Are you in Recovery? Are you struggling, finding it hard to process your emotions and feelings? Have you ever heard of empaths? If not, have you considered you might be one? I had never even heard of the word empath until a few years ago. Whilst I had learned a lot about myself in my […]
Give people recovering from addiction a second chance
When the teachers at school asked me, “what do you want to be when you are older, what career do you want to pursue?” I didn’t have a reply because I didn’t have a scooby doo. All everyone talked about was qualifications this, qualification that! Personally, I didn’t see the relevance. Growing up, money had […]
Understanding my addiction and how it helped my recovery
What started, as a release became more of a habit. Unbeknown to me at that time, my repeated drug use was secretly rewiring my reward circuits in my brain, which had started to interfere with my ability to resist taking more. Which eventually turned into a dependency, or also known as addiction. Looking back, I […]
It is the best feeling in the world to be able to look back and see just how far you have come.
I try not to dwell on the past for too long. Over the years, I have worked hard at paying attention to the present in preparation for whatever the future may hold. That was until it came to writing this bleeding book. A couple of times, I found myself struggling to piece together fragments of […]
The therapeutic act of writing
For years after Dad’s death, I would often dream of Dad. Unfortunately, most felt more like nightmares. The most common one was that he was alive, but I could never work out how? The memories of his burial would be clear as day in my mind, stood by his grave, throwing in a single red […]
COVID one year on
Facebook had just asked me – What’s on your mind, so i had a think about it… As I flicked through my memories, I realise such much has changed Its been a long xxcking year and yet, i’m still here Only eight years ago, Sheffield was covered in snow The year before I […]
Connecting the Dots: Everything happens for a reason.
Today is a particularly poignant day. It is precisely 16 years since Dad took his last breath. I remember the day as if it was yesterday. Me and my sister found him on the living room floor in his flat, and despite looking like shit, he was in a positive mood. He reached out his […]
Writing it out
There have been some days over the past year; I have had to have some serious Words Wi Me Sen to adjust with this shit show called COVID. Confined to home working, being isolated from the usual office/social chat and banter has been replaced with more time to think or, should I say, overthink. I […]
Hormones and the cycle of change – Part of a woman’s recovery that’s rarely talked about
Most people in recovery have heard Prochaska and DiClemente’s Stages of Change, but what about the monthly cycle. I have spoken to many women whose periods stopped during their using but came back with a vengeance when they started their recovery journey. “I mean as if us women don’t have enough emotional shit to deal […]
Growing up on the Valley
Growing up on the Valley I was brought up on the Valley Back in the day when I was a scally I’m proud of mi working class roots And my life on the estates The Valley is the place I met some lifelong mates Back in the day when we fought wi our fists […]
