How Allison Holker Discovered Stephen “tWitch” Boss’ Drug Addiction (Exclusive)

Allison Holker made a devastating discovery about her late husband Stephen “tWitch” Boss on one of the most difficult days of her life.

weeks after Ellen DeGeneres Show When co-executive producer and longtime DJ died by suicide in December 2022 at age 40, the dancer discovered a “cornucopia” of drugs — including mushrooms, pills and “other substances that I had to look up on my phone” — hidden in his shoe boxes.

“I was with one of my really dear friends, and we were cleaning out the closet and picking out an outfit for him to wear to the funeral,” Holker, 36, recalls in an exclusive interview with PEOPLE for its latest cover story, out Friday Kiosk appeared.

“It was a really triggering moment for me because I discovered a lot of things in our closet that I didn’t know existed. It was very disturbing for me to learn that so much was happening that I had no idea about. ” she continues. “It was a really scary moment in my life to find out, but it also helped me understand that he had been through so much and was hiding so much, and that must have been a lot of shame.”

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During her nine-year marriage, Holker has detailed her healing journey in a new memoir titled Up to here (published Feb. 4) — believed she and Boss had “very honest” communication, including about his marijuana use. In the evenings, after her children had gone to bed, he would slip quietly into their guest house to smoke or drink.

“It was his time alone. It was his time to recharge, and that was fine,” she says.

But as she combed through his journals in hopes of finding clarity—and closure—after his death, Holker learned that her husband had hidden painful secrets even from those closest to him.

“He was struggling with a lot inside and trying to self-medicate and deal with all these feelings because he didn’t want to do it to anyone else because he loved everyone so much,” she says of Boss, who alluded to it in several of his Diary entries are about how he was sexually abused by a male figure in his childhood. “He didn’t want other people to take on his pain.”

While she felt betrayed by his secrets, Holker has also gained a new perspective over time.

“Reading Stephen’s diaries and even looking back at the books he had read and the things he highlighted and underlined really gave me a better insight into his current life situation and the types of things he was struggling with had,” she says. “It made me feel great compassion for him and saddened by all the pain he had to endure.”

She emphasizes that she now shares Boss’s struggles – and the aftermath of his death – in the hope of saving even one person who has struggled in silence.

“It was really hard to put all the pieces together. “Through certain conversations, even with friends and things that were said, reading through his diaries… you realize he went through a lot as a child and never dealt with it,” she says. “It’s hard to believe he never opened up to anyone and wanted to face it and come through on the other side. I really hope that people who are struggling with the same thing come out of the shadows and (know) that you are going to be okay.

While Boss — who was withdrawn, showered less and smoked morning and night — admitted to her that he was in a low phase, he was “very careful about that wording,” she recalls.

At this point, he concluded his career eight years later The Ellen DeGeneres Show while also ending a run as a judge So you think you can dance.

Still, “we were preparing for this big year,” she says. “It seemed to me like he was saying, ‘Oh, he’s taking a rest period,’ which he would say he never had.”

In retrospect, Holker believes he struggled deeply with the gap between the extroverted “TWitch,” his beloved public persona, and the introverted Stephen, a man who longed to be the “perfect” husband and father to their three children Weslie, 16, to be. Maddox, 8, and Zaia, 5.

“When I thought about my husband at the time, I thought, ‘Oh, I love that tWitch is such a great performer, but then when he comes home he’ll feel safe enough to be Stephen,'” she says. “I was with him for so long and he was like that throughout the relationship. I thought, ‘It’s a beautiful thing that he can be both.'”

Looking back, Holker realizes that his “two very different personalities” were increasingly “fighting” each other. “What if he felt safe because he was this one individual with different energies,” she wonders now. “You don’t have to be a completely different person and separate them.”

The morning before he disappeared, Boss took Weslie to school. She was the last person in her family to see him alive, and his last words to her were, “I wish I could be your Superman.”

“When someone says the last words to you that you didn’t really recognize at the time as anything wrong… that’s really hard, especially as a teenager,” Holker says, pointing out that Weslie still attends the same school.

“She handles it with far more grace than she should have. We took the steps to really help her communicate and make her feel seen and heard,” Holker continues. “I think she sees these words as both something beautiful and something ugly. It’s a battle she will always have with herself, but I know she can see it from both sides.”

Holker hopes others will feel the full range of emotions from her new book — and know that it’s okay.

“I’ve been very fortunate to have resources that have helped me, that I’ve now worked with,” she says of working with organizations like the National Alliance of Mental Illness and Maple Counseling. “I learned that there are so many other resources that a lot of people don’t know about. I’ve had so many people reach out to me wanting to talk, and if I’ve learned anything, I’ve learned that it’s mental.” Health can affect anyone at any point in their life.

“It’s important to just be an open vessel for them, listen to them and give them the space to be who they are in that moment and not make them feel like it’s wrong,” Holker says . “People who have a lot of light have still gone through a lot of darkness. And that’s okay because you can’t have one without the other.”

If you or someone you know is considering suicide, call the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 or text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741741.

Up to this point: My story of love, loss and the embrace of light by Allison Holker will be published by Harper Select on February 4th and is available for pre-order now wherever books are sold.