It started with cilantro scissors.

We were in the kitchen, my mum freshly sober and beaming with Pinterest-level optimism, showing me how to mince herbs the “right” way. She’d never cooked for me growing up – never packed a lunch, never stirred soup.

But that week, she was in full redemption mode: shopping at Whole Foods, binge-watching feel-good movies and promising to be the mum I always needed.

Just six months earlier, she’d been living in Texas – trapped in a cycle of alcohol, drugs and eviction notices. She and her husband were broke, desperate and spiralling. Then their trailer caught fire, and they ended up at my grandmother’s in Louisiana.

Somewhere between rock bottom and a megachurch that specialised in redemption arcs, she found sobriety. And Jesus.

My grandmother called to

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