Speech by Anne

I come from a typical middle class family. 1 of 10 children, raised by parents with a strong value system, mother a teacher, father a plumber with his own business. Most of us have university qualifications, many of us more than 1. All of us are gainfully employed a number of us in senior management positions others with their own business. We think of ourselves as well educated, fairly liberal minded and tolerant of ourselves and others. It never occurred to us that there could or would be a drug user in our family...

and still in 2001, we found out that my then 22 year old sister had been using heroin since she was 17. She had had a fight with her then boyfriend, who in a fit of anger, rang my mother and told her.

And so we became ‘one of those families’ …
the family that are ashamed and embarrassed,
the family that find things missing…. Money, cameras, cd players,
the family that knows which pawn shop to go to to reclaim their possessions the family that finds used needles and bent spoons under beds
the family where conditions on coming to the family home are made – conditions that mean attendance by some is dependant on the exclusion of others

My sisters life was out of control - lost jobs, smashed cars, broken relationships. All of the chaos that comes with her addiction came to us.

Our family became fragmented. Most of the family gave up on her and then criticised those who did not.

All types of advice was given
Throw her out onto the streets

She needs to hit rockbottom

Make her go into rehabilitation

Cut off all communication until she gives up drugs

The advice was well intentioned, however neither my mother nor I felt that any of these actions would help.

My mother and I would take turns having my sister live with us – when one of us could no longer bear the days of unexplained absences, the fear that a phone call would cause, the police knocking on the door looking for her - that would be that day we would pack my sister up and relocate her to the other’s house

We knew that my sister needed us – her great fear was that we would give up on her – but the absolute chaos of her addiction was impacting our lives on a daily basis.

One day my mother rang me and said she had spoken to someone from Family Drug Support– and there was a support group meeting at Ashfield on that Monday night and we should go.

And so we went.

I need to say up front that I am not a group person.. sharing in that forum is not particularly something I am comfortable with – thank God my mother was the opposite.

Family Drug Support helped us to hold on; supported us when all seemed lost; and reassured us that we were not the only ones going through this. We developed strategies to minimize the chaos, while at the same time recognizing that the problem was hers and only she could do anything about it.

There were many Monday nights when after leaving the meeting, we would say how much better we felt being able to talk with others who know how we felt, we would talk about the good ideas that other members had given us. And we would cry for those whose situation was even more difficult than ours.

FDS helped us navigate through these years while we waited and watched – following the advice and suggestions from group at FDS.

My sister has now been drug free for about 8 years.

She is debt free, saving money and looking at buying a home. She has become the delightful, caring, mature adult we knew she could be.

None of this would have happened if Family Drug Support had not been there to support us during those very difficult years.

Family Drug Support saved my sister’s life – and they did this by helping us save our family.