Faith Versus Medicine

br /> "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">

Not much older than 16 I was introduced to hard drugs , it started
with smoking grass or pot . Never let anybody tell you that pot doesn't
lead on to harder drugs . That is untrue . The circle of people I
smoked pot with tried other drugs ,as they became available and in turn
they were offered to me . At first hash then LSD and other
hallucinogenic
drugs called trips, dots, acid and finally heroin . The daily use of
hard narcotics in my system upset the chemical balance in my brain and
that's when I realised that I was really off the planet without any
idea of what reality was anymore I had to reclaim back my sanity and my
life . I had decided to use these drugs and not it was up to me to get
off these substances .

At eighteen and still living with Mum and Dad in the family home no one
in my family knew what was going on . I had kept my drug addiction a
secret .

As soon as I realised how evil drugs were and how they were making me a
stranger to myself and the world around me was when I started to think
about getting out of the drugs .

Once I stopped taking drugs my problems began . Cold turkey brought me
into a nightmare existence where I experienced both audible and visual
hallucinations . What I heard and seen where not pleasant .

It is worth mentioning that constant daily use of narcotics had made
these psychotic experiences become my only living reality . Each day
was hell and each day I refused to take any drugs . I cut myself off
from the circle of friends I had who were still using drugs . I was not
a popular kid anymore and the name fink was used to describe someone
like me who went straight .
Because of the chemical imbalance in my brain it was going to take a
long time for me to straighten out .
Like the old Moody blues number I was lost in a lost world .
I grasped on to help wherever I could find it .
Very briefly here is a record of what I went through during a period of
over ten years as I tried to straighten myself out after years of drug
use .

1972-1974 Arrived in Australia from Belfat at 16 years of age and after
a few weeks in my this new country I was very badly burned in a fire at
a factory where I was working .
With 3rd degree burns on both legs I was unable to walk for six months
.
The factory fire left emotional scars as well as the permanent scars to
my skin tissue and without any compensation I was feeling quite at a
loss . When a group of friends from my job offered me some pot to smoke
I tried it . The feeling made me happy at first and the smoking of pot
became a daily ritual . Pot became hard to get as I was told and other
heavy drugs were made available to me .
After some time experimenting with hallucinagenoics I ended up
injecting heroin . Daily drug use was now a normal way of life for me
and I was now living a life where nnothing made any sense . I was going
insane and could do nothing about it .

1974- Stopped Using Hard Narcotics and began therapy with Wisteria
House in Sydney .

1976- Lost my job due to the effects from drugs ,and returned to
Belfast .

1976 to 1978 . Suicidal I was sent into Purdysburn Hospital . Received
the last rites in a hospital bed and bounced back
to life. Many relations and friends kept up their novenas to St Jude
the patron of hopeless cases and constant prayers where being offered
up on my behalf . I know they pulled me through Steve . I had a heavy
course of electric shock treatment (ECT)
followed up with a daily course of tranquillisers and sedatives .

1978 to 1980- My mind had now been hijacked by prescribed drugs and I
returned to my family in Sydney. Much different to the person they knew
I tried to forget the person I was and be again their son and brother
.
That was difficult .
I found a job and bought a car and kept going to my weekly therapy
sessions with GROW and the community health groups .

1980 to 1986 . During this time I tried every thing humanly possible to
recover from drug abuse . Now after some sessions with a psychiatrist
who diagnosed me as a chronic paranoiac schizophrenic I was sent into
Chelmsford Hospital for further (ECT) and/or deep sleep therapy . After
multiple deaths and suicides at Chelmsford, the hospital was closed
down and a royal commission ordered . Released into a hostile society a
very fragile me found other means of coping . Hypnotherapy was a new
method I used to combat the diagnosis . Since 1975 I had been on daily
medication . My body was now used to these very heavy
tranquillisers.
Over the past ten years doctors had tried many different kinds of drugs
on me.
My sister was killed in 1986 in a car crash and that for me marked the
turning point . My sister who I loved
was snatched from this life without anyone really knowing how beautful
she was . She would never have children of her own , she would never be
able to see me face to face . I would never see her smile again . At
first I was angry but I channeled this into a determination to defeat
the effects of what drugs had done to me .
I began attending daily mass and praying very hard . It came to me like
a light through an old window one day .
I knelt before the altar and said these words , God you created me .
You know every hair on my head and have counted every bone in my body .
You have carved my name in the palm of your hand . Dear God you know my
heart and my mind .
If you created me then it should be no problem to cure me . God help me
to recover . Heal my broken nerves . Cure my troubled mind . God I am
handing myself over to you completely.
Steve at that moment I could hear God say , My son why did you not come
to me before this . Of course I will heal you .
From that day I never looked back . I was so angry with myself because
for over ten years I wasted time going to Doctors, psychiatrists ,
Hypnothereapists , councillors, group therapy , medications, and never
once did I allow myself the thought ask God
for help . It was all so simple and yet I never saw it , and so that
day I made the decision to quit all prescribed drugs and let God have a
go .
It was not an easy road however and many people have said that I should
have weaned off my medication slowly .
1986 to 1989 With no other help other that my faith I returned to the
UK . I was robbed in London and became homeless for three years . God
worked on me during this time . Although homeless I kept going to mass
and receiving holy communion .
I continued to allow God to work on me and he was . Every where I went
I met communities called The Good Shepherd Mission in Bethnal Green in
East London and the Good Shepherd Church on the Ormeau Road in Belfast
.

I was helped by charities like Simon Community in Ireland ,
The Manna Centre, The Salvation Army and Bible Way Church in London
,
The ST Vincent De Paul in Belfast ,
and begged for my existence until I found a job .
I owe a lot to a greta many good lay people both in London and
Ireland
who pulled me through my nightmare .
My family in Australia had no idea where I was and what was happening
to me . Beaten up on the streets and abused I fell into very dangerous
hands .
I was driven so low and had to cope with so much hardship that my drug
experience was completely obliterated .

By the time I was ready to return to Australia in 1990 I was cured
completely .
What I had now was a stronger faith .

1990 to 1992 Returned to Australia and started my own business which
fell . I married Mary and children started to arrive .

1992 to present day . I am giving talks on how to beat drug addiction
with faith alone and teaching scripture.
I have continued to write poetry, songs and other creative writings .
All the Doctors and psychiatrists who had once said I would never be
able to have children or marry because of the stress have squashed
their diagnoses of me . I have had apologies from other people who call
themselves doctors . The truth of it is none of them ever knew how to
deal with my problem and so they resigned themselves to doping me up or
sedating me heavily .
Jesus my saviour took me into his hands and I was cured .
I hope some of this experience may shed some light into how with faith
we can conquer anything .
This true story of how I found my way to health again through Christ is
one that I hope may help some other people who are facing difficulties
in life .
I pray that the hope of the risen Lord will bring them out from the
darkness and into the light of his wonderful love .

The tomb of depression can only keep us a prisoner for a while until
Christ reaches out his hand to us .
Jesus rose so that we may have life and live it to the full .

The End