When Mary* and her husband, Peter*, first noticed that their teenage daughter Saoirse* was drinking alcohol and using cannabis, they never imagined the “pain and anguish” it would cause over the next 13 years.
Sitting in the office of addiction family support service, the Whitechurch Addiction Support Programme (WASP), based in the South Dublin suburb of Rathfarnham, Mary and Peter share their journey. Their story is documented alongside 30 others in a new book, Love is not Enough: Families’ Journeys through Addiction, published by WASP last week.
What the couple realised later was a coping mechanism for Saoirse to deal with bullying she faced in school spiralled quickly into cross-addiction and acted as “a gateway drug”.
Soon she moved from cannabis and started taking other illegal substances, even at home, becoming unrecognisable to her parents and younger brother. Gambling, alcoholism and substance abuse all became interconnected issues.
“I would describe it as a tornado that comes into the home and literally sends the three of us n
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