Angie's story

My life was smashed into tiny pieces and scattered all over when I first came to A Place for Parents.   My son and I were hiding from an extremely violent partner. My four-year relationship with this man has been based on our mutual heroin addiction. I had been a user on and off, mostly on, since I was 17.

My son was going to The Place2Be at his school and he was on the child protection register due to an incident where a friend accidentally overdosed on heroin and died. Social Services were involved and I was told I had to get clean or I risked having my son taken into care. I couldn't imagine being without him and decided to get clean for his sake. I started on the methadone programme at the local addiction clinic.

When I was offered some sessions with the Parent Worker I jumped at the chance because the clinic provided medical help and support but not counselling. By this time I had been clean for 5 weeks. It was so hard all I wanted to do was use 24/7. My counsellor accepted the fact that I wanted to use but she didn't preach to me. Instead she helped me to understand why I wanted to use and how I'd started in the first place. She didn't judge me but seemed to understand how sometimes people use drugs to escape the bad things in their life. I gradually started to understand how my addiction was about the abuse in my past and the cycle of abuse that continued long after I left home.

As the weeks went by, getting clean stopped being just about keeping my son. I started to want to get clean for me and for a better life for both of us. It was still hard but the cravings were starting to get less and less and my counsellor helped me build healthy ways of coping with them.

When I started to pull round, the trail of devastation the addiction left behind came back to haunt me. It was one thing after another. I faced up to things and dealt with them one by one; step by step. That's how it was for a while. My counsellor was there for me every week. She was never shocked by anything I had done. She just said OK what do you need to do about this? My appointment kept me sane at this time.

In time my son was taken off the At Risk register. That was a great day.

I have a new partner now. He doesn't hit me – I don't do abuse anymore! We are happy and he knows everything about my past. It's still hard sometimes but I can cope with things now. I can take the rough with the smooth without using heroin to get me through. I hope I will never use again and I don't think that I will. I am proud of myself.

I will always be grateful to my counsellor in A Place for Parents. I don't think I could have made it otherwise.