Beat addiction
structure back to my life.
“They offer everything you need to get your life back on track and teach you how to live again.
“It has been amazing just seeing people today - a year ago, I would’ve never thought I could do something like this on a Friday without substances in my body but I’ve been given a whole new outlook and it’s just a credit to the communities for bringing something like this together.”
The emotions and gratitude are shared by fellow FVRC attendee on the day, Scott Lewis - who first came into the group five years ago in an effort to beat a long-standing alcohol addiction.
Scott, who is 57, told us: “I initially realised I had a problem with alcohol in my early twenties, but I was still functioning and holding down good jobs so I just carried on for a couple of decades until I was no longer functioning.
“At that point, I sought help through Signpost and key workers, but I was still in and out of abstinence and on the last meeting, Signpost advised me that I might be more suited to the Addictions Support and Counselling charity.
“I had counselling with ASC and that’s how I found out about FVRC so I started attending their cafes and eventually I was taking part in all of the activities and started volunteer training.
“FVRC has given me a fulfilling, balanced life and that’s what I was striving towards for decades abstinence was the first step, it was difficult for the first few steps but from my experience, it does get easier.
“There is a lot of help available compared to when I was in my early 20s, when there was very little and it was basically just AA, but now there are different organisations and it’s just about getting in touch with them.”
This year’s event was initially planned to take place at Stirling Albion’s Forthbank stadium but due to the pandemic, it ended up as a smaller event with FVRC battling it out against their counterparts from North Lanarkshire Recovery Community.
Christina Feaks, team leader at FVRC, told the Observer: “It’s all about trying to make recovery visible and get it out there into the community and we usually invite other partners, including the police and Change Grow Live, to help promote the message.
“People often feel alone with addiction, so it’s all about bringing organisations together and making people realise they aren’t alone because those social connections can really help them aid their own recovery.
“When lockdown happened, we had to move things online and that can cause some people to relapse because they’ve not got that social aspect of attending a group or activity and being stuck at home can really impact their mental health.
“We’ve done a lot of stuff online to keep people connected, but having the cafes and the drop-ins back has been really invaluable because it can prove difficult to open up about your feelings on a Zoom call with 20 other people. Some people have come into us since lockdown so they’ve never met some of the others before even though they’ve been in the Zoom meetings every day so that has been a real positive from today.
“It’s just about telling people that it’s okay to have had an addiction and that recovery is possible; we offer the peer support and learning from people who have been in that position themselves because that is invaluable for people going through recovery.”