Joanna Gaines Recalls Rough Patch She Went Through Last Year

Joanna Gaines had to find ways to take care of herself amid a rough patch last year, the Fixer Upper star writes in a new essay for her Magnolia Journal magazine. Gaines launched the Magnolia Network with husband Chip Gaines in January 2022 after the premiere was pushed back months due to pandemic-related production delays, and admits in the essay she had to learn to introduce a bit of balance into her life.

"I found myself in this place late last year. Unbalanced by how much I was pouring out without being poured into in the ways I really needed," she wrote, as per PEOPLE. "I was learning that a well that's only ever knee-deep can't outlast a drought and that I had to figure out what it was that would pull me out of the grind and give me renewed perspective."

Joanna continued that she learned that in order to take care of herself, she needed to dedicate herself to things that were meaningful to her and to which she paid too little mind. "I considered what I'm already drawn to, what I already know wakes me up and brings me life – nature, the garden, being in my kitchen, and the peace that meets me there – and I leaned in," she said.

For weeks, Joanna says she "pored over books, threw my hands into the soil, and filled every surface of the house with jars for canning just about anything." While her family joked she had "gone a little extreme," Joanna felt "truly full" for the first time in a long while. "And at the end of those days, I was bursting with so much more to give," she wrote. "And really, that's all that I was after."

Joanna and Chip have had a busy year trying to get the original programming launches ready for Magnolia Network, which took over the DIY Network on Jan. 5 after previously launching on discovery+ last summer. While the delay was pushed back months due to the pandemic, Joanna said on Good Morning America last month that looking back, they "couldn't have planned it any better." She continued, "It's January, it's a new year. Just the message of hope and inspiration from these storytellers and the stories that they're telling... The world is ready for that kind of beauty to be seen."