I first came into Ashleigh House in August. I came from the Dochás Centre. I had a bad problem with heroin and sleeping tablets. I was serving three years in the Dóchas Centre for crimes I had done during my addiction. The probation officer told me about Ashleigh House, the women’s programme at Coolmine, and asked me if I would be interested in it.

At the time, I wasn’t ready to give up drugs but I would of done anything to get out of prison. So in August, Ashleigh House took me in and I lasted five days and then went out and took heroin. I only lasted one day out and was brought back to the prison. When I was back inside, it took me a couple of days to realise what I had done, reality started to hit me badly. I went back into the probation officer and asked if there was a chance to go back to Ashleigh House for treatment.

The answer was that there was a chance that I could go back as they could see I was interested. I was told that it would take around six weeks and that my urine samples would have to be clean of drugs during that time, so that they would know I was really committed to the programme. It was a long and hard six weeks. Drugs were getting thrown at me in prison, but I refused them all the time. Eventually the six weeks were up and I had done it; on the 7th of September I was taken back to Ashleigh House.

At first I thought it was hard opening up my feelings and thoughts to people about the stuff I had done and my addiction – the embarrassment, the shame, the guilt. After a while, I realised I wasn’t the only one who went through it. I’ve learned a lot about myself and my behaviours.

I was my biggest and only enemy. The only thing standing in my way to live a full and happy life was me.

I had a normal upbringing with the highs and lows of any teenager. Dad worked while my Mum stayed at home to raise us kids. My two brothers and I were very close, we always stuck together. I was about 17 when the highs seemed to stop and the lows felt endless so I visited my GP who prescribed medication in an effort to make me feel better. I was prescribed these on and off over four years.

During that time I trained as a veterinary nurse and for the first time in my life I felt a passion for something. I felt capable and confident working with animals and I had, I felt, a purpose. It was during my training that my knowledge of prescription medication and their effects grew. I had been educated in school around drug abuse and the types of drugs used, such as heroin, cocaine, hash, etc. so I didn’t ever consider myself to be a drug user. After all, I was on “medication”, not taking drugs. There was never a mention at school about these types of drugs when it came to drug abuse. As far as I was concerned, ME? A DRUG ADDICT? NAHHH!!

But the more I learned through work and the more sleepless nights I was having the more I began to think that I had a problem. It took a while but I stopped taking the drugs, and I believed that as no one was aware of my drug use in the first place, there was no harm done.

Over the year or so I really began to focus on my career, I gave it my all (yeah, Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt), because the reality was I wasn’t coping at all. I buried myself in work and isolated myself from friends, family and the world around me. I had replaced my drugs with work. And it did work for a while. But then my Nana died and my world fell apart. I didn’t want to face it so I turned to the one thing I had learned would make me feel better, drugs.

For the next 2 ½ years, I worked to use and used to work. There were times I’d manage to be clean but it didn’t last long. As soon as I found things too difficult, I went straight back to the one thing that would fix me.

The last year of my active addiction was and remains the worst year of my life. I felt totally alone, no friends, work was the only connection I had to the outside world. I felt worthless and frozen on the inside. I viewed the world as a cold and empty place. I lost my job, and with it all hope I had. I gave up and didn’t care if I lived or died. Drugs were all I had left and I used them at every given opportunity.
In April 2006, I linked in with Coolmine and in June I started on the Drug Free Day Programme. Doing this programme was one of the hardest and scariest things I had ever done. I was under the illusion, that once I stopped using drugs and stayed clean I would be grand, cured! For a while, I had convinced myself I was working the programme, doing what was suggested but found myself getting more and more frustrated because how I felt on the inside wasn’t changing. But I began to realize that I wasn’t working the programme at all. I wasn’t getting it because I was still resisting, still fighting and as the penny dropped I found out what my biggest problem was…

It wasn’t the programme, drugs, people, the world! It was me. I was still fighting with my biggest and only enemy, myself. The only thing standing in my way to live a full and happy life was me. I came to realise this when I stopped fighting, let my guard down and began really letting people in. This is something I had never done before, and it terrified me, but I did it.

Surrendering to a life without drugs is one thing, but to surrender to myself was quite another. But it is paying off, because today I have found a new passion, passion for life. This is something I have never had before. I want to experience life for all it has to offer, both the good and the bad. I still have a ways to go, but I like the person I am today. I am happy with the life I have and very grateful for my second chance in life. More than this, I am forever grateful for the continuing support from my family, my great friends and everyone I have had the privilege to meet while in recovery. I truly believe that regardless of what life wishes to throw my way, with the support from the people I have in my life today, there is nothing I can’t handle.

Remember when we were small we had a bad mother,
but you had to step in and be the big brother
Ma would drink, and then she’d turn mean
She would try to hit us but you would jump in between
You had to grow up before your time
To make sure we were all right and keep us going tight
Because that wicked witch didn’t give a sh*t
Only for you we wouldn’t have grown bright
That’s why I pray for you each and every night

All my life all I could see was a little kid inside of me
And all that she wanted was to break free
For sometime she couldn’t let go
And all that she did know
Was to have a glass of stout,
that turned into more than she could count
She cried and cried inside and felt like she had died
But little did she know that one day she would grow
To Live and Let Go