Former AEW Star Mike Santana Opens Up About 'Dark Time' And Getting Sober

Former AEW star Mike Santana is beginning a new chapter of his career following his departure from AEW. Santana announced in March that he would be leaving the promotion after nearly five years, but during those five years, he experienced a lot of highs and some even darker lows. 

One of his lows was when he suffered a serious knee injury that kept him out of action for 14 months, which came just a few years after the passing of his father, and right in the middle of his lowest point battling addiction. Santana opened up about the darkest period of his life on Chris Van Vliet's podcast "Insight," where he said that he was extremely unhappy towards the end of his AEW run as he knew he needed to get his life in order. He revealed that the date he decided to get sober was February 16 as he finally saw how much he was hurting himself and his family. 

"I knew it was getting bad because I wasn't coming home and I would be out for days," Santana said. "Christmas was coming up, and every year my daughter always wrote her Christmas list to Santa ... in her list, one of the only things on her list was she wanted Daddy to stop."

The former AEW star stated that his grandmother, someone who he cites as a savior of his, wrote him a letter that made him realize how much pain he was causing to his family, as well as himself. Santana eventually checkeed himself into rehab, where he also admitted that going through a detox was enough for him to stay away from drugs and alcohol forever as he stated it was the worst experience of his life. 

Please credit "Insight" when using quotes from this article, and give a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.