Former TV Reporter’s Addiction Left Her Toothless During CNN Appearance

Former Minnesota TV crime reporter Beth McDonough is opening up about her darkest days — including the night she smashed her teeth just hours before appearing on CNN.

The 57-year-old journalist, once a familiar face on KMSP in the Twin Cities, revealed in a new interview with The Minnesota Star Tribune that her drinking spiraled so far out of control she lost her job, her reputation, and nearly everything else.

“It was humiliating,” McDonough admitted. “But that’s what it took to wake me up.”

One of her lowest moments came when she stayed out drinking alone after coworkers had gone home. She stumbled “face-first” in a parking lot, breaking her teeth the night before a CNN segment. The next morning, she sat in a dentist’s chair getting emergency temporary teeth before going live on national TV.

But the real crash came in 2008, when McDonough — who had already been warned after a prior DUI — was arrested again for drunk driving after a Halloween crash that totaled another car. The driver was unhurt, but McDonough woke up days later in jail, watching her own mugshot play on TV.

“I looked up at the monitor and saw myself on the news,” she recalled. “I knew right then my life was over.”

The longtime reporter said being fired from KMSP was her rock bottom. “If they hadn’t fired me, I don’t know where I’d be,” she said.

After completing treatment and losing her home, car, and job, McDonough got sober — a journey she documents in her raw new memoir, “Standby,” released August 8. In it, she details years of blackouts, sneaking alcohol, and even being disowned by her father.

“I had to strip away everything — my pride, my profession, my denial,” she said. “People need to see how bad it got to understand that recovery is possible.”

Now 17 years sober, McDonough eventually rebuilt her career. After starting a dog-walking business to stay afloat, she landed a second chance at KSTP in 2012 — this time under one condition: she had to provide proof of weekly Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.

“If you’d ever told me the second half of my career would be better than the first, I wouldn’t have believed you,” she said.

Today, McDonough is sharing her comeback story with honesty — and a warning. Her follow-up memoir, “Still Standing,” comes out next year.

“I want to show what it takes to get your life back — and why it’s worth it,” she said.