Cheryl Burke is celebrating seven years of sobriety.
The Dancing With The Stars pro, 41, marked the milestone with a powerful post about quitting alcohol on Thursday.
In her candid message, Cheryl said she initially believed drinking provided her with ‘confidence’ – until one day she was unable to recognize her own reflection.
The post contained various photos from her past when she did indulge in alcohol – before she gave it up for a life of ‘peace’, ‘power’, and more.
‘7 years ago, I thought sobriety would mean losing everything. The fun. The freedom. The fearless version of me I thought only showed up after a drink,’ she wrote in the Instagram caption.
‘But what I didn’t realize back then… Was that the escape I craved was really from myself. And the girl I ran from? She was the one waiting to save me.
Cheryl Burke marked the milestone with a powerful post about quitting alcohol for a life of ‘peace’ and ‘self-respect’
The post contained various photos from her old life of drinking
‘I used to believe alcohol gave me confidence, connection, and control. Turns out, it stole those things quietly — day by day — until I couldn’t recognize my own reflection.
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‘Today, I no longer chase chaos dressed as fun. I no longer tolerate connections that require me to abandon myself. And I no longer mistake numbness for peace.
‘What I thought I’d miss in sobriety? Was never real to begin with. I’ve gained… Presence. Peace. Self-respect.
‘And a relationship with my Higher Power that reminds me I was never walking alone — not even in my darkest moments.
‘God didn’t take the pain away… He held my hand through it and gave me the strength to rise.
‘If you’re reading this and wondering if it’s possible — I promise you, it is. There’s a whole world on the other side of rock bottom. And it’s so much more beautiful than I ever imagined.
‘Here’s to 7 years sober. Here’s to choosing clarity, wholeness, and me. One day, one hour, one minute at a time.’
In the photos, Cheryl delved further into her decision to cut out alcohol completely, saying she believed it would ‘numb everything – the pain, the pressure, the pretending.’
Cheryl said she once thought drinking made her a more ‘magnetic’ and ‘lovable’ person to be around
She used alcohol in order to ‘numb’ the ‘pain’ and ‘pretending’
She assured those struggling with addiction that sobriety is ‘beautiful’
Burke candidly reflected on her old life in the powerful post
‘Addiction wasn’t freedom. It was a cage dressed up like a good time,’ she also noted, before assuring those struggling that it sobriety indeed a ‘beautiful’ thing.
Cheryl became sober in 2018, during her engagement to her now ex-husband Matthew Lawrence.
‘It was just a decision that I made for myself,’ she previously said on the Lady Gang podcast, explaining she realized she was ‘done’ with drinking during their engagement party.
Cheryl also described how her late father, who also struggled with alcoholism, factored into her decision to quit drinking.
The dancer’s father Stephen Louis Burke died shortly before she announced her engagement to Matt.
‘My dad was an alcoholic,’ she said. ‘So either I was gonna crash and burn and check myself into rehab or I was gonna just quit cold turkey.’
She expanded on this in a 2020 interview with Extra, saying: ‘My father had passed away during that time… It was almost like a promise to myself. I was also getting engaged, I was engaged, sorry, and I was about to get married…For me, my dad was a former alcoholic, so it was either, I was going to crash and burn, or I was going to stop cold turkey.’
She feared missing out on being ‘the life of the party’ by quitting drinking
Now Cheryl has found ‘peace’ and ‘power’ in sobriety
‘It became, like, an everyday thing, me drinking. It was like I needed to show myself, I guess, that this was not something that I depended on, especially after my dad’s passing.
‘It wasn’t a hard thing for me to do, also my body just wasn’t reacting well to it at all…
‘Probably more like a subconscious thing than anything else.’