‘I lost 20 years of my life to heroin. Now I’m award-winning student’

For years, no one saw Lucy as Lucy. It was ‘Lucy the junkie’. Thanks to a second chance, she’s now an awardwinning student embracing life as a scholar, dog owner and a grandma.

Lucy started taking drugs aged 13.

By 18 she had three children in her care, two of her own and one stepdaughter. She was in an abusive relationship, violence a daily occurrence, including a fractured cheekbone. Drugs became a coping mechanism.

Fast forward to age 25, Lucy found herself in front of a judge, for drug related crime. She was fully expecting a custodial sentence.

“I stood, terrified, expecting a prison sentence, with tears in my eyes. It had been a year and a half since I had been arrested and in that time I had got clean, undertaken peer training and really started to turn my life around. But I knew I had to face the punishment for the crime.”

And that’s when Lucy was given her second chance. The judge looked at the exceptional circumstances of her recent life and gave her 300 hours of community service, recognising that Lucy

0 Lucy has turned her life around after getting a second chance

was already trying and succeeding down a new, positive path.

Onestop womans learning service (OWLS) Total Community Action (TCA) and Venture Trust were the three services that supported Lucy’s second chance.

“I started working in the charity shop, talking to people just going about their lives, just being part of the community was massive for me. As a drug user, you feel like the scurge of society, it was

massive to be part of the community, recognised as a person.

“Being recognised seems small but it’s not, its not easy turning your life around. It’s just words, unless you’ve been through it, finding people who believe in you and will help you – even though they don’t know you.”

Lucy hopes to be ready to start a degree next year.

“Now, I’m just Lucy, I’m a mother, grandmother, dog owner, student. But I’m still a work in progress.”