Love Is Blind's Zack Goytowski has opened up about his tough upbringing and heartache over his mother's death.
Zack married Bliss Poureetezadi on the show after a dramatic break-up with Irina Solomonovay, who he originally proposed to in the pods.
He became emotional during a conversation with his sister and grandma about how he wished his mother was at their wedding day.
Zack has now discussed coping with his mother's mental illness and addiction while growing up.
During the reunion show, Zack told Netflix viewers: 'All I want to say is look at my receipts on instagram'
Honest: Love Is Blind's Zack Goytowski has opened up about his tough upbringing and heartache over his mother's death
Tough: Zack has now discussed coping with his mother's mental illness and addiction while growing up
In a lengthy post, he penned: 'My senior year in high school, I was filled with anger and rage. My mother's mental illness and addiction were out of control. Sometimes I would come home, and my entire room would be destroyed, walls smashed with a hammer, clothes thrown about after my mother had gone into a manic state.
Zack was forced to move home and schools as a child several times and admitted there was 'no stability'.
He said: 'I didn't understand mental illness; I didn't understand addiction. I was just angry. Angry that I had to say goodbye to so many friends, angry that I couldn't bring my friends over, angry for all the times I had to sit there at night, listening to my mother fight with her boyfriends, fight with my stepdad, angry about all the times I had to watch the cops come to our house, angry about the nights where my mother would threaten to kill herself, and having to lay at home not knowing if the next day I wouldn't have a mother.
'The night my mother dedicated the song I Hope You Dance to me, we had a huge argument. She was not mentally well, drove her car and parked it in the front yard. Then she came in our home and began screaming at my friends. I left, and she threatened to kill herself if I didn't come back. So I did. That's when she dedicated the song that would be the first dance at my wedding.
Zack went on to explain that during senior year he started attending church and felt a 'sense of belonging'.
He continued: 'It was the pastor that lead the youth group who told me a story about a man who sacrificed everything so that others could be forgiven. That story made me realize what it means to give grace.
'The idea that a parent would take on the punishment that their child deserved not because it was just but out of love changed something inside of me. It was in that moment that I chose to forgive my mother. Truly forgive her. And that choice changed my life.
'Fast forward three years. I'm entering my junior year in college. My mother had been committed several times and lost custody of my little sister. It was the end of the summer, and I had just left Portland, volunteering at a homeless shelter.
'I spent my time there not handing out food, but listening to the stories of men and women who were at rock bottom. And it was in listening to their stories that I realized something that shook me to my core. I heard the story of a woman who was abandoned by her family and thrown out on the street, sexually assaulted several times, and then killed herself by jumping off a bridge.
'I heard the story of a father addicted to drugs, who lost his job and was living on the streets of Portland. I asked him if his children knew how he was doing. He told me that he lied to them and didn't let them know. And that's when the lightbulb went off. I hadn't seen my mother in almost six months.
'Every time I tried to meet with her, she would make up an excuse and avoid me. It was in that moment that I realized that my mother was homeless, and she was hiding from me because she didn't want me to see how bad she had gotten.
'I remember driving back home and crying, looking down at the ground for a second and praying to God that I would get to see my mother. She hadn't answered my phone calls for over a week. And shortly after I said that prayer, I looked down at my phone to see a missed call from her.'
During the reunion show, Zack told Netflix viewers: 'All I want to say is look at my receipts on instagram'
She added: 'I picked up the phone and called her. When she finally answered, I told her that I wanted to see her the next day. With that I drove across the state of Washington to a little town in the middle of nowhere. When I arrived, I got another call from my mother. She said she was feeling sick and couldn't make it. I told her I didn't care how sick she was. She needed to come see me. And she did.
'When I saw her, her face was gaunt. She looked like she hadn't eaten or slept in weeks. I sat down with my mother that day. I hugged her, and I told her I forgave her for everything. She had still not forgiven herself.
'She was living at the time in a storage unit, using a space heater at night to keep warm. She was at rock bottom, and she didn't want me to know. I prayed with her that day. I prayed that she would overcome her addiction. I prayed she would be able to overcome her mental illness. And I told her how much I loved her. And it was after that day that everything changed.'
Speaking on his mother turning her life around, he explained: 'My mother miraculously, after decades of being unable to work, decades struggling with addiction and mental illness, she recovered. She finally got clean after relapse and relapse. After being committed numerous times, they finally got her medication stabilized. She got better with the support of my grandmother and my aunts.
'They never gave up on her, never stopped believing in her. She spent the rest of her life serving the mentally and physically disabled. And it was after that moment, my sister and I finally got to have a few normal Christmases together. They were the happiest moments of my life.
'They are moments that I never would have gotten if I held onto the pain of the past and chosen not to forgive. Grace isn't fair. But if we choose to give it every day, we make the world a better place for everyone.'
He ended the post by saying: 'When I was going through my mother's things after she died, I found a small note. It was dated shortly after the day I sat down with her in that small town in the middle of nowhere.
'It said "Somehow she found a little hope in her hopelessness." We all can be someone's hope in the hopelessness.'
Romance: Zack married Bliss Poureetezadi on the show after a dramatic break-up with Irina Solomonovay, who he originally proposed to in the pods
Irina got choked up when trying to apologise to Zack and to the show's viewers, telling the audience she 'needs a minute' which caused some to burst out into laughter.
'I know that's not the person that I want to be and that I'm not,' Irina said, admitted she treated Zack, 'like s---.'
Zack also came face-to-face with his ex Irina, and he didn't pull any punches during the special.
'You did a lot of things, um, that hurt a lot of people, including me, and I mean, you only see 10 percent of it on the camera. There was so much stuff that happened that was just unbelievable,' Zack, 32, began.
'If we're real, you went on this show to get famous. But look, I forgive you. I genuinely, 100 percent forgive you, Irina,' he said to cheers from the audience.
'I really don't hold anything against you. There's so many people that want to attack the people, the cast on this show. And you have no idea, like, everybody who made a mistake on this show, it has been punishment enough for the entire world to see them at their worst,' he continued.
'Like trust me, Irina, Micah [Lussier], everybody here who did something. We all did something stupid. And so I 100 percent forgive you Irina," he added.
'My last comment, I stand on that. I have receipts. The only receipts I think the world should see are the ones I posted on my Instagram today. And with that said, I really believe Irina that you will become an amazing person one day. I believe that and I forgive you for what happened and I hope the world does too,' he said.
Zack's new wife Bliss added, 'I do too and we talked. I really don't hold anything against you,' though she did bring up something harmful Irina said.
'You did tell me when you landed in Mexico that I dodged a bullet while you also texted him, "I'm so sorry, let's talk. I hope something happens with you and Bliss,"' Bliss, 33, said.
'I think you can have panic attacks and you can have trouble with mental illness and all of that. That's totally valid. But then you're turning around and you're doing malicious things and you're acting in really cruel ways. It's hard to reconcile those two things,' she added
Apology: Irina got choked up when trying to apologise to Zack and to the show's viewers, telling the audience she 'needs a minute' which caused some to burst out into laughter
Irina responded, 'That was completely out of line for me to say. Nothing I did was okay, the way I was acting, the way I was talking.'
Irina also admitted that she was flirting with her BFF Micah Lussier's fiance Paul Peden, with Micah saying she always stuck up for her.
'I always was like, "That's my b***h. She's a good person." I never left your side. Was I the big fool here that missed your red flags or was it just a misunderstanding?' Micah asked.
'I do admit to doing that. That's so sneaky. Me seeing Paul, honestly, I was way more attracted to him than I was to Zack,' Irina admitted.
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7pa3IpbCmmZmhe6S7ja6iaKymqLWww8GisWikn6uybrXSZpmloZ6ZfKK%2B06KapZ1dZn56hJRxb3BnfKTDpnmhpaCnnKNip6KvymZ%2BqLGkpMS0t8hmmpqmlJ6xrcWMnaCsm6WowKa%2FjKGcmqqklrCpsYympq2glafAbrDEmquhZpipuq0%3D