Sherry O'Neill

Strong at the Broken Places Sherry O'Neill

Sherry grew up in an idyllic southern hamlet on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. Life was chaotic and unstable with glamorous, but hard-drinking parents. When she was nine years old, her mother began a dark, slow descent into alcoholism and insanity. At the same time, her beloved father turned his back on the family, removing his love and protection, and leaving her to care for her mother and two younger siblings. Her father divorced her mother while was recuperating in a mental hospital and left the family for good. He deposited Sherry's siblings with their maternal grandparents, and embarked on a new, single life.




Bruised and emotionally battered, Sherry began an odyssey of moving from one residence to another while attempting to finish high school. Looking for a way to deal with her unrequited anger and grief, she turned to food as solace, becoming a binge eater and a morbidly obese young girl. Hopelessness, shame, and loneliness drove her deep into depression and frightening, self-destructive behavior.




During the darkest times, help often arrived through chance encounters with unexpected people who gave Sherry the will to keep going. In her twenties, one seemingly random event reset her journey and placed her on the road to healing.




This is ultimately a story of resilience and hard-won acceptance that the people we love the most can break our heart-that often the person we'd take a bullet for is the one holding the gun. And it is also a reminder that we are not destined to hand on pain to others as it was handed to us.




Strong at the Broken Places is a road map for redemption, a cautionary tale rich with emotion and honest to the core. Told with courage and love, it is a triumph.