Content warning: This piece includes raw descriptions of active addiction, domestic abuse, trauma, emotional dysregulation, suicidal ideation, and shame. If that’s heavy for you right now, take care of yourself first. Progress is progress—mile or millimeter.
I used to lie on a bathroom floor, cheek pressed against cold, dirty tile that smelled of mildew and regret, wondering how the hell I got here. Meth smoke still lingering in my hair, track marks hidden under long sleeves, heart racing from the latest hit that promised relief but delivered only more emptiness. That woman—junkie, liar, thief, broken mother—was me. And today, as Belinda “Belle” Morey, CSAC, licensed clinical substance abuse counselor, recovery coach, wife, and mom building Progress Is Progress LLC in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, she is still me. All of it. No apologies.
The labels don’t get to fight each other anymore. I hold them all in these same hands that once clutched a rifle in the back of a freezing pickup truck, and now sign progress notes for clients clawing their way out of the same darkness.
The Shed and the Lies That Felt Like Love
Picture a 10x10 shed behind my in-laws’ house in northern Wisconsin. No running water. Extension cord snaking electricity from the main house. A king bed dominating the space, a pack-and-play squeezed beside it for my newborn with the crazy blonde halo of hair and Benjamin Button face. We hauled every bucket of water by hand. It felt rustic at first—building something together. Romantic, even.
That’s where the love shack illusion cracked open. The man I thought could save me—charismatic, wounded, just like me—brought the chaos. Infidelity while I recovered from a C-section. Punches that “didn’t leave marks.” A tooth punched clean through my lip—twice. Seventeen stitches the second time. Choking until the edges of my vision went black. Rape that I didn’t even name as such for years because codependency had me convinced it was love, or my fault, or something I could fix if I just tried harder.
We moved to a trailer deep in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. Isolation wrapped around us like the pines—beautiful until it became chains. I sold my land in Michigan’s UP to make it happen. The violence escalated. The name-calling. The degradation. The constant walking on eggshells while using meth to numb the fear and shame.
I lost years with my kids in that fog. Time I can never get back. The biological father’s rights were eventually terminated after years of his own addiction, abuse, and prison stints. My current husband—steady, supportive, a tribal member—adopted the boys. We stood in that courtroom, tears flowing (mine, his, even the judge’s), hearing we were “amazing.” Full circle from the times I stood before judges begging for mercy as the defendant.
The Truck Night
One freezing Wisconsin winter night, the rage and pain boiled over. I left my baby bundled in the pack-and-play, heater humming, and drove. Parked where I could watch the house through the open tailgate window of my old pickup. .270 Savage rifle heavy in my hands—the same one I’d carried hunting with my grandpa. Burgundy’s curtains glowing warm inside. Shadows moving close together. My husband and her.
For a split second, the dark power felt intoxicating: I control this. I can end the pain. Then the full movie hit—blue lights, cuffs biting wrists, the smell of the squad car, my baby growing up without me, repeating the cycle. I didn’t pull the trigger. Grace won, barely. That moment lives in my bones still—the metallic gun oil, the fog of breath, the howling wind.
I crawled back to the shed. Kept surviving. Kept using. Until I didn’t.
From Rock Bottom to the Other Side of the Stretcher
Ten-plus years sober now from methamphetamine. I went from the patient wheeled into the ER—labeled “drug seeker,” “noncompliant,” “difficult”—to the counselor and former EMT walking the same ambulance bay, presenting on breaking shame in healthcare systems. I’ve sat with clients who see their own stories in mine. I’ve coached high-functioning professionals who wear the same masks I once did.
I still feel the imposter voice in “too-nice” spaces—like walking into that potential Northwoods office rental filled with delicate pottery and hand-blown glass, hands clasped, afraid to touch anything. This place is too good for someone like me. Sweaty palms during business talk. The old script playing loud: You smoked meth. You did those things. Do you belong here?
I say it out loud now. The full truth. Because hiding feeds the shame. Owning it starves it.
My mom is doing her own codependency work with my workbook, learning boundaries and voice. My kids are thriving—bedtime stories, woods play, stability they deserve. I facilitate groups, plan community events like Real Talk Recovery in Lac du Flambeau, build partnerships with tribal communities and schools. Progress Is Progress isn’t just a name or LLC. It’s the millimeter wins that got me here.
Holding It All Without Apology
I am the junkie on the bathroom floor.
The survivor who left the trailer.
The mother who lost time but fought for more.
The counselor on the other side of the notes.
The wife in a healthy marriage.
The business owner staring down funding struggles and imposter syndrome while scaling something real.
These identities don’t cancel each other out. They layer. They inform. They make me dangerous to stigma because I’ve lived every angle.
To the person reading this from their own bathroom floor, or the back of their metaphorical truck, or the “high-functioning” mask that’s cracking: You are not broken beyond repair. Your past doesn’t get the final word. The shame lies. It tells you you’re only one label. You’re the whole damn story—and the story keeps going.
Fuck the shame. Not in the defiant middle-finger way of early recovery (though that had its place). In the quiet, radical acceptance way that lets you walk into the nice office anyway. That lets you coach others while still doing your own work. That lets you hold all the versions of yourself without apology.
You have no idea where your next right decision can take you. It won’t be perfect. It won’t erase the scars (the lip that still catches the light, the memories that hit at loud noises). But it can be real. Grounded. Purposeful. Filled with connection you didn’t think was possible.
Progress is progress. Mile or millimeter.
I’m not sorry. And you don’t have to be either.
Belle Morey, BS, CSAC
Clinical Substance Abuse Counselor & Recovery Coach
Progress Is Progress LLC
Arbor Vitae, Wisconsin | Serving the Northwoods and beyond
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