I Broke the Cycle: From Childhood Trauma and Addiction to 21 Years of Sobriety
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With Christina Simos.
On this week’s episode of Crosstalk Podcast, we speak with Christina Simos, CEO of Friendly House and a woman in long-term recovery who has spent more than two decades rebuilding her life and helping other women do the same.
Christina’s story is not simply about getting sober.
It is a story about growing up surrounded by alcoholism and generational trauma, surviving a deeply chaotic childhood, struggling with addiction herself, becoming a mother, finding recovery, and eventually returning to the very place that helped save her life.
It is a story about breaking the cycle and discovering purpose on the other side of addiction.
Growing Up in Chaos
Christina was born in Queens to a Black father and Puerto Rican mother. Her parents joined the Air Force hoping to escape poverty, but when her father returned from Vietnam, he came home with PTSD, drug and alcohol problems, and trauma that nobody around him knew how to address.
Alcohol became part of the family environment. There was conflict, instability, and experiences Christina would spend years trying to understand.
As a child, she learned to survive by keeping secrets, becoming a people pleaser, and adapting herself to whatever the people around her needed.
She also struggled with feeling like she belonged nowhere. Growing up mixed in the 1970s, she felt caught between identities and often felt like an outsider looking in.
Her grandmother became one of the few sources of unconditional love and safety in her childhood.
That relationship gave Christina something she desperately needed: hope.
When Survival Wasn’t Enough
By her teenage years, the weight of everything she had experienced became overwhelming.
At around 15, Christina attempted to take her own life multiple times. She eventually entered a treatment facility and made it clear that returning home was not an option.
Instead, she entered a transitional living program in Arizona and began living independently while still a teenager.
She eventually went to college, first at a community college and later at Arizona State University. Her dream was music, but messages from her family made her question whether she was capable of pursuing it.
So she turned toward journalism, hoping she could use storytelling to create change and influence how people like her were represented.
But the unresolved trauma was still there.
The Addiction She Never Thought She Would Have
Christina had spent much of her childhood watching alcohol destroy her family.
She was determined not to become like her parents.
Then, at 24, she tried marijuana for the first time.
Her first experience was frightening. The next day, however, everything changed.
She experienced a high that made her feel confident, powerful, beautiful, and free from the constant noise in her head.
For the first time, she felt like she could turn everything off.
And she wanted more.
What began as experimentation quickly became a lifestyle. She began partying, drinking, using cocaine and other substances, and exploring a version of herself that felt completely different from the “good girl” she had always been.
She believed she was in control.
She wasn't.
Chasing the Life She Thought She Wanted
During her years of active addiction, Christina continued pursuing her dreams.
She returned to music, recorded an album, became a finalist for an MTV VJ opportunity, and found herself surrounded by an environment where drinking and drug use were normalized.
From the outside, she was pursuing her ambitions.
Behind the scenes, her substance use was escalating.
She was drinking daily and using cocaine. The shame was there, even when she told herself she had everything under control.
Then she became pregnant.
Christina describes the pregnancy as something that may have saved her life because it forced her to confront the danger she was putting herself in.
When her son was born, something inside her shifted.
For the first time, she experienced a kind of unconditional love that made her want to give her child everything she had never received herself.
But becoming a mother did not immediately mean becoming sober.
It would take another five years.
Rock Bottom and the Decision to Change
Christina eventually returned to using.
The cycle continued until she reached a point where she once again wanted to die.
At 33, she spent 12 days in a hospital and was eventually admitted to a psychiatric ward.
She remembers looking at her life and wondering how she had ended up there.
But she also knew something had to change.
She had a child who needed her.
She couldn't continue living the way she had been living.
After leaving the hospital, Christina entered Friendly House, a recovery home for women in Los Angeles that had been founded in 1951.
It was different from anything she had experienced before.
For the first time, she found herself surrounded by women who understood her.
And then someone told her something simple:
“Sweetheart, you're going to be okay.”
Christina wasn't convinced.
But she was willing to listen.
That willingness changed everything.
Why Christina Simos' Story Matters
Addiction doesn't always look like someone who has completely lost everything.
Sometimes it looks like a talented woman pursuing her dreams.
Sometimes it looks like a mother trying to hold her family together.
Sometimes it looks like someone who appears confident, successful, and completely in control.
Christina's story reminds us that recovery isn't simply about stopping the substance.
It is about confronting trauma, learning humility, building accountability, accepting help, repairing relationships, and creating a life worth staying present for.
Twenty-one years into sobriety, Christina isn't just living proof that recovery is possible.
She is helping create that possibility for other women.
And perhaps the most powerful part of her story is this:
She didn't just survive her past. She broke the cycle.
FAQs
Who is Christina Simos?
Christina Simos is a woman in long-term recovery and the CEO of Friendly House, a Los Angeles recovery home for women. Her personal experience with addiction and recovery has shaped her work helping other women rebuild their lives.
How long has Christina Simos been sober?
Christina shared that she had reached 21 years of sobriety at the time of the conversation.
What role did Friendly House play in Christina's recovery?
Friendly House provided Christina with a community of women, structure, accountability, meetings, and an environment where she could begin learning how to live in recovery. She later returned to the organization as a volunteer and eventually became its CEO.
Is Christina's story only about addiction?
No. Her story also explores childhood trauma, generational alcoholism, mental health, motherhood, relationships, forgiveness, recovery, and breaking generational cycles.
What does Christina believe is important for lasting recovery?
Christina emphasizes time, structure, community, accountability, service, and consistent recovery practices. She also challenges the idea that a short treatment stay alone is enough to create lasting change.
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I Broke the Cycle: From Childhood Trauma and Addiction to 21 Years of Sobriety