[Serious] People who hit rock bottom and had to start again from zero, what happened and how did it go?

My rock bottom started when I moved to a new country with a boyfriend who quickly became emotionally and at one point, physically, abusive. We were both drinking a lot and doing a bunch of drugs and I pretty much stopped eating and eventually I quit my job because I wasn't coping.

A couple of months later I had used up all my money, still had no job, and finally broke up with the boyfriend losing my house in the process. The friend who took me in immediately after that, kicked me out after about a week and I was left on my own with very little money and no job prospects. I was at this point regularly crying on the street and also blacking out from not eating. It was not a great time.

One day I happened to have coffee with an old housemate and he offered for me to stay on his couch for a bit which took some stress off and meant I could focus on applying for work. It was difficult because I really only had shitty old baggy clothes to go to job interviews in, looked like shit and I was still eating very little so my brain wasn't very sharp but I did get a job. From there I was able to move into a hostel, then after some time and saving eventually moved into a house with a friend.

It wasn't really all up and up from there on out though, I was left with pretty crippling anxiety for a year or so after that, the inability to save money (I just felt like I had to spend everything I had in case it was gone again), drinking problems, and just generally was pretty broken for quite some time.

/r/AskReddit Thread