Dying to Survive

by Rachael Keogh

  And that was it. That was Keltoi in a bag. I had never experienced anything like it in my life. Used to guessing what others wanted of me in treatment and giving it to them, I found Keltoi a shock to begin with. No-one gave me orders or showed me what to do, nobody told me what they were thinking. And I really needed to know what everyone was thinking. That way I would know where I stood. But it wasn’t a game. It appeared to be the most ‘normal’ treatment centre I had ever come across. I was later to learn that Keltoi was designed that way on purpose: being left to our own devices in a safe place would teach us self-reliance and self-trust. And after two weeks I began to really feel at home.

  _____

  I had never been one for hanging out with the girls. My experiences in prison had turned me off them and, in spite of everything I had gone through with men, I had always felt more comfortable with them. But things had changed with me this time. I planned to stay as far away from men as possible and to start making friendships with women as Katriona, my NA sponsor, had advised me. This would be difficult for me. I couldn’t manipulate women. They would see right through me. But then I remembered that I no longer had the need to manipulate anyone. I had nothing to hide and people’s opinions of me didn’t matter any more.

  Rachel and I didn’t see eye to eye at first, in spite of sharing the same name. She had come into Cuan Dara two weeks after me. She was the same age and she had the same taste in clothes. We should have had a lot in common, but I had no idea how to approach her. We tried to be polite to each other, but we avoided being left alone together at all costs. I knew that we had to clear the air, but I had no idea what I would say to her. So I decided to just be honest. We both sat alone together and I told Rachel how much I admired her for sticking with the detox and coming into rehab, as it was her first time. It had taken me ten years to get this far. She then told me how much she admired me and had secretly done so, even in Cuan Dara. But her fear of women had got the better of her.

  The more that I spoke to Rachel, the more I realised how much we had in common. We both loved dancing, music and singing. After that initial chat, we became firm friends, so much so that within two weeks, the other clients were jokingly accusing myself and Rachel of being co-dependent. (That’s how rehab is. You enter with one addiction and all of a sudden you have dozens of them!) But the counsellors encouraged our friendship: we had missed out on so many years of doing girlie things and Keltoi gave us the freedom to make up for lost time.

  Rachel and I spent most of our free time together, telling each other our innermost secrets, heartily laughing together about embarrassing things that we had done in our addiction and at times crying together with the sheer relief of being clean and having each other to share it with. Any chance we got, we made up dances, chatted about fashion and defended each other in group therapy. I was learning all over again what it meant to have a girlfriend and to be a girlfriend.

  _____

  My time in Keltoi would be over in the blink of an eye and I planned to make the best of it. I had learned so much about myself and my addiction over the years and my relapses hadn’t taken that away from me. I had no question in my mind or any doubt about whether or not I was an addict. No matter what I did, I couldn’t use any mood-altering substance without it having devastating consequences. I truly accepted this now without any reservation. My addiction was intricately part of my make-up. If I really wanted to recover I would have to change everything: my thinking, my behaviour, my perception of myself and of the world around me. Day by day I would have to learn how to live with that. Keltoi was teaching me how to put into practice all that I had learned.

  My new-found ability to do things that had been beyond my control in the past made me question my belief in a power greater than myself. Did I even believe in God any more, or was I the one who was doing all the work and not God? I couldn’t deny the fact that I had escaped death on more than one occasion. Was that just luck or coincidental? Was I making things harder for myself by believing in God, or had I really been carried through my addiction by a higher power? If I was, why me? Why had so many of my friends died and not me? I wasn’t sure. But I had always been certain of the fact that when I meditated and I stilled my mind I was no longer tormented by my addiction. I somehow found a strength which surpassed my own capabilities.

  But the whole God thing had got me into trouble before, and so now it was important for me to take serious stock of my beliefs around all of this. And I came to the realisation that any suffering I had encountered had absolutely nothing to do with God. The God of my understanding wasn’t a judgmental tyrant who sat on a cloud setting up ways for me to fall flat on my face and to suffer unnecessarily. I really didn’t know what ‘God’ was, but it was something that was inside of me and all around me. It was an energy that was loving and caring, forgiving and understanding. It was there for me to tap into whenever I wanted.

  I had always been too afraid to truly get in touch with this good side of myself before. It wasn’t familiar and I didn’t trust it. If I got in touch with this side of myself, my heart would surely crumble. I would become too soft and people would take me for an eegit. So I held on to the negativity and I fed it. This was my way of keeping some sort of control. But look where it had got me. All that bullshit was over now. I intended to do things differently. In the quietness of meditation, I was recognising the difference between my addiction and myself as a human being. It was all very simple now. My addiction was negative and I was positive. I was learning how to nourish my positive side. I had been told to give myself positive affirmations—even if I didn’t believe what I was saying I would do it anyway. I found that, over time, this technique was really beginning to work for me.

  Apart from the spiritual side, Keltoi put a lot of emphasis on practicalities. The importance of planning out my day and sticking with my plan. I had no concept of time or planning. My attitude had been that somehow, someway, everything would magically fall into place and without any effort on my behalf. With the help of the clients and the staff in Keltoi, I realised that this type of attitude had always got me into trouble. It was one of the many things that I needed to change. So I began to make a real effort to get out of bed on time. To be at the breakfast table on time. To do my job on time. And in doing these simple things I began to feel like a human being again. I was learning the meaning of self-discipline and achievement. And my failure to do these simple things had always marked the beginning of my past relapses into drug addiction.

  I was halfway through my rehabilitation and I was loving every minute of it. But, for me, letting go of the drugs was as though someone had died. I felt as though I was grieving and becoming liberated all at once. The camaraderie that I shared with the other clients got me through the tough times. And I knew that I was blessed to be around such a wonderful bunch of people.

  I kept pictures on my wall of Justin and some other people who had hurt me in the past. As strange as it may seem, they were my driving force at times. The pictures empowered me, reminding me that it wasn’t what they had done to me that played a part in me going back using drugs; it was how I had reacted to what they had done to me that caused me the most pain. I now knew in my heart that nobody could really hurt me any more than I could hurt myself. And I would never again give anyone that power. Not Justin, Derek, any man or woman, or even my family. It was my responsibility now who I let into my life. And I had learned the hard way that not everyone could be trusted. I wouldn’t wear my heart on my sleeve the way I had done before: people would have to earn my trust.

  During this time, my family came to visit me, but when I let them. For so many years I had been emotionally enmeshed with them, destroying myself because they couldn’t be the people that I wanted them to be. Praying for them was helping me to accept them for who they were and I was slowly but surely realising that they had done their best with what they had. I was still terribly angry and hurt though. It would probably take me the rest of my life to heal from every
thing that had happened, but I had stopped trying to understand why I ended up the way I did. I stopped trying to understand my addiction and I stopped trying to understand God. It was pointless because they were things that were beyond my comprehension. Anyway, I couldn’t live my life and stay clean on knowledge alone. The solution for me now was accepting that I was an addict. Having faith that I was being looked after in a spiritual sense. Being true to myself and simply trying to do the next right thing. Keltoi had been just what I needed.

  After all that peace and quiet, that meditation and reflection, I was dreading leaving Keltoi in some ways. Would the media and the public exposure be too much for me to handle? Did I really want to be known as ‘the girl with the arms’ or ‘the face of heroin’? All I wanted was to get clean. I was just one of thousands of recovering addicts all over the world. The only difference between me and them was that I had made my story known to the public. Yes, it was a miracle that I had got clean and I definitely had a story to tell. But I had to stay grounded and not get carried away with the glory of it all.

  Keltoi had arranged living accommodation for me in transitional housing for when I left, in what is called a ‘step-down’ programme, which provides support and counselling in a centre in Dublin city. The accommodation was a one-bedroomed apartment and it was ideal. I had my NA meetings within arm’s reach and Keltoi provided one-to-one counselling sessions and after-care weekly for that extra bit of support. I was delighted when my friend Rachel got a place on the same programme. By now we were inseparable. Other close friends were offered transitional housing not too far away. One of the conditions of my stay in transitional housing was that I attend a day programme, preferably of a rehabilitative nature. I point-blank refused. I would do a day programme but I wanted to move away from rehabilitation: I had done all that before and now it was time for a change. My goal was to go to college at some stage and I knew that I needed to prepare myself. So we came to the agreement that I would do an educational day programme. And this suited me fine.

  Chapter 17

  LETTING GO

  I was set up in my new life, with all the support I needed, but I also had another reason to look forward to the future. Patrick had come to Keltoi when I had settled in and had just got comfortable in my skin. One Tuesday, the buzz went around that a new client was arriving. I tried to not pay attention. I was in Keltoi to focus on myself, and the last thing that I needed was a distraction. When the new client arrived I was doing my household chores. I knew his face to see. I had seen him around town, but I had never spoken to him before. It was his glittering blue eyes that had stuck in my head. He politely shook my hand and he introduced himself as Patrick. Just by his appearance I knew that he came from a good family. (When an addict has a good family, it makes the world of difference to his/her health and well-being.) Patrick was a little bit taller than myself, slender but well built. His hair was dark with a trendy cut to it. I tried not to notice how attractive he was, but when he picked up the guitar and he began to sing during our free time, I found myself drooling.

  It wasn’t in my character to drool. The only time I had drooled was when I was goofing off on heroin, but of all the people who I had met during my life, none of them made my heart skip a beat like he did. Talk about seeing sparks. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. I had to pinch myself and remind myself why I was in Keltoi. Don’t go there, I told myself. Relationships always get you into trouble. I had fought so hard to get this far and I wasn’t about to jeopardise myself or anyone else just for some sort of instant gratification, or to feel good about myself. Been there, done that.

  Thank God for the no-physical-contact rule, I thought. Of course the more I got to know Patrick, the more I fancied him. But I was in early recovery, my hormones were all over the place and I just didn’t trust myself yet. I couldn’t keep this to myself, so I decided to tell one of the counsellors. ‘You know, your secrets grow in the dark, so you did the right thing by being honest,’ said the counsellor. Now that the counsellors knew, I definitely couldn’t act on my desires. And I knew that the counsellors would keep an eye on us both.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about Patrick though. I found myself completely in awe of him. Everything about him made me spin. He was gorgeous, talented, musically gifted, well-educated, a great listener and really funny. When he told me that he was attracted to me, I felt like a little girl again. But I didn’t let him know that. Then he said that he respected me too much to even try anything on with me. Not that I would have let him. But I liked that he had his priorities straight. He was in the same boat as me and he wasn’t about to mess up.

  So it was out in the open for everyone to see. I was human after all, with the same needs as everyone else, but I was conscious of the fact that I had a big part to play in the disastrous relationships that I had had in the past. I wasn’t totally innocent in it all. I had always been attracted to men who were bad boys and who wouldn’t treat me right. I wasn’t about to make the same mistake again.

  Myself and Patrick were reminded to focus on our recovery—there were to be no exclusive relationships in Keltoi. Some days I couldn’t stay in the same room as him. He was too much of a distraction. Working in the kitchen together was sheer torture. We would be accompanied by one of the counsellors, but I couldn’t see anyone but him. We kept our distance from each other as he sang to me from the other side of the kitchen. He called me his Golden Barley. Sometimes I would ask him to help me just so that I could be close to him. He would happily oblige.

  I decided that I was going to marry Patrick some day and have his babies with him when the time was right. Rachel thought that this was funny. ‘Ah, yeah, typical addict. You hardly even know him and you have your life planned out with him already.’ But I had never experienced anything like this before. I never felt for anyone the way I did about him.

  Everyone knew that myself and Patrick were mad about each other. The chemistry between us was explosive. I was truly tested and challenged around my attraction for him in Keltoi, but we both managed to be as honest as we could without breaking any of the rules. The difficulty would be when we got out, and I knew in my heart that we would end up being together.

  I knew that getting into a relationship was risky for me. I had to question myself around my feelings for Patrick. Was it me or my addiction? Was I just afraid of being on my own? Was I running from something? I knew the meaning now of being left on my own. And it didn’t frighten me any more. I knew in my heart of hearts that my feelings for Patrick were solid, that I wasn’t looking for him to replace the drugs or to fill the void. I entered a relationship with Patrick with my eyes wide open.

  _____

  When I left Keltoi to live on my own I became really friendly with Alison, the girl from Sky News. At first I was a little bit surprised that she wanted to be my friend. I was a recovering drug-addict and she was a reporter/journalist. Not a likely mix. And I thought that she would be too concerned about what other people thought. But she wasn’t. When the drugs were taken away, we had much in common. The difference between us was that I coped with my life by using drugs. She coped by working every hour that God sent her. She reminded me so much of my old friend Katie from Ballymun whom I hadn’t seen in years, and I felt that I could trust her with anything. Spending time with Alison was making me realise that it wasn’t only addicts who wanted to dull their pain. It was human nature. This was a bit of a revelation to me. I had been convinced that addicts were only half human. Like we were missing something. But the more I got to know Alison, the more I realised that she suffered from the same fears, the same anxieties and the same self-doubt as I did. We all do. But everyone deals with things in different ways. This information was a big relief for me. And for the first time in my life I felt connected to the human race.

  Things were going so well that I was beginning to think something was wrong, but I wouldn’t allow myself to be negative. I was training myself now to think positive thoughts. Even when I heard people
talk about me on the streets saying, ‘There’s your woman with the arms’, or nasty comments like ‘You shouldn’t have used drugs in the first place,’ I wouldn’t let it get me down. Some people lacked understanding, that was all. I had to take the good with the bad, and the majority of people were surprisingly supportive.

  It was summer time. The sun was shining, I was clean and free from drugs and I had a roof over my head. That was the most important thing. Myself and Rachel were lapping up the sun, going shopping and having our own little parties on her rooftop. We were having the time of our lives. Patrick’s music career was beginning to take off. He had been offered a deal to make six singles. All of us were chuffed for Patrick. We knew how much his music meant to him. And there was no doubt that he had a raw gift. My relationship with Patrick was my little piece of heaven. I was really beginning to think that I could easily spend the rest of my life with him. We had been together for six months now. Six months clean had always being a dodgy time for me in the past. For some reason I could never get beyond this stage. But things were actually going really well. My family loved Patrick the minute they met him. Especially Philip. He looked at Patrick as if he were God and he was amazed by Patrick’s musical abilities. It wasn’t long before they became really good friends. I was surprised that my grandmother approved of Patrick. She never liked any of the company that I kept and in her eyes no-one was ever good enough for me. But she saw something in Patrick that she really took to.

  _____

  I noticed that I had missed my period. At first I didn’t think much of it. My body was still adjusting to being clean. One week passed, two, then three. Now I was worried. Patrick came with me to get the pregnancy test and I nearly passed out when it read positive. This couldn’t be right, I thought. I was convinced that I couldn’t have children. I had done too much damage to my body. I couldn’t be pregnant. It just wasn’t possible. Six months ago I was at death’s door and now I was pregnant. Patrick went white when I told him. And he stayed white for a couple of weeks. He told me that he wasn’t ready for a baby. We weren’t ready for a baby. We were too early in recovery for such a big responsibility. He was right, it would be a huge responsibility. But I wasn’t about to run from it. Patrick told me that he would support me in whatever decision I made. And I decided to keep the baby.