I Wasn't Supposed to Fall Apart

My name is Madison Carter, and I’m 18.

If you’d asked anyone last year, they’d say I had it all figured out—4.0 GPA, varsity tennis, early acceptance into a good college, and a boyfriend who made it seem like forever was already here. That’s the version everyone believed.

But truth is… I was unraveling.

It started right after graduation. Everyone else seemed excited—talking about majors, dorms, summer plans. I couldn’t breathe. At night, I’d lie in bed thinking, What if I’m not good enough? What if I peak now? What if my life just… falls apart?

Then Ethan left.

He said, “You’re too much, Mads. Too intense. Too scared of life.”

That night, something in me cracked. And then came the pills.

It wasn’t dramatic at first. Just a Xanax from a friend. Then a Percocet. Then something else. It made the panic fade for a while. I’d stare at the ceiling, numb, floating above the questions I couldn’t answer.

Soon, I was popping two before class, three when I was alone. I stopped eating. I stopped answering texts. I even skipped college orientation. My mom thought I had the flu. I let her believe it.

But it got darker. Way darker.

One night, I found myself at this party in Eastside—alone, dressed like I wanted someone to notice me, but praying no one would. Some guy offered me something stronger. He said it would make me “feel alive.”

I took it.

Everything blurred.

I woke up in someone’s bathtub with bruises I couldn’t explain and tears I hadn’t realized I was crying. My phone had 23 missed calls. My best friend, Jenna, had texted: “Please, Mads. Come back. You’re scaring me.”

That was the turning point.

Because I looked at myself in that cracked mirror above the sink and thought: This is it. This is where it ends. Or changes.

I walked out of that house barefoot, clutching my phone like it was the last anchor to who I used to be. I called my mom and whispered, “I need help.”

It wasn’t easy. Rehab wasn’t glamorous. It was cold, raw, humiliating at times. But it was real.

There, I met girls like me. Smart, scared, shattered by pressure and pretending. We shared stories like war veterans. We cried. We screamed. We got honest.

Now, it’s been 173 days.

I still get anxious. I still have nights where my chest tightens and the future feels like a monster under the bed. But I talk. I write. I run. And when I feel like I’m falling, I remember that girl in the bathtub and promise I’ll never let her go back.

If you’re reading this and feel like you’re drowning—don’t wait to hit rock bottom. Scream. Call someone. Choose life, even if you don’t know what it looks like yet.

Because I was Madison Carter, and I wasn’t supposed to fall apart.

But I did.

And I’m still here.