Alicia Witt on Overcoming the ‘Toughest Time’ in Her Life and Why She Quit Drinking (Exclusive)

The singer-songwriter released an EP titled ‘Witness’ on Friday

After facing much adversity, Alicia Witt wrote a set of songs dedicated to the people who were there for her through it all.

On Friday, the singer-songwriter released Witness, a six-song EP where Witt covers topics like mental health, infidelity, love and something she’s far too familiar with: giving up drinking.

“I knew that I wanted to create a collection with the name Witness,” Witt, 48, tells PEOPLE of the project. “It describes so vividly to my own heart what I was experiencing at the toughest time I’ve gone through, and the very tiny group of inner circle friends who were right by my side through the thick of it… who are my witnesses.”

She continues, “I knew while I was in the thick of it that when I got to the other side and life would blessedly go on, and we’d have distance from these days, I knew I’d need somebody to remind me just what really happened and what I really experienced.”

In June of last year, Witt revealed she was cancer-free after undergoing chemotherapy and a mastectomy. At the time, she said keeping the news private served as a “much needed part of my healing” as she grieved the loss of her parents, Robert and Diane Witt, who were found dead in their Worcester, Massachusetts, home in December 2021, around the same time Witt was “beginning” her treatments.

Since then, Witt remains cancer-free and finds joy in the little things in life — like walking her dog in the morning and gardening.