Thre fracture that started the Movement.

Hey, my name is Joey Biener, and I started Cracked Glass as a way to represent my own mental illness. At the very beginning, I thought it would be something simple—a TikTok account, maybe a podcast—just a place to share my coping mechanisms and reach a few people outside my rural Minnesotan circle.

Honestly, I may have built the conduit for Cracked Glass, but I can’t call myself a founder. I’m not the first person with mental health issues, and I won’t be the last.

I’ve been living with chronic depression for decades, though I wasn’t officially diagnosed until I was 22. Now, at almost 35, I’ve survived suicidal tendencies, alcoholism, and long stretches of isolation—where shutting people out felt easier than burdening them with my pain. There were times I thought about keeping my funeral short and sweet, so fewer people would have to sit through it. That’s where I was.

Through the years, I haven’t really given up drinking. In fact, I use it more than ever, not as an escape but as a tool to cope. My perspective on depression is like the sun—it rises and it sets. Some days last only hours, others last six months. Some nights do too. When I see the sun start to set in my mind, I try to acknowledge it. I try to get ahead of that emptiness by surrounding myself with people whose actions remind me they care.

Those people—my “tea candles”—light my night. It could be taking over the jukebox, grabbing a mic for karaoke, setting something on fire just to laugh together, or having a few beers and trading stories. Depression is often called the disease of loneliness. And while alcohol is a depressant, it’s also a social drug—and sometimes, in the right company, it becomes a tool for connection.

That’s what I want this to be. Not just my story, but ours. I want to hear your cracks. I want to know how you cope. I want to showcase your stories here, so that maybe someone lost in the dark can find a strategy, a candle, a voice to remind them they’re not alone.

Cracked Glass isn’t about being perfect. It’s about being here. Still fractured, still standing, still shining through.