Making Up For Lost Time

Ruth never got to see her daughter roll over for the first time or make her first tentative crawl.

Instead, she was either in jail or a meth-induced state that wasn’t fit for parenting.

Ruth (not her real name), realises she can’t retrieve those precious moments but she now appreciates every minute she shares with her daughter.

After five years of addiction and several stints in jail, Ruth has been clean for 20 months and has finally become a good mum.

“That’s enough to give me motivation to stay clean,” she said. “Our bonding attachment is amazing. Even child protection said they were impressed with how we bonded.”

Her baby was removed from her care at birth and Ruth now realises child protection authorities had no choice.

“I had been in addiction for about five years and in and out of jail,” she said.

Ruth had been using a cocktail of pills but was coerced into using meth while in a troubled and abusive relationship.

“He said I’m going to light this and if you don’t smoke it, it’s going to be wasted and I’m going to be angry,” Ruth said. “My options were smoke the meth or get beaten so I chose the meth and from there on it spiralled downhill.”

Ruth’s ribs and jaw were broken in a terrifying incident, prompting her to use more heavily. Depression and anxiety became severe, she lost her job, cut off friends and left school.

Ruth went to jail for possessing and trafficking methamphetamines, but that didn’t stop her. “I went to jail and then did the same shit all over again and was back in jail within three months. I was arrested three times in three days for possession of meth.”

During a stint out of jail she entered a new relationship and fell pregnant. This could have been her salvation, but it wasn’t.

“That’s when things got really hard. I knew when I got pregnant that I should stop using but I just couldn’t. There was no support put in place to help me. It was like a taboo subject; everyone would report it but put nothing in place to try to stop it.”

She knew before giving birth that she wouldn’t be able to keep her child.

“I gave birth on a Friday night and she was put in care of the hospital and taken off me the next Saturday.”

She was a healthy baby but with complications caused by Ruth’s drug use. “She had no birth problems but she was having minor tremors from withdrawals, which was really hard. I get a bit emotional talking about it now.”

Sixteen days after giving birth, her partner was jailed. Ruth knew what she needed to do to get access to her daughter but having no child and no partner made it worse.

Access visits were often under a cloud of drugs, making it had to bond with her child.

 “Getting clean seemed like an impossible task,” Ruth admitted.

Two and a half months after her partner was jailed, Ruth was also locked up for trafficking. For five hard months, she had no access to her daughter.

Her partner was the first to clean up his act, and when Ruth was released from jail, she was ordered to attend rehab as a condition of a three-year corrections order.

Her corrections officer referred her to the Sliding Doors non-residential rehabilitation program at WRAD and finally there was a light on the horizon.

“I thought when I got out of jail it was as simple don’t use, but it wasn’t that simple,” Ruth said. “There were triggers left, right and centre; people rocking up at my house and things going on but all I wanted was my baby. I didn’t want to be the old me, but that’s what people expected.”

That’s where Sliding Doors came in. “Having that support, I was able to recognise my triggers, to see high-risk situations and avoid putting myself in them.”

Ruth says Sliding Doors’ focus on cognitive behavioural therapy helped her to learn about her thoughts, feelings and behaviour.

“They showed me how my thoughts led to my behaviour and how we could challenge those thoughts when we get them,” she said.

“I discovered things about myself and how to change my core beliefs and how to communicate without yelling, because that’s how I thought I could be heard.”

COVID was another challenge and the Sliding Doors team was essential in helping Ruth through a difficult time.

“They handled COVID amazingly,” she said. “Offering support for addicts on a virtual platform is really hard, but they did it.”

Ruth had been getting one-hour access to her daughter three times a week. “It was hard getting out and staying clean, but my reward was to see my daughter,” she said.

However, during COVID visits were cut for two months because the child’s carer had diabetes and was considered high risk. “That was one of my biggest triggers,” Ruth said. “Having that taken away from me was excruciating. If I didn’t have Sliding Doors and my clinician at WRAD who went above and beyond to support me through it, I don’t think I’d be clean today.”

After completing the program and not using drugs, Ruth fought to bring her daughter home. 

She was initially granted six overnight stays over a two-week period and was then given a six-month preservation order where her daughter was home but child protection services checked regularly and Ruth was screened for drugs. The order expired in January. Ruth’s daughter has now been in the family home since July, two weeks after her first birthday.

Ruth is rightly proud of her achievements. “It was a lot of hard work but Sliding Doors gave me the skills and tools to be able to get to where I am,” she said. “The best part about Sliding Doors is that once you finish, they just don’t shut you off. I know that if I’m having a bad day I can call.”

Ruth has also been attending WRAD’s WARP peer support group and Narcotics Anonymous and continues appointments with her AOD clinician at WRAD. She’s also studying a Certificate IV in Child, Youth and Family Intervention. “I share bits and pieces about my addiction and recovery and people tell me they find that very useful. That makes me feel good.”

Ruth has been clean for 20 months and her partner is two-years clean and back at work and playing football.

“I’d be lying if I said I never feel like smoking meth but now I have that support and the tools and strategies to deal with it,” Ruth said.

“We have our own little family that we both cherish and keep together. I feel healthier and can function and have a better understanding of being a mum.

“I’ve been able to accept that I’m an addict and even though I haven’t used for 20 months, that doesn’t make me any less of an addict.

“Sliding Doors taught me it’s ok to have these emotions. I had a lot of guilt and shame around being an addict and that I had used in my pregnancy and had my daughter taken off me, but there’s nothing I can do to change my prior actions.”

“Now I accept my past and look forward to the future.”