The Year Everything Fell Apart (And How I Put It Back Together)

There’s a moment when the cracks in your life stop being hairline fractures you can ignore and suddenly split wide enough to swallow the whole thing whole. For me, that moment came about midway through last January, somewhere between burning my tongue on scalding hot leftover soup and realizing my car wouldn’t start in the frozen Boise morning. A metaphor, sure—but it was also real soup, actual car trouble, and the start of a year I was pretty sure belonged more to a country song than my carefully mapped-out life.

But here’s the thing about falling apart: sometimes, the clean-up is where the good stuff happens. Let’s break this down, section by messy section, and take a look at how I went from sobbing into my steering wheel to piecing my life back together—and living to tell (and laugh about) it.

Chapter One: When the Potato Chips Are Down

Let me set the stage. I was newly single at 33, which felt like being dropped into the ocean straight out of a perfectly serviceable paddleboat. My long-term live-in partner had pulled the old, “We’ve grown apart,” speech, which I now refer to as the Idaho Special™—a charming way of saying, “I’d rather backpack through South America with someone else.”

Add to that a job that had grown stagnant, a pile of unpaid student loans lurking like an ill-timed horror-movie jump-scare, and friendships that had drifted because I’d spent too long inside Relationship Tunnel Vision. From the outside, everything looked… fine-ish. From the inside, though? Total chaos.

You know those survival shows where contestants wrap duct tape around broken gear to stay afloat in their hand-built canoe? That’s what I tried doing. Figured if I could just keep going—stick the paddle in harder, you know?—I’d make it to the other side of the rapids.

Spoiler alert: I capsized.

Chapter Two: Flirt Like a Farmer

Here’s the advice I wish someone had given me: stand still for a second. When you’re in the middle of a free fall, the last thing you should do is try to fix everything at once. Lost partner? Let them go. Job stress? Take long walks, even if that means leaving the inbox unattended for an afternoon. Personal identity crisis? You’re on the brink of redefining who you are—don’t force that clarity by speed-running self-help podcasts.

My first baby step didn’t come on purpose. (This is the part where I make potatoes sound metaphorically profound, because here in Idaho, vegetables teach life lessons.) One frozen Saturday morning, I wandered into the Boise Farmers Market, mostly to distract myself from crying in bed for the third straight weekend. There was a farmer selling five-pound bags of wonky-looking potatoes they called “ugly but hearty.” They were selling for half-price because they weren’t perfect.

Honestly? Same.

I took some home because I couldn’t not adopt these little underdogs. While peeling those misshapen spuds into submission later that night, I realized I’d spent years trying to sand down my own imperfections for other people. I was a gourmet dinner pretending to be weekday convenience-store sushi, and it was exhausting. So, without overthinking it, I made the quietest of resolutions: this year was going to be about peeling back expectations and sitting comfortably in my skin—even the bumpy, uneven parts.

Chapter Three: Building a Life From the Rubble

How do you rebuild a house—or a soul—that’s caved in? You don’t start by dragging the dusty roof back into place. You pick a foundation and square it up. For me, this meant three big steps:

  1. Find Your People (The Ones Who Cheer Even When You Cry):
    After years of becoming a relationship-packed hermit crab, my friendships needed major attention. So I texted a friend I hadn’t seen since pre-pandemic times and said, “Brunch? Or, like, any food involving mimosas?” She replied instantly: “Yes. Always yes.”
    What started with one mimosa friend turned into reconnecting with Boise’s literary crowd again, attending open mic nights, and even joining a few book swaps. Some weekends, I stayed out later than expected; nothing broke, the world didn’t implode, and I remembered how to laugh so hard my ribs hurt.

  2. Let Hobbies Be Bad:
    I attempted pottery. It was a disaster, but the joy of messing up without consequence felt like rebellion. I planted tomatoes in a backyard patch, and a particularly violent thunderstorm wiped out half the crop—I still grilled the surviving ones into bruschetta, making memories of failure tasted ridiculously sweet. And that’s the beauty of hobbies. You can be genuinely terrible at them, and they’ll never leave you for someone adventurous.

  3. Reconsider Your Day Job:
    This might be the hardest part, but I had to ask the terrifying question: Did my work still fill me up, or was I doing it because it was safe? Quitting the Idaho Statesman outright was too bold for Post-Breakup Leslie, but freelancing at night to test my voice again gave me the creative spark I’d let fizzle. Starting small matters.

Chapter Four: Dating This New Version of Myself

I know, I know. Writing anything about “dating yourself” sounds like it belongs on a chalkboard sign at a coffee shop that serves $8 matcha lattes. But hear me out.

When I wasn’t trying to tack my identity to anyone else’s, I realized I could be a pretty solid person to hang out with. I took myself to poorly attended indie movies, walked along the Boise Greenbelt at dusk, and sang my lungs out to The National’s High Violet while driving down Hill Road. Sure, there were moments I’d see a cute couple at Whole Foods and frown hard enough to invent new forehead wrinkles, but I was doing something. One foot, one toe, in front of the other.

Chapter Five: Lessons I Didn't Know I Was Learning

Here’s the plot twist: while rebuilding the broken stuff, I accidentally set the stage for new things I didn’t know I needed.

When I stopped expecting everything to miraculously fix itself on my timetable, the universe answered in small, subtle ways. A new writing assignment last May brought me to a tech conference, where I met a fellow journalist who insisted we grab coffee to swap notes. That coffee turned into a three-hour chat, and while I swore I wasn’t dating anyone yet, I didn’t mind when he asked for my number.

Spoiler alert: That coffee guy? We’re still seeing each other. He doesn’t miss deadlines or skip good-night texts. And I don’t rush to throw all my hopes and dreams onto his shoulders.

Conclusion: If You Can’t Dance, Just Sway

So, yeah—the year everything fell apart was also the year things fell into place in ways I couldn’t predict. If you’re surviving a season of soul-level earthquakes, let me tell you this much: stop trying to glue yourself to an image of perfection that doesn’t fit.

Let things break. Let yourself sulk in sweatpants for as long as you want. But don’t forget to pick up the “ugly but hearty” bits of life you thought you’d lost. They’ll surprise you every time.

And when you’re ready—whether that’s tomorrow, next month, or sometime years from now—you can peel another potato and start again.