An Armagh woman is embarking on an ambitious plan to open a rehabilitation centre for addiction in the city.
Emma Metcalfe, from Blackwatertown, says she herself has lived through alcoholism – and survived.
The 40-year-old has spent many years in recovery, using her lived experience to help others – but says more needs to be done.
There are currently only six rehabilitation centres in Northern Ireland, all of which are full to capacity – which, Emma says, only exacerbates the epidemic this country is experiencing.
Locally, the issue is a huge problem bubbling beneath the surface.
“In the last six months, I don’t know how many wakes and funerals I’ve actually been to – young people taking their own lives due to alcohol and drug addiction,” Emma told Armagh I.
The reality is stark.
“These people have been through university and got degrees, or are currently studying. This isn’t just the less fortunate – it’s people from all walks of life.
“Their parents are praying day and night, just hoping their child will make it. There are hundreds of people like me who do this on a daily basis.”
Emma says that while there are plenty of meetings, “that’s not the problem – it’s the people who have nowhere to go and nowhere to turn”.
Rehabilitation centres are “maxed out”, and many are near impossible to get into.
In Armagh, there is nothing. That’s not due to a lack of demand – something Emma is categoric about. The hospital treatment room isn’t the solution either.
“The number of alcoholics who end up in A&E in Craigavon and Daisy Hill is enormous. But the process they go through in hospital – they’re set up to fail every time.”
Emma says she could no longer sit back and do nothing. And while she admits it’s a shot in the dark, the wakes and funerals are mounting.
“It’s really hard to watch. I’ve been to three funerals recently. These were young people, with degrees, good families – and drink overruled their lives.
“And they wouldn’t take drugs, by the way, unless they had drink in their system. For me, drink is the problem – it kills more people than cancer.”
Emma is hoping to create a safe, supportive space for those in our community “who need it most”.
But she needs the support of the community to make it happen.
“There should be a safe space in every county,” she said. “The number of young lads who have come to me looking for help – but it’s just not there.
“Alcoholism is a selfish disease, but nobody wakes up thinking they’re going to be an alcoholic. They need the right help to get off it and speaking to others is a massive help. I’m living proof. All I need to do is talk to another person who has been through what I have, and it keeps me well.”
Emma says the centre wouldn’t require as much as people might think.
“There are no medical resources needed,” she said. “We have AA rooms, but that’s just an hour and a half for a meeting. That’s all well and good – but there needs to be more.
“People battling alcoholism often feel so ashamed of what they’ve become, and they hate that they’ve hurt the people they love most. The embarrassment and the taboo of it – it’s an awful, rotten feeling to be labelled an addict.
“Some people need two or three weeks to heal – to literally heal. And you heal better in a simple environment. You don’t need medical services or any of that. These types of rehab centres are all over the world. I’ve been to them.
“These are open treatment centres with no doctors or nurses. It’s people like me helping others recover, heal, talk, go to meetings, and eventually go back into society and find themselves again. It’s not medically based – the facility would be self-supporting.
“You’re talking about volunteers – people who have been in recovery, people like myself, with long periods of sobriety behind them. That’s how it works. You’re not paying people. Helping others actually helps me stay sober too.
“There are people I know who go to Craigavon, openly and freely, in their own time, to talk to people who are being detoxed. And it helps them, in a selfish way – but it’s also helping the person who’s suffering. That’s how it works.”
“Addiction doesn’t care who you are – barristers, doctors, solicitors, teachers. Society believes it only affects the less fortunate, which is sometimes sad.
“It’s our children on our streets – in our city of Armagh. It just takes one person to give that hand of hope. There was a hand of hope put out to me – and at the time I thought, ‘What would they know?’ But ten years later, I’m just passing on what was freely given to me.”
Emma says there isn’t a family in Armagh that hasn’t been affected by addiction – whether it’s a child, partner, or another relative.
“If the campaign doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. At least I know I tried.”
But already there have been much positivity with a fantastic response, Emma says, from “MPs, councillors and the wider public, all willing to do what they can to make this dream come true.”
“After all, I know Armagh won’t let us down – they are the best supporters in Ireland.
“I’d really like to thank those for their support already; I can not do this alone but we can do it together – let’s get the job done!”
Related: Lurgan man on verge of losing everything pleads for help as gambling problem ‘a ticking timebomb’
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