Courtesy of Mackenzie McKee/Instagram
‘Teen Mom OG’ Star Mackenzie McKee Was in a ‘Dark’ Place After Mom’s Death: ‘I Was Making Poor Decisions’
Making it through. Mackenzie McKee is excited for fans to see her “growth” on the upcoming season of Teen Mom OG, but she exclusively reveals to In Touch she was in a “dark” place following mother Angie Douthit’s death.
“I literally was so low in life that I needed a change. There was no getting lower, it was so bad, so dark, that I couldn’t physically and mentally even get out of bed most days,” Mackenzie tells In Touch ahead of the season premiere of the hit MTV series. “And then I realized like I will lose everything I have, I will lose my children, my business, my friends, obviously my marriage. I had to take a step forward and put my best foot forward and walk and get off the medication and stop numbing myself and just do something. And I had to make a drastic change.”
The Oklahoma native explains the dark period started after Douthit’s death in December 2019. Mackenzie’s marriage with Josh McKee, 27, was already strained and it took another hit as she grieved the loss of her mother.
“Things took a turn and I just decided, ‘I don’t want to remarry this guy. I don’t want to be with him,'” she reveals. “I just kept kicking him out and kicking him out. And he finally got tired of fighting back.”
Mackenzie reveals she turned to substances to cope with her grief. “I got on medicine that just made me a walking zombie. I started drinking and I was on a dating website and that was no secret, obviously, cause when people see my face, they’re like, ‘Oh, Mackenzie has a Tinder account,'” she continues. “And then I got involved with a guy on there.”
“I was just making really poor decisions, obviously, with drinking, with partying again, with seeing guys I shouldn’t have been. And then when I wasn’t around anyone, I would just take enough medicine to just knock me out because being coherent was too painful,” Mackenzie reveals. “So I had to walk away from every single bit of that and find myself again. And that’s why I wanted to come to Florida alone.”
Mackenzie announced her move to Florida in August 2020, revealing to In Touch she received Josh’s blessing to relocate with the couple’s three children — 9-year-old son Gannon, 6-year-old daughter Jaxie, and 4-year-old son Broncs.
She credits her move to Florida with helping her turn her life around. “When I arrived and sat down and I was like, ‘Wow,'” Mackenzie says. “Like, I am absolutely coming out of that hole I never saw light at the end.”
Teen Mom OG premieres on MTV Tuesday, January 26, at 8 p.m. ET.
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