Alcohol Addiction, Liver Failure & Transplant | Tia’s Recovery StoryAlcohol Addiction, Liver Failure & Transplant | Tia’s Recovery Story
Hard Knox Talks: Sober Stories. Real Talk.
Tia talks about growing up with alcoholism, drinking herself into liver failure, and the harrowing journey to a liver transplant. She shares how faith, gratitude and a sense of responsibility to her donor shape her ongoing recovery and future plans in nursing.
32:38•2 Oct 2026
Liver Failure, Second Chances and Faith: Tia’s Journey Through Alcohol Addiction
Episode Overview
- Growing up around heavy drinking can normalise alcohol use from a very young age and shape later addiction.
- Denial can persist even after a life-threatening diagnosis, making medical crises feel unreal or exaggerated.
- End-stage liver disease involves intense procedures, physical pain and loss of independence, not a quick fix.
- Reconnecting with faith and practising simple prayer can be a turning point, even before physical healing occurs.
- Life after transplant carries a "heavy gift" of responsibility, requiring daily medication, healthy habits and ongoing gratitude.
“Alcohol is the ultimate deceptor. It makes you think that everything’s perfect, everything’s beautiful, everything’s great, even when you’re throwing up.”
Curious about how others navigate their sobriety journey? This conversation with Tia offers a raw look at alcohol addiction, liver failure, and what it means to be handed a literal second shot at life. You’ll hear how Tia grew up in a home filled with alcoholism, sneaking sips of beer under the table at six and drinking regularly by her early teens.
She talks about suicide attempts, relationships soaked in alcohol, and reaching the point where a gallon of booze a day felt normal. Even after doctors told her, "my liver was dying" and she needed a transplant, she kept drinking, describing her life as "nothing but denial" and alcohol as "the ultimate deceptor". The episode doesn’t gloss over the medical reality.
Tia explains her abdomen filling with fluid, having seven to nine litres drained every couple of weeks, becoming bedbound, and feeling like death might be a relief. She shares how she eventually stopped drinking because she physically couldn’t move, and how a "forever hangover" and relentless nausea made survival feel impossible. Faith becomes a central thread.
Tia admits she first believed she "deserved to die" for drinking herself into liver failure, then describes the shift when she started praying again, saying, "once I finally let God into my soul… the healing started"—even before the transplant. She recounts failed liver offers, the emotional rollercoaster of a Christmas Eve near-miss, and the moment she finally got the call that a liver was waiting on a special machine.
Post-surgery, Tia wakes in unbearable pain, faces complications, then experiences the shock of waking with "no pain" and an overwhelming sense of responsibility to honour the donor she lovingly calls "Chad". Now studying nursing, she wants to support other transplant patients and bring some of that light she found to others. If you’re wrestling with guilt, denial, or fear of change, could Tia’s story be the reminder that a second chance might be worth fighting for?
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