Category: Women and Addiction

Tia recently shared her incredible story “Ice: to hell and back” about her recovery from ice addiction. Now Orazia, Tia’s mother, has kindly shared her side of Tia’s addiction and recovery.

Hello, my name is Orazia and I’m a business owner and wife. I’m also a mother to three children.

My youngest daughter, Tia, is an addict, and participated in The Hader Clinic Queensland residential addiction rehabilitation program, as well as the transitional housing program.

I am happy to report that 21 year old Tia has remained clean since attending rehab and is currently over a year clean.

She has turned her life around for the better.

Since leaving the transition housing program in January, Tia has participated in the intensive outpatient program, which she found very beneficial.

We also moved from Brisbane to the coast, which was also helpful as it provided all of us with a fresh start.

Through the Hader Clinic Queensland’s Family Education program, I have learned that relapse can be triggered by people, places and things. I remember Tia telling me that when she came home to live with us in our old place in Brisbane that it was challenging because she had previously used in our home.

She reported “feeling constricted” and openly shared that she was feeling a bit wobbly and uncertain. Whereas on the coast, she feels good.

It took a little while before I understood the trouble that Tia was in.

My older children warned me repeatedly that something was “off” and as time went by, we could see that she wasn’t doing well. Something was not right.

Eventually we discovered that she’d been using drugs and what started was a four year cycle where she’d come home for a bit, then leave for days.

We never really knew where she was or what she was doing. I remember taking her to family functions where I could see that she was using to try and cope.

I soon came to learn that this was typical addict behaviour.

We investigated things a bit more and discovered that we were stereotypical enabling parents.

If she needed a bed, we’d provide it. Food? Of course, no problem and money? Well we thought that we were helping her out. Eventually we noticed that money was being stolen from our home.

What brought everything to a head, was that I went away on a pre planned trip overseas. I arrived home to see Tia passed out in her bed and strangers in our house coming and going. It was the final straw to have my home violated like that.

We kicked Tia out of home and changed the locks so that she couldn’t come home.

We decided that we needed to get Tia to rehab and we tried some government funded ones but could not get her to go.

Every time I thought we had a chance, she’d do a runner. I’d stay up most of the night watching her and when I thought it was finally safe to go to sleep, she’d be off again.

Eventually we got in touch with Hayden and Olivia at the Hader Clinic Queensland and forced Tia into rehab. She was starting to become more ready as without access to home or money, she was starting to consider rehab as an option.

Eventually we got her into the residential rehab program, a day later than planned as she’d done yet, another runner.

As parents, we felt a wonderful sense of relief knowing where she was, that she was safe and that she was being treated.

At this point, we had felt that her only other options were being on the street, overdosing, dead or in jail. I remember her doctor not having so much concerns about her habits but wanting to immediately address that her organs were likely shutting down.

It was a grim time.

As parents, we found The Hader Clinic Queensland’s program amazing.

The clinic educated us as parents and gave the addict what they needed – time away from the distractions of life and technology to really focus on their issues. We were always kept in the loop about Tia’s progress and we found the family nights invaluable for both giving and receiving support – it was comforting to know that there were other parents battling the same issues.

I think we were lucky that Tia got into rehab when she did – her brain wasn’t completely ‘fried’ and as she detoxed, she became more articulate and reasonable. She was always an intelligent kid and quickly worked out that she didn’t want to be in a using environment.

Rehab wasn’t without bumps though.

She got kicked out for having sex with another resident attending rehab.

Second time around, however, she returned to rehab with a better mindset. She stayed in residential rehab for another month. Then realised that if she was to go home immediately, that she would have “nothing to support me” as we were still working and doing what we needed to do in our own lives.

The transition housing program was the best option for us. It gave Tia some freedoms, yet it put structure and the all important accountability in place. She craved structure and wanted recovery.

I was so impressed and grateful at how the whole program runs as a whole. I remember Mel from the Hader Clinic Queensland telling me that if a client says that the “program didn’t work” then that client was probably “not working the program”.

She was 100% correct. I

have a background in counselling and the tools that the clinic give you to manage life and recovery are just amazing.

I also learned that Tia was not being an addict to be malicious towards us, she was just doing what addicts do.

I believe that it’s important that you want recovery. Tia wanted recovery and I think that is one factor that keeps her clean today.

Since leaving rehab, Tia gave plenty of thought to what she wanted to do and is completing a Certificate of Mental Health at TAFE. I

t’s kept her busy and doing exams and assessment is completely new for her as she left school after Year Ten. She reckons it’s been a bit of a learning curve, but a good one.

I want Tia to make sure that she’s working on herself, doing things for herself and having her own career and most of all, having the capacity to become self sufficient.

Especially as Tia is six months’ pregnant. Initially it was a bit of a shock, but she is determined to have the baby and be a mum. She met her partner at NA, and they are both committed to staying clean.

In fact, if anything, since falling pregnant, Tia has cut even more ties with previous associates etc. She wants this baby to have the best.  We, of course, will support her in every way we can.

We are impressed by, and grateful to, The Hader Clinic Queensland, for changing our lives for the better.

The last year has been wonderful, and we are looking forward to the future.

Rosie has been wrestling with addiction for fourteen years. Now 33, she has just completed rehab at The Hader Clinic Queensland. Here she shares her rollercoaster recovery story and what she learned that will help keep her in recovery.

I’m 33 now and have just completed a ninety day residential addiction treatment program at the Hader Clinic Queensland. I actually joined the fellowship at age 19, after my first rehabilitation and have had extended periods of time where I’ve managed to stay clean and times when I’ve relapsed, often for a few years at a time.

My drug of choice? I would have happily taken anything and everything, but mainly I used heroin.

I ended up in rehab at the age of twenty. I tried a Naltrexone implant but that only stopped me from using the one drug. That’s when I realised that I had a problem with all drugs. I thought that if I removed one drug, then I’d be OK, but it clearly wasn’t the case.  Things got a lot worse – I had no choice really but to end up doing rehab.

That was probably the best thing that happened to me at the time. I completed rehab and stayed clean for a few years. I did all the things that I’d never been able to do before such as getting a job, renting a house and starting university.

I did a couple of years of a paramedic degree and decided that while I was at university, that I could, “drink responsibly”.

I was young and I still didn’t fully understand the nature of addiction. At the time, I’d never had any issues with drinking alcohol.

Drinking alcohol led me back to using drugs very quickly.  My drinking wasn’t out of control, I’d drink every couple of weekends with my work mates if they were going out – I was working at a bar to support my university studies.

However, the feelings of “obsession” around drugs had entered my head, if that makes sense.

It only took a few months for me to decide that alcohol wasn’t what I preferred, it was drugs. I had actually fooled myself into thinking that if I could drink responsibly, then maybe I could do drugs responsibly.

It was such a delusion of course. Once I separated myself from the fellowship and my friends, I didn’t have anyone around me to combat my delusional thinking.

That delusional thinking got me back into drugs and the lifestyle that goes with it. The user lifestyle, you’ve probably heard it all before – doesn’t need explaining. 

Did I steal to support my habit? Absolutely. It was much worse for me than the first time around. The crime got worse anyway. When I was younger it was more petty stuff that got me into trouble like possession. This time I continued on to violent crime within the community and just really did things that I would never consider now that I’m clean.

These issues still affect me today. I had nearly finished my paramedic science degree and as a result of the crime, could not go back to finish that study.

I guess that it wasn’t meant to be, but I’m OK with that.  I’m studying business and marketing within the creative industries now.

As a result of that relapse I ended up serving twelve months of a four year prison sentence. That relapse was my longest, about four years. Being in prison didn’t stop my drug use, but it certainly was a reality check for me.

I also had to do three months of community service. Life began to get better for me again. I came back into the fellowship. I was still in the maintenance program, accepted and welcomed and spent the next few years working my way off a methadone program. I got clean and stayed that way for a few years.

Then I relapsed last year.

Looking back, I believe that I had quite a full life, which meant that I really wasn’t focusing on recovery. I had two jobs, I was studying – I have now come to a place these days where I’ve realised that I just have to take my time.

I didn’t set out to use drugs that fateful day, they were put directly in my path and I had no defences to counter them with.

I was tired, I was stressed, I had exams coming up – it was a perfect storm. Someone near to me had used and normally that wouldn’t be a trigger for me. I just wasn’t paying attention to my recovery – at the time I was getting to one meeting a week, if that. 

I wasn’t doing step work, or service – all the things that are keeping me clean today.

I can now see where I made mistakes and have come to the conclusion that if I have to slowly plod along at life and take longer to finish my uni degree because I’m putting recovery front and centre, then that’s OK. I’d rather get there and achieve something than lose it to drugs.

I know it sounds crazy but In that moment of relapse I had the thought of “you know what? Stuff it. I’ll come back (to a meeting) tomorrow. I’ll be fine.”

And I did exactly that – I went to a meeting the next day, thinking that, “these people are a complete bunch of idiots here”. 

My head had already started with the distorted thinking – I had unleashed the beast.

It wasn’t until I bumped into my friend, Jay, who’s been in recovery and has notched up ten years clean that things changed.

We were holidaying in Noosa for Christmas with my family and I was still trying to go to a meeting.  I bumped into him there. Knowing that he would understand, I levelled with him, telling him that I wasn’t well and that I was struggling.

I asked him if there was any chance that he could help and he replied, “yes” and that’s how I ended up coming to the Hader Clinic. Jay is one of the Clinic’s highly valued staff. I am very grateful to him.

I detoxed from the heroin the week before I was admitted into rehab. I was still suffering withdrawal sickness, though I had managed to get through the worst of it.  I had insomnia, and I was sweaty and shaky. I could still move around quite easily though.

My experience of rehab was great. The fact that it was ninety days made the biggest difference – it was a good time frame, given that I’d been exposed to the fellowship before. It was comfortable. There was an excellent therapeutic community within the rehab and surrounds.

The staff were caring and accommodating. It’s a wide open space and the food, the food that was served was fantastic as was the group work. I found the limited contact from the outside world a little challenging – fifteen minutes never seemed like enough. However, it did give me time to focus on myself and learn to “sit” with what I needed.

This time around in rehab, I spent more time helping those who were new to the recovery process which made the time pass quickly. I was also able to work through the 12 Steps with a local member from the community, Janet.

I found that really cool that if I was serious about working through the twelve steps that I could ask someone local for help – and the staff at Hader were very encouraging of that.

Because I got to do that in the time that I was at the rehab, I felt like I was better equipped to start practising what we do on the outside, and that is to help other people with the same issues. I found my day a lot easier if I was OK and I could reach out and help someone else. I could reach out and ask how their day was going and what I could do for them.

What also hit home for me was that it’s a daily program. The staff have all walked this road and keep working at their own recoveries. I’ve never got past two years clean because I’ve let things fall away.  The most profound understanding has been that it doesn’t matter how long you’ve been in recovery, you still have to work at it.  I’ve got more insight into the connection you have with the fellowship and the importance of a daily routine in recovery.

As well as my recovery, I’m slowly working my way towards finishing my uni degree and live with my partner, who is also a recovering addict and our puppy.  This recovery has taken longer than previous times at rehab where I seem to have landed on my feet more. I still have previous belongings in my life like my house and my car, but emotionally it’s taken me longer to adjust.

My partner works and I’ve only just gone back to uni. You can sometimes feel like you don’t have any other purpose but NA. It can get a bit dull – I just felt overwhelmed with life when I left the rehab.

My dog’s been really therapeutic for me as he gets me out in the mornings and the afternoons for a walk which helps me clear my mind.

My partner and I needed to be separated – it just doesn’t work trying to get clean together – he did his on the outside with the fellowship. We’re very open about our recovery journeys but we don’t directly support each other – we both have separate sponsors and support networks and that works well for us.

If I had any advice for someone contemplating recovery, it would be to go for it.

If you want a change in your life, seek help – people do care and others can help you.

Hi, I’m Caroline. I’m a former advertising executive and I struggled with a cocaine addiction before it blew my world apart. This is my story about how I came back from the brink.

My addiction happened so slowly I didn’t even realise it was an addiction until the end, when it was too late.

I was working in the advertising space in Sydney when I first starting using cocaine, and tried to get away from it by moving to Melbourne.

I was earning a lot of money pretty early on in my career, and I had no idea how to manage it. Not that I’m blaming what happened on that, but rather, I’m trying to paint a picture. I was young and had a lot of money.

I started using cocaine and then hoped my move to Melbourne would help me stop (it didn’t) and my drug use got really bad. My reputation started to deteriorate as a consequence.

I tell people that I resigned from my job to go to the Hader Clinic Queensland, but the reality is I lost my job. I ended up having to do some things that weren’t right to pay my debts to drug dealers. I lost my house, my car and my job. And I lost myself.

It all blew up when I started prioritising paying for drugs over paying rent and other debts so in the end, I had lost my job, I was two month’s behind in my rent. I just had to flee. I had dug a hole so deep that the only way out of it was telling the truth really.

I remember the day that I was confronted at work by management about what was going on. I was driving to work thinking that it was all going to come to an end soon and that the only way out of it was just to be honest about my struggles. I just wanted it to be over.

I was lucky enough to be able to secure a bed at the Hader Clinic Queensland otherwise I would never have had the opportunity to attend.

So, that’s how I ended up there. Everything with work kind of came crashing down. That was the biggest part of my identity and my life. I moved out of my place in Melbourne and my partner and I simply walked out and left everything there. We flew to Queensland, thanks to my mum’s help and the help of family getting our stuff packed up and out of the apartment in Melbourne.

They talk about some people being born with a predisposition towards addiction. I don’t know if I was that. I went through a lot of trauma as a kid, but I don’t remember that much. My psychologist at the Hader Clinic Queensland reckons that I dissociated from a lot of those experiences, hence the hazy memories.

Anyway, I remember always living well beyond my means and having obsessive behaviours, plus all the things that go with it. Every time I used drugs early on, say as a teenager, I would always be the one who would secretly have five times more drugs than anyone else but not tell anyone.

That kinds of tells me that upon reflection, that I was always going to end up here. It just didn’t start that much earlier because my two previous partners were quite introverted and anti-social. I catered to their needs and never saw my friends or went out.

When I got out of my previous relationship, I started partying pretty hard. When I met my current partner, she was outgoing and displayed many of the same traits that I did.

I got introduced to cocaine when I was living in Sydney through some friends and I just remember thinking that it just had me from the beginning. I just never wanted to stop, I was just that person that never wanted it to end.

I’ve always been a big self sacrificer and I’ve always found it difficult to express what I’m  feeling, what I need and what I want. I think maybe using gave me some sense of self control.

Somewhere down the track, you cross that line without even realising it, and suddenly it’s not fun anymore. It becomes a thing where you’re on that hamster wheel and you can’t get off. But you don’t that’s happening until it’s too late.

I’d make half-hearted attempts to break the cycle. I’d binge use and then swear never to do it again. I was hating it and didn’t want my life to be like that and you’d pick it up again once you started to feel OK.

I’d only buy a small amount thinking, “I’ll just do one night only, just one” and that would be it. But that was never the case. Once I had that first hit, I was gone for days.

Initially, I felt like the drug gave me superpowers and I could go to work. However not sleeping for two to three days at a time meant that it became unproductive. I would tell myself that I needed it to get stuff done, to clean the house or whatever but nothing gets done.

When I moved to Melbourne, it didn’t take long to realise that I had more drug dealer contacts than I had friends.

I hadn’t spoken to my mum for a couple of years, I slowly drifted away from my whole family over the years. But when things all came crashing down, I had to tell everyone – my mum, dad, and my siblings.

I went into rehab with ten days’ clean under my belt after leaving Melbourne. Cocaine is such an expensive drug, so I probably couldn’t have used it even if I had wanted to. I was just at the point where I was happy to stop.

Once at the rehab, I was feeling so beaten. At that point I was so willing to recover. I took it all in from the get go. There were people struggling with being there, the program and its rules. I don’t think some people could understand why the rehab was set up a certain way.

That wasn’t my experience though. I could see that everything in rehab was designed to teach you something. I really loved everything about it. I had a room to myself, air conditioning, a bed, a safe space. I felt really good there and I actually didn’t want to leave.

What helped me the most in the rehab was the education classes and psychology. I also loved the discipline and the routine and I really tried to use the time to set some behaviours for myself that I could carry to the outside because I’ve always been the sort of person who’s been inconsistent, always sleeping in and not so great with self care.

While I was in rehab, I put a lot of energy into getting up at 6am and exercising and getting that routine going.

I remember the first psycho education class. It was about the Karpmann drama triangle and I just cried. I spent a lot of the first few weeks in tears because I was having all these lightbulb moments. The classes taught me a lot about relationships and boundaries, anxiety, mental health and addiction. I found all of that really great.

I think the best thing the rehab is that it’s part of the 12 Step fellowship program, because it  introduces you to a new way of living. That’s the thing that will help keep you clean on the outside even though rehab gives you the opportunity to reset and refocus.

Throughout the whole process, the relationships I have with my family have improved as well.

The other thing in the program that worked really well for me were the one on one counselling sessions I had. I found them to be really beneficial and it uncovered a lot.

I think that’s important because the program really strips you bare and the counselling  helped fast track the progress that I made.

I finished the 90-day program at the Hader Clinic Queensland about 8 weeks ago now. And already my life is better. I’ve decided to stay in Queensland because of the connections I’ve made here. I’ve been approved for a rental property and am back in full time work in marketing.

I still just try to live in each day, but I cannot thank the Hader Clinic Queensland enough for the support and help that they’ve given me in reclaiming my life back.