Why I Believe in Second Chances
When I named my business Sheryl’s Second Chance Designs, I didn’t choose the words Second Chance because they sounded good.
I chose them because I’m living mine.
There was a time when the life I have today would have felt impossible.
I spent years trapped in addiction to meth, heroin, and gambling. My addiction took me places I never imagined I would go. I used dirty needles. I stole to support my habit. I made choices that hurt myself and other people. I became someone I barely recognized.
My Recovery Didn’t Happen All at Once
On June 2, 2018, I stopped using heroin. That was a huge change, but it wasn’t the end of my addiction.
I was still using meth. I was still gambling. And gambling had its own grip on my life.
I couldn’t begin to tell you exactly how much money I put into casinos over the years. Tens of thousands of dollars, possibly hundreds of thousands. I could win money and lose it just as quickly. Today, I’m still working on repairing my relationship with money because of the way gambling taught me to think about it.
I don’t share those things because I’m proud of them.
I share them because that person deserved a second chance, too.
The Truth About My Clean Date
On May 29, 2022, I started pursuing recovery. But I wasn’t actually clean yet.
I told people I was.
At first, it was a lie I was afraid to admit. Then the longer I carried it, the harder it became to tell the truth.
I was ashamed. I was afraid of being judged. I was afraid of disappointing the people who loved and supported me. I was afraid that admitting the truth would somehow erase everything I had accomplished since then.
So I carried it for more than four years.
Every time I said the clean date I had originally claimed, I knew it wasn’t true. Even though I really had stopped using drugs shortly afterward and had built years of recovery, that dishonesty became something I carried quietly with me.
Eventually, I realized I didn’t want shame deciding what parts of my story I was allowed to tell anymore.
So I got honest.
June 28, 2022 is my clean date.
Telling the truth didn’t erase the recovery I had built. It gave me the freedom to finally own all of it.
Why I Stayed
My recovery didn’t begin with some perfect, inspirational moment where I suddenly knew my worth.
I felt lost. I felt hopeless. I thought I was in love with someone who had been in recovery for a while, and initially I wanted to stop using because I wanted to be with him.
That relationship didn’t last.
But something unexpected happened when it ended.
I stayed.
I really did quit using drugs. And somewhere along the way, I decided I wanted recovery for me.
I spent 17 months living in an Oxford House, surrounded by people learning how to live differently. I found Narcotics Anonymous, and through NA I found something I desperately needed: people who understood where I had been without believing that was where I had to stay.
I found hope.
I found love.
I found community.
And slowly, I started building a life instead of simply surviving one.
What My Second Chance Looks Like Today
Today, I’m a mom who gets the incredible opportunity to be present in my daughter’s life. I have a career. I have people I love and a community I care deeply about. I’ve been trusted to use my voice in ways I never could have imagined during my addiction.
And now I own a business built around hope and awareness.
The woman who once felt completely hopeless now gets to create things that tell other people:
You matter.
Recovery is possible.
Your past does not get to decide your future.
Your story isn’t over.
My life isn’t magically perfect because I’m in recovery. I’m still repairing things. I’m still learning. I’m still growing. I’m still discovering parts of myself that addiction buried for a long time.
And recovery can still ask me to become more honest years later.
Maybe that’s part of the second chance, too.
It isn’t getting to rewrite the past into a prettier version. It’s finally being willing to tell the truth about it and realizing you are still worthy of the life you’ve built.
A second chance doesn’t erase the first chapter. It gives you the opportunity to write what comes next.
Why This Business Exists
That’s why I believe so strongly in second chances.
It’s why I believe we have to stop reducing people to the worst things they’ve ever done.
It’s why recovery awareness matters to me.
And it’s why Sheryl’s Second Chance Designs exists.
When you see Second Chance in my logo, you’re seeing more than the name of a little business.
You’re seeing my story.
And if something I create starts one conversation, challenges one person’s idea about addiction, celebrates someone’s recovery, honors someone we’ve lost, or gives one struggling person a little hope, then this business is doing exactly what I created it to do.
There are a whole lot of us walking around today because somebody, somewhere, believed our story wasn’t finished.
I’m one of them.
Wear hope. Spread awareness. Inspire change.