Hello, I had this spider plant for about 4 years. I planted it from a friend‘s spider plant baby. It was doing well for years, but this past year the leaves seemed to brown up. Not all the leaves turned brown, some stayed green. I thought maybe it needed more sun, fertilizer, or was getting chills from the window. I looked at it recently and realized that the base of the plant was turning black and mushy. Reading on here it sounded like root rot, so I took the plant out. The roots seemed like white carrots. They were white and had a little give to them, but we’re not mushy. Any idea what was going on? I feel like I would have noticed this before if it had been going on long, but truth is I couldn’t tell you when this started.

I have attached photos. I thought I could remove the damaged leaves, but it seemed to go to the heart of the plant. More and more was being removed and I gave up. Clearly this plant is gone. I should have posted before acting on the plant- but I hope your guidance could help me know how to correctly act if I encounter this again. Could I have saved it if I hadn’t butchered it?

thank you!