There are so many risks I don’t regret, it’s hard to just narrow it down to one. Life is risk, walking out your door is risk, but taking chances with your life is one you shouldn’t take – but one that I have many times over. Being in the mental health system for so long, and also using drugs with my husband, I found myself in various situations where I could have died – either shot dead by a drug dealer, overdosing by the wrong drug, or just crashing into another car because of all the reckless driving I did while high – all of those are risks I don’t regret because it reminds me of where I never want to be again, and it also, (if I am being morbidly honest), let me experience life in a way in which I actually got to “live on the edge.”

But for argument’s sake, the one risk I will NEVER regret, is the one I took when I left New York. I had just gotten furloughed from my job during COVID, and me and my husband decided on just a crazy whim to leave all our furniture on the street and pack up whatever we could fit in my car and head to North Carolina. Being separated from him now, I honestly romanticize that part the most because we embarked on a wild adventure together that would land us both in jail for a year, then him in a pysch hospital for another whole year, and me in a homeless shelter/rehab for 15 more months. We took a lot of risks in those years, just going back in forth in the justice system, boosting stuff from stores to feed our habit, and just living a Bonnie and Clyde fantasy existence. I want to say I regret all of that too, but again, it was an experience like no other that was the epitome of adventure compared to my previous long, boring existence.

That move to North Carolina was something I could have never done on my own – I needed someone, the catalyst, the inspiration that a writer would need to make that leap into a book, that muse that artists crave so bad, that push that only God can give sometimes. I always believed my husband was my greatest downfall, but he was my rescuer as well. I would have forever lived my life in a room in a corner of my parent’s house like I did for so many years, with no hope of ever moving out on my own or getting my own life. Have you ever been stuck in a rut that lasted years? That’s where I was before this move.

“Even though we are not together anymore, thank you Giovanni for giving me that gift of gumption, so I was able to go on that adventure with you – even though we are in separate places now, living different lives, (you chose a life still following drugs), I know now that the season you were here with me was to bring me to the place I needed to be.”

Today, I live on my own independently, three years happily sober, with my wonderful little place, nice car and decent job. I may be single again, but my ex will always hold a place in my heart as the man who I took the biggest risks of my life with – the most beneficial one being the move from New York to North Carolina.

Without risk, there is no reward, and I am living that reward today.

Stay tuned.

Daily writing prompt

Describe a risk you took that you do not regret.

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