Inside Justice

Karyn Mccluskey hails the life-transforming heroes of the recovery services

Iheard last week of someone that I have known for a long time who had relapsed into drugs. It was a moment tinged with huge sadness, for this person has done so amazingly – but drugs and alcohol are seductive when things aren’t going so well, and relapse is always possible. Abstinence is a difficult journey.

I have never been in addiction but have the huge privilege of knowing so many people who are in recovery and it’s amazing how many people they know. A quick call led to more calls and within 30 minutes someone had contacted this person and within an hour and a half they were on their way to a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. It was like sending up the Bat-signal, for the helping response was almost immediate.

The journey for this person will be theirs alone; but walking beside them, guiding them and forming a circle of love and support will be a raft of others who will have walked this path also. It’s likely a sponsor will have come forward, it may be someone they knew or someone new, but sponsors are people who have been there, in recovery often for many years, and encourage and motivate people to stay in abstinence and accompany them through the 12 steps.

I hope fervently that this has a good outcome, I hope that the desire to get off substances is greater than the seductive pull of them. I hope they don’t overdose. I hope. The early days of recovery are hard – people feel overwhelmed by the scale of the challenge but this is a necessary part of the journey. I was told last week that they encourage 90 meetings in 90 days – but I also know people who have attended three meetings a day in the early days.

The opportunity to go into residential treatment should always be there for those who need it; Phoenix Futures, Castle Craig, Abbeycare and one of my favourite services, LEAP, based in Edinburgh and run by extraordinary people, have transformed lives. Their approach to recovery is long-term, treating the addiction in residential treatment, but also connecting people back to their community so that the support is seamless.

I am always struck by meeting people in longterm recovery, that they can be almost preternaturally still, a calmness I am sure emerges from the level of work that they have done on themselves and the repair of everything that was damaged during the addiction. Part of the 12 step programme is making a list of all the people you have harmed and make amends to them. Many people I know say that their lists went to many pages and by the time they entered recovery they had no one left who was untouched by their addiction. Relationships take a long time to heal.

We are coming up to a period in our calendar where excess is almost encouraged, the adverts of families round fires, the urge to spend money and assumption that life is rosy is everywhere. Yet people around the country are suffering. Many feel huge loneliness and are completely isolated, many will experience relapses and it takes extra effort to maintain their recovery.

I have had family members who struggled with substances, some had a sponsor, and so this is a shout out to the recovery community – the unsung heroes who respond to the Bat-signal, the tens of thousands of them around the country who put themselves at the service of others, knowing the key to their own success in recovery is the recovery of others. Now, more than ever, we need you.

•Karyn Mccluskey is chief executive of Community Justice Scotland