Witchcraft, Relapse, and Survival: Who I Wrote This Book For

Who Ink, Blood, Prayer is Written For

This book is for the addict who doesn’t recognize herself in church basements but still keeps showing up because she wants to believe healing is real.

Desperate mature male crying after sharing feeling with group during recovery meeting

It’s for the witch with shaky hands lighting a candle at 3AM, praying the flame doesn’t go out because it’s the only light she has left.

It’s for the ones who walk the in-between: who don’t belong in the sanitized version of recovery or the glitter-filtered altars on social media. The ones who pray with cuss words in their mouth and ash in their hair. The ones who are still bleeding when they kneel.

The grasped hands of those in a small recovery meeting.

It’s for you if you’ve ever looked at your own reflection and seen both a monster and a miracle staring back.

It’s for those who know the Gods as storm and silence, as rage and balm. For those who love Them but also sometimes scream at Them. Who don’t want platitudes: they want proof. And somehow, they keep believing anyway.

This book is for every person who has ever walked into the fire, not because they wanted to burn, but because they were hoping there might be something sacred in the ashes.

You won’t find perfection in these pages. You’ll find pain. You’ll find prayers that sound more like battle cries. You’ll find me—bare, unfiltered, trembling, and still trying. And maybe, just maybe, you’ll find yourself too.

Ink, Blood, & Prayer is not a book you read with clean hands. It’s a book you take to your altar, your bathwater, your graveyard. It’s a book you read when you need to remember that survival is a kind of magic. That staying alive is sacred work.

Higher Powers and Recovery: How They Intertwine with this Poetry Anthology

When I wrote Ink, Blood, & Prayer, I wasn’t setting out to write a book about Paganism. I was trying to survive. I was clawing my way out of relapse, one broken line at a time, reaching for anything that felt like truth. But as the poems poured out, I realized I wasn’t alone on the page. The Old Gods were there with me: every step, every prayer, every scream into the void. They were holding me even when I didn’t yet know how to hold myself.

Paganism isn’t just part of my recovery. It is my recovery.

Recovery and the Steps

This morning, I completed a ritual for Step One. My last part of a 40 day journey before I became ready to move on to Step Two. I didn’t just write a list. I lit candles. I sprinkled herbs, burned my list, and offered up every ounce of surrender I had left. I called on Wodan, Frau Holle, and Frau Perchta. I cried out to the spirits of my ancestors. And I felt something I haven’t felt in a long time: peace. Not the Instagram kind. The blood-and-bone kind. The kind you earn when you break open and let the Divine in.

If you’re interested in exactly what I did for this ritual, a step-by-step guide is available on my TikTok at

A blurred ghostly figure appearing on a path, like a pagan spirit, in a spooky forest with trees silhouetted on a moody foggy winters day.

Now, I’m stepping into Step Two with these Proto-Germanic deities at my side. I’m inviting in their clarity, their wildness, their unflinching presence. These Gods don’t ask me to be perfect. They ask me to be real. And in that rawness, I am finding serenity.

What Does a Book About Recovery Matter to a Non-Addict Pagan?

Ink, Blood, & Prayer is soaked in this magic. In its pages, you’ll find whispered prayers to the Seneca spirits from the soil in which I was born and raised and I will forever call home, the Germanic Gods who taught me strength, the Norwegian deities who walked with me through snow and silence. This book is not just my story: it’s my offering. It’s a sacred mess of grief, rage, surrender, and survival.

Come see what it means to pray with dirt under your nails.
Come see how the Old Gods answer.
Come walk with me through Ink, Blood, & Prayer.

So if you’re a recovering addict, a kitchen witch, a spirit worker, a wounded healer, a poet in pain, or someone just barely holding it together: this is for you.

Because you’re still here.
And that matters more than you know.

Tell Me About Your God(s)

I’ve shown you mine, now I want to hear about yours.

Whether you call on the Old Gods, the elements, your ancestors, a nameless Spirit, or something entirely your own… I want to know what holds you up when the world falls apart. What do you turn to when recovery feels impossible? Who do you pray to when you’re not sure you believe in anything?

Drop a comment below and tell me about your higher power(s): however you define them. Share your rituals, your doubts, your moments of grace. Let this be a place where we name the sacred out loud, in all its forms.

And if this post speaks to you, please share it. Someone out there is waiting to remember they’re not alone in this.

Let’s light the way for each other.

Candlelit books on a teal background create a cozy atmosphere.

Your Invitation to this Sacred Mess

Ink, Blood, & Prayer is available for pre-order now on all major platforms, in both print and eBook. It will be available on July 17th, 2025.

If you’ve ever felt like recovery didn’t have space for your magic…
If you’ve ever needed to scream a prayer through gritted teeth…
If you’ve ever stood at the edge of your own life and begged the Gods to give a damn.

This book is for you.

Pre-order Ink, Blood, & Prayer today and join me in reclaiming the sacred, the broken, and everything in between.
Bring your grief. Bring your rituals. Bring your rage and your hope.

The Gods are listening.
And so am I.

Kiera Gerety