Kaley Cuoco has been open about the emotional crash that followed the end of her second marriage — describing one particular morning as the worst of her entire life, barely functioning and completely lost in a way that the bubbly Big Bang Theory star the whole world thought they knew would have been unrecognizable.

Then she heard Tom Pelphrey’s voice at a premiere, turned around and said out loud that it felt like her life was over — or just starting. She turned 40 this year celebrating with Tom and their daughter Matilda at a special location in New York — and the woman in those photos looks nothing like someone who once said she would never trust love again. Some people need to lose everything to finally find what they were always looking for.