One hit was all it took... I ended up a psychotic meth addict

Woman’s descent from graduate to junkie in 16 months

deal with anxiety and would have used a joint to help me get over to sleep. But now I was being offered meth, MDMA, speed, weed. Basically, I could have anything from the menu. “I said I didn’t want to end up addicted and was told the meth was nonaddictive. But that one hit was all it took for it to take over my life for almost two years.

“Day after day, night after night, I abused this substance. When I wasn’t using it, I was reading up about how to hide the fact I was using it. My partner was taking it too so we would share deals. We could get a gram of crystal meth for $300 and we soon went from using half in the day to using the lot.

“I went from that to an 8-ball which was three-and-a-half grams.

“I’d worked hard and saved up to go to Australia and travel but I got through the equivalent of £6,000 on drugs in the first two months.

“I was in the grasp of an addiction. Deep inside I knew it couldn’t work out but I felt amazing because the meth was keeping me high.

“I got a job in a pub and people just thought I was a mad Irish girl with a lot of energy. But I started to need more and more to keep going and started smoking it at work. I read forums about how you can cover up crystal meth use. I was determined no one would know so no one would take it away from me.

“I would spend up to three hours doing my make-up. I showered and kept clean. I felt happy to be honest.

APPETITE

“I felt I could get away with it, even if I was the only one. I used to spend all my money except for $20 on meth and keep the $20 for cigarettes.

“I had been a size 16 when I left home for Australia and the weight started to drop off me because the meth killed my appetite so I was pretty happy with that. But that only lasted so long.

“Then my hair started to fall out and I blamed hair straighteners.” When Karen lost her job after returning home for a Christmas break, she relied on marijuana to try to avoid withdrawal symptoms.

But within three weeks of returning to Brisbane, she was in hospital in a drug-induced psychosis which she didn’t come out of for three weeks.

She said: “I was hallucinating and could see people hiding in my wardrobe. I could hear people talking about me. I was utterly paranoid and terrified, I had never been so frightened in my life.

“I was in hospital for two weeks and it was decided I should go home. That’s what saved my life.

“My brother paid for my ticket and my mum took me from the airport

LETHAL Drugs are readily available