HGTV star David Bromstad is getting honest about his struggles with substance abuse.
In his newest special, “My Lottery Dream Home: David’s Happy Ending,” which premiered Dec. 19, Bromstad revealed that he entered a treatment program after storm damage to his Florida dream home led him to turn to substances to cope with the emotional fallout.
Bromstad said severe damage to his fairytale-inspired home, including extensive mold that required stripping the structure to the studs, triggered a personal crisis.
“I got into some unhealthy behaviors and it’s really easy to go there when you’re under distress,” Bromstad said in the special. “I knew I was in trouble.”
The renovation project held deep personal significance for the 52-year-old creative, who designed the home to help heal childhood trauma from being bullied. When the storm nearly destroyed it, he connected the physical damage to his emotional state.
“Back when I was a teenager, I didn’t deal with what really happened,” Bromstad said. “I was exactly this amount of gay, this amount of perfect, but that was not celebrated, that was looked [at] in a different way back then.” He added, “Now my childhood fantasy, my house, is broken, like me.”
As the renovation stalled, Bromstad recognized he needed help. “I think with the house, with where I’m at emotionally, physically, spiritually, psychologically, everything has stopped. I was literally screaming out for help,” he said.
That realization led him to seek treatment. “I decided it’s time. I need to put my house on hold and I need to check myself into some sort of program,” Bromstad said. “I need to talk. I need to climb out of this hole. I need to understand why I climbed into it in the first place.”
After completing his treatment, the TV star celebrated his 50th birthday in August 2023 with a trip to Norway. In Instagram posts from the trip, he reflected on his recovery journey.
“Learning to love myself, warts and all, has been the hardest and most beautiful process,” he wrote. In another post, he said it “feels good to be present, sober and living the life I was intended to live.”
