Rods Bio

Hi. My name is Rod (that's me in the picture not on the wanted list anymore), I live in Australia, and I've been clean (from Heroin) for a number of years now. When I was in my late teens and early 20's, I developed a serious drug problem. My wife 'to be' came along and I stopped using, and so ended one chapter of my life - or so I thought, but only to find out later in life that I had just pushed a lot of issues aside and not dealt with them.

I married and raised 3 wonderful children, but then I lost my job (retrenchment), and found that for the first time in my life that I could not support my family - I was devastated. My only answer, at the age of 45, was to start using heroin again. It was the one thing that I knew I could take comfort in and something that would be my closest friend. An escape I could rely on.

Fortunately, with the help of my family, friends and church, I again was able to stop, but this time dealing with some of the underlying issues. Things such as sexual abuse as a child, of being beaten by my father, of having no self worth, of twice attempting suicide, of 'run-ins' with the police, all the things that I had 'ignored' earlier in my life. During the past 2 years, I have twice visited drug rehab facilities in the UK and Spain and now have a totally different outlook on life. I currently work in the IT industry, but now know that I want to change direction and help those who have been through similar experiences as me. At my lowest point a few years ago, one thing I found was that there was little support for people 'my age' (I'm over 50 now), and that everything was directed towards youth. Heroin addiction is not JUST a youth problem, and I want to be able to support any one with an addiction, regardless of how old, or how young.