationship. We grew up pretty lukewarm Catholic. So we'd go to church on Christmas and Easter, and whenever grandma guilted us into going, or you know, whenever the family was doing family things, we would go. So I always had this like um ethereal ideology of like, yeah, sure, God, okay, right. But it was never a real thing to me. Reading scripture, having a personal relationship with God was never something that existed in in my life. And in my household, we didn't really talk about God and we didn't really talk about identity or values or even emotions. We didn't, they weren't something to be, you just needed to stop it, and uh, that was enough, and you're fine, you know, some of that kind of energy towards any big feelings. So I never really knew how to manage what was happening inside of me.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

Were your parents aware of the drug and alcohol consumption, at least in the house?

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Uh so my dad is an addict as well. Um, and I'm pretty sure that my mom is an unattentive alcoholic. So, like, she doesn't really she would never admit that she was an alcoholic. She might say that she had some problems here and there, overdrank sometimes. But my dad'll admit that he's an addict. So my dad was smoking weed, and my mom would that was some of the arguing that would happen is that my dad would be in the house or and he wasn't regularly getting high from what I knew, but it was around. And so um, I don't think that they knew specifically that my brother and I were participating, but my mom's not dumb, and my dad participated, so I think they had to know that it was around, but I was always such a good kid that I kind of slipped under the radar. My brother is 18 months older than me, and he got into a lot more of trouble, I would say, with things. And I always did very good in school, I always had pretty good relationships, you know, around me. So I knew how to not cause any problems, I guess. At that point, the problems came later.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

Okay. So, what was the hardest part of life during addiction, physically, emotionally, and spiritually?

SPEAKER_00 7:14

That's a great question. The hardest part of life for me during addiction was probably the loneliness, the lack of feeling known and seen and understood, and feeling really lost, and that I was just treading water and think that physically I just didn't feel good. I mean, doing drugs and alcohol to the extent that I was doing them, I just didn't feel good. And on top of it, now, all these years removed, I also know that I have dietary restrictions, and so there's a lot of stuff that I was doing that was like like I'm gluten-free. I have a gluten sensitivity, and so like drinking a bunch of beer, of course, I didn't feel good. So mentally, I had brain fog and emotionally I was struggling with loneliness and uh just feeling like so lost and in despair and really directionless. And I really just struggled to know why I even mattered, and so a lot of the way that I managed myself around people and situations was just to do whatever felt good to me. So whether it be uh uh the people I would spend time with, the ways that I would interact with men, the way I would interact with my girlfriends, I just was like selfish and self-centered because I didn't know that the way I behaved mattered, that the consequences, I just never really associated the consequences of my behavior as having a negative impact on other people because I just didn't really think I mattered that much. And um, it wasn't until I got sober and found the Lord that I started to have this like realization that the way I behave, the way I interact with people, the way that uh I um do things does matter and it does have a consequence, and that and I don't even think it's until like more recently that I realized that I do matter. That's all a journey, right?

SPEAKER_01 9:09

Absolutely. Speaking of, was there a moment, a conversation or a rock bottom experience when you realized something had to change?

SPEAKER_00 9:19

Absolutely, yes. So in um 2006, I got a OWI, which is operating while impaired, which is basically a DUI. And um how old were you then? I was um 20. I was 20. So I wasn't even legally allowed to drink yet. And uh no, let me think. Was I 19? No, no, 20, because it was 2006. So I was 20 and I got a DUI, and I that kind of like instigated me into this process of needing to figure out what was going on in regards to my alcohol consumption because I just didn't think it was that big of a deal. Earlier that year, I had gone to an AA meeting because I got kicked out of a camp. It's a very long story, so I don't want to bog down. Obviously, our lives are full of those like moments that really uh can change the trajectory of our lives. And I think getting kicked out of the camp, going to this AA meeting, it was the beginning of it for me. But getting the DUI really set in stone that I had to do things uh legally uh to change my life. And so I started going to AA meetings and because I was court mandated and I had to do a bunch of classes. And but at that time I still didn't think it was a big deal. I thought everybody drinks until they get blacked out. Um everybody interacts with drugs in some capacity, it's not that big of a deal. And so as I'm going to these AA meetings and they're talking about blacking out not being normal, I was like, oh, huh, okay. So these are like some of the indicators for me. But then in May of 2017, I violated my probation because I was on probation. So I was still drinking all during that time, but I would have a handle on my alcohol consumption. So that was from like October until May. I did a pretty decent job not drinking excessively if I had to blow into the breathalyzer the next morning. But May of 2007, um, I drank too much. I'd gotten into a fight with uh the boyfriend at the time. And uh the next morning I went to blow and I blew dirty, and so I violated probation. So I got an alcohol tether, and I was supposed to have for three months, but because I was getting some rash or something, they allowed me to go to the police station and blow every night and every morning for that last month. And so May 20th of 2007 was my last drink. Um, but a year later, June of 2008, I got off probation and I went to a party with all the owners since I was in preschool, and we just got so stoned. We got a bunch of weed and we got so high, and I'm in this room full of these people who I've known forever, and I'm so high, and I'm sitting there thinking, this isn't sobriety. These people don't genuinely care about me, and I don't think this is how I want to live anymore. And so I left that party eventually after, and I got home and I just cried, and I thought to myself, gosh, I don't want to keep doing it like this anymore. So I left. So then the next day I went to a meeting and I didn't tell anybody I wasn't doing well because I didn't want them to know, even though I wasn't doing well. I left that meeting and I went to a friend's house and I got high again. And it was at that moment that I I left her house and I got home and I just wept and I wept and I wept and I said, God, if you're real, and I hit my knees and and I said to God, if you're real, I really need some help. And then I got off my knees because I felt stupid and I went to a new meeting the next day and I got a new sponsor, and not because my old sponsor, my old meetings were wrong, I just needed to do something different for my sobriety. And so that sponsor was a churchgoer, and so I committed, I'm just gonna go to church with her every week. And I started to hear these ideas and these concepts of like who God was and what Christians say that you should do. And I was just like so desperate to not get high anymore, and I was so desperate to be sober and of sound mind and to like feel better about myself that I was just willing to do whatever it took to find healing. And so I started going to church every weekend and they said you should serve, and so I served in their kids' ministry every weekend, and they said you should join a small group, and so I joined four small groups, and they said you should tithe, and so I tithed, and you should get baptized and be, and so I got baptized. And so through that journey, it was in uh July of 2008 that I went to a conference where there was a Christian speaker, and she said, If you've never accepted Jesus as your savior, stand up. And I was like, Well, I haven't done that part yet. So I stood up and then and I said, Jesus, I accept you as my savior, and then I sat back down, and I just had no idea what I was doing, but I was just so ready for something to be different. And so it was at those points that my life genuinely started to change. I went and bought a Bible and I sat down and I was reading along with it. I was watching Christian, these Christian movies, and I was following along in the Bible while I was watching these Christian movies, and if they missed a part, I'd pause the movie and I'd read along, and it really just revolutionized my way of thinking and my way of behaving, and uh really shot me forward in a trajectory that I never imagined I would be.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

So I'm trying to understand for me, how would I respond? I think showing up to a church and listening to people talk, I don't know that I would just openly accept it. I I would continue to question it. I'm a scientist, right? I want proof, I want evidence. We always talk about uh evidence-based decision making. So, where did faith step into your story? Was it gradual or did you have a moment where you felt, God say, come home?

SPEAKER_00 15:33

It was very uh it was I had tried everything, okay, when I was going to these AA meetings to get sober. I had tried praying to and talking to my deceased grandmother. I tried the tree outside my window. I tried the community and the fellowship of AA, that's gonna do it. These things are gonna help me stay sober. And they didn't. They didn't change the way I thought, they didn't change the way I lived. They were helpful tools, but I didn't, I didn't be different. Like I didn't be a different person all of a sudden. It wasn't until I accepted this, I can't keep doing it this way. God is an option I haven't checked off the list yet. Let's try that. And I will tell you, even today, I have a bajillion questions. I don't just, I don't just blindly think like, sure, you said to do you said that's the right thing. I am constantly evaluating, constantly digging in. It's why I love God's word so much, because you can really use it to check and balance itself and ask all the questions. But where I landed was the way I was doing it wasn't working. What I believed wasn't helpful, and I needed to do something different. And so as I explored God's word and these suggestions that this Christian community was making, I found peace and I found hope and I found truth that lined up with human behavior too. So, like reciprocity, which we were talking about off-air before we got on, I found this boundaries and I found these limits as human beings. I see that all in scripture. And so as I explore these concepts, I am consistently being made new. I'm consistently being transformed. And the way that I think, just because I think something doesn't make it true. And so to evaluate and say, what does God have to say about this? Because ultimately everything I had done up until I accepted Jesus didn't work for me. My relationships were shot, uh, the my inner, my inner personal world was a train wreck. I was directionless and purposeless and had nowhere to go. And not everybody who doesn't have the Lord feels that way. And that's okay. If if you if people are without God and they feel at peace and their world is good, then uh I'd love to talk to them and I'd love to find out more because I think that everyone struggles with something in someone. And so as we're exploring these ideas of God, it's not a one size fits all, it's a very subjective experience. And what I read in scripture is that God is so personal. The way he pursues this is really personal, but the answers are always the same. And so for me, faith is one of my strengths. And you know, they always do all these tests and personality quizzes and all that good stuff. And in the church, we have many of those as well. And so they say your spiritual giftings. And so I did a spiritual gifting test a handful of years ago, and then again recently to evaluate. And um, faith is my number one. And so over the years, I have just grown in this idea that I can trust God infinitely. He has never left me or forsaken me, and he is always with me. No matter what circumstances happened in my world, whether it be self-induced because I made really bad decisions or others induced where other people's decisions have affected me negatively, God has always taken care of me and provided in the midst of whatever tribulation has occurred.

SPEAKER_01 19:06

So, who were the people who showed up for you when you didn't feel worthy of being seen?

SPEAKER_00 19:12

Oh man, the the women in AA for sure were super pivotal. There were significant leaders in the original church that I started going to with my sponsor Goldie. Um that uh Melissa was one of the women at the church that I was going to who's really significant. And then there were significant pastors who showed up for me as well. So um that gave me opportunities and chances that I never would have allowed me to have, if it was up to me. But like I went and served at a youth camp without even being a part of the church. So I ended up being on staff at a church called Life Church, Canton, at the time. And but before I was on staff there, one of the pastors, Dan Pratt, invited me to be a part of the Camp and Marcy Rahill was uh the wife of another pastor who invited me to be a part of that. And so I went and served with this week-long camp experience and fell in love with teenagers. Just the opportunity to show up for them and tell them how meaningful they are and the purpose that they have to be the adult in these kids' lives that I wish that I would have had was revolutionary for me. And then I ended up starting to go to the church in that fall, but I I left the other church. And not because that church was bad, just because it's not where God had me. It was a good church. I just had such a hard time getting connected and I really wrestled with that because of my personality. I was serving every single week and I was in all these small groups and I became a member, and but I just didn't have any intimate relationships. Meanwhile, I'm serving at another church and building all of these valuable relationships and pouring out. And so I prayed about it for about six months and then made the decision to move over. But anyway, so I ended up there and just felt this like beautiful opportunity to love people and build good relationships. And so the pastors at that church were really wonderful. So Life Church can they're all disseminated now to different congregations. But uh Dan Pratt was really wonderful, Mike Rice was really Alex Rahill Sr. He is the one who gave me the chance to serve in ministry in a ministry capacity. And um that was probably one of the most um valuing experiences that I had, where I did not know enough. I did not think I should be afforded an opportunity to work at a church. Um I considered myself a baby Christian, but it was uh five years after I had accepted Jesus. So I still was like, oh, I don't know enough. If only you knew these things about me, you wouldn't let me work here. But I told him the things and he welcomed me with open arms, and it was really profound. It was really powerful.

SPEAKER_01 22:05

How has your past shaped the way you lead? You love and you serve others today.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

Oh man. Well, some of the challenges that I have is that I'm pretty extreme with some of the boundaries that I have with people about habits and health. So the pros and cons of being in recovery is that I understand the throes of addiction. And so the pro of that is that I'm very gracious and compassionate towards people who have struggles. And I think everybody should be in recovery because we all struggle with a variety of things, whether it's attention, addiction, or coping through social media or drugs or food. I just think everybody really struggles with something. So it has given me that perspective, which is a which is a benefit in ministry to be able to offer people hope and freedom and encouragement that they matter and that they don't have to continue to live the way that they're living now. One of the cons, I would say, one of the ways that it negatively impacts me is that I'm a little bit more um rigid. I'm a little bit more confrontational about issues that I see. And so that can be off-putting to some people. I'm not a very gracious person, which I asked the Lord to help me with that. And so I have a lot of really high expectations for people. And I worked really hard over the past 10 years to grow in the fruit of the spirit of gentleness and kindness. And because sometimes I just want to say, you know, what you're doing is super unhealthy, you have to stop doing it. It was about five years ago that I realized that I often will try to play the Holy Spirit in people's lives. And what I mean by that is if somebody is struggling with something and they don't see it, I'm like, oh, well, I could just tell you, I could just tell you that you're struggling with this thing. But so often in our journey with God or in our journey with the ourselves, we really need to come to a place where we experience that ourselves. And if somebody else points it out to us and we're not prepared or we're not ready to receive that truth, we're just gonna shut down and run in the opposite direction. And so I have had to work really hard at not doing that for people.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

You're married, healthy, and living a life filled with purpose. What does quote living your best life mean to you now compared to what you thought it meant years ago?

SPEAKER_00 24:37

Well, let's see. Living my best life means that it doesn't mean that everything is rainbows and butterflies, for sure. I think it means that I show up authentically in situations and I have self-restraint and self-control, and I be mindful about how I treat people. It means that I have intention behind the things that I spend my time doing. And does that mean I don't scroll too much sometimes? I for sure do. But it just means that I that I do due diligence to pay attention to what's going on around me and I work hard to find peace with what is going on. So, for example, it would be like I can't control everything going on around me, but I can control my response to everything going on around me. And so I think that living my best life means that I have uh consistency and intention with the way that I do things. So, whether that be my marriage or whether that be the way I parent my girls, or whether it be how I show up to work, I want to have intentionality behind the things that I'm doing in submission to what God has called me to do. And so a lot of it has come through some really mindful prayer and meditation and considering my giftings, the things I have experienced in my life, my personality, my attitude and abilities. Then I take all of those things and I have created kind of like a personal calling, essentially, and figured out what God has desired for me to do. And then I filter everything I do through that lens. Is this gonna lead towards what God has called me to do, or is this a distraction? And I have to say no to really good things sometimes, but ultimately I want everything I do to be in submission to the Lord and in submission to what he's called me to do. And what that is, is that God has gifted and called me to help other people evaluate and identify who God has called them to be and then equip them to move forward in relationship with God and in relationship with the calling that God has placed on their lives. So my calling is to help other people identify and live fully into who God has called them to be. And once I realized that, it was so much more helpful to realize how I should be spending my time, what I should be doing, what I should be studying and reading and learning about. So I think that has been very valuable versus my best life historically was just do whatever feels good and do what you want, which leads to a life of just futility and emptiness. It's just despair, really meaningless. Um, because what feels good is not always the right decision, and it's not always what brings us true and genuine joy. And happiness and joy are different, I think. Happiness is often circumstantial, and joy is just a sense of uh something that we carry regardless of what's going on around us.

SPEAKER_01 27:46

So, what do you want people to understand about addiction, especially those who've never experienced it or have loved someone who has?

SPEAKER_00 27:55

Everybody's bottom is different, and you cannot play the Holy Spirit in people's lives. You cannot get them to want to be sober, you cannot get them to want to do it until they come to a place within themselves that they're ready to do it. And I would say that even goes to anything. It's such a anytime we struggle with things, so whether it be addiction or just an identity crisis, you can't make people think a certain way and you can't make people get healthy. You genuinely have to decide what level of their behavior you're willing to tolerate or be a part of, and then have intentional boundaries with that, which is so tricky to do because you think if I don't show up for this person, they could kill themselves through drinking or through drugs. And in that event, I would call 911, I would call crisis hotlines, I would ask people for help. But addiction, whether it be to food or pornography or drugs or alcohol, it really is such a self-discovery thing. And I would say don't give up on people, but make sure that you don't sacrifice yourself at the altar of trying to get it for someone else because that's codependency and you really can't get it for someone else. And so I think my greatest suggestion is take care of yourself, be intentional with finding your own healing while also showing up intentionally for others where you're able to do that. But it won't change until the addict is ready.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

Right. It's hard. Um, I think finding that balance between wanting to support them, but not enabling them and wanting for them to get better, but also recognizing you can't control that. They have to want that for themselves.

SPEAKER_00 29:42

Yeah. Yep, absolutely. It is so nuanced and it is so tricky, and I do not have it figured out. I talk to people every single day who are dealing with family issues, relationship dynamic problems, their own struggles, and it is such a fine line between love and enablement that I don't have a clear-cut answer. And it's so subjective and individual. Um, because what is uh codependent and enabling, someone might just not be able to not do that yet. And so while they're struggling with their loved ones' addiction, they're also struggling with their own addiction to codependency. And so it just becomes very tricky for me, even to have healthy boundaries with somebody who's trying to help somebody to not tell them what to do. It's all it's just a fine line. It is a fine, fine line.

SPEAKER_01 30:37

So for the person who's listening right now and feels lost in their own story, what would you say to them?

SPEAKER_00 30:45

Don't do it alone. Don't wrestle alone. Find a healthy group of people to show up to. And I obviously I love the Lord more than anything in the whole world, and I think that he is the way, the truth, and the light, that Jesus Christ is the only way. And so my suggestion would be to find a healthy church community. But if you're not a believer, if you're like eye rolling at me a little bit, that's okay. Uh, find a group of people who are in pursuit of emotional health and spiritual health and physical health to really show up to and say, hey, I'm really struggling and I don't know what to do. And uh if you're listening to this podcast, I would say, I'm available, I would love to chat with you. Uh but if you just don't know what to do, I would really encourage you not to wrestle alone. Uh, that I'm sure you have at least one or two people in your life who would love to support you and care for you, and that there is evil in this world, and the darkness of this world wants to isolate us and it wants to tell us that nobody understands and that we have to figure this all out by ourselves, and that's just a lie. And uh you can't fight against lies on your own. And it's really important to turn to a community of people, and I think ultimately the Lord for true guidance and understanding of who you are and how to overcome those dark places.

SPEAKER_01 32:13

Your story is a powerful reminder that no one is too far gone or too broken or too lost for redemption. You've shown us that healing isn't a straight line, that it's a journey of faith, of courage, humility, and choosing to step toward the light every single day. So thank you for your honesty and the way you use your past, not as a place of shame, but as a testimony of what's actually possible. Your life is proof that grace transforms, love restores, and purpose can rise from the ashes. And to anyone listening, if you're navigating the darkness, please hear Kate's message and find your tribe and the people you can lean on as you go through your journey. Kate, thank you for joining us today.

SPEAKER_00 33:10

Thank you, Tanya, for having me, and thank you everybody for listening. I'm so grateful for the opportunity.

SPEAKER_01 33:18

Thank you for spending time with me today. If you enjoyed this content, please make sure you subscribe to this podcast and leave a quick review to help us share the message.