42 Simon Communities in Ireland CASE STUDY 2: Caitlyn, age 28 Caitlyn had been recently housed in private rented accommodation following a prolonged stay in high support housing. She told that she was raised in a “small country town” and described a somewhat distant relationship with her family members during childhood and adolescence: “Our relationship was grand; I think everyone had their own problems and we just went off on our own and did our own kind of stuff like”. She was introduced to alcohol and illicit substances through peer networks in her local community during her early to mid-teens and soon began to disengage from school and embark on a pattern of ‘staying out’ with friends on a regular basis. Caitlyn explained that as her substance use escalated, she rapidly progressed from recreational to problematic poly-substance use. “Well I started using substances at 14 or 15 years old. Weed, hash, drink and stuff and then on to ecstasy and coke and crack and speed and MDMA and drinking and constantly smoking joints. It just got worse and worse and worse until I was kind of just using everything and anything.” Caitlyn initiated heroin use by smoking in her early 20s and sometime later accessed a methadone maintenance programme with the support of her doctor and addiction counsellor: “It was like hospitals and methadone clinics and doctor’s surgeries and chemists … that was my kind of circle for a while”. She spoke at length about the difficulties she faced in relation to engaging fully with the treatment programme, explaining that she was not “ready” to fully address her addiction issues and reduce her heroin use at that point in her life: “A lot of help was offered to me, I just wasn’t ready to take it or even approach it like. I wasn’t done with gear heroin”. At the age of 24, she attempted to reduce her drug intake without medical supervision, which had significant implications for her physical and mental health. She was subsequently placed in a psychiatric hospital for a short period: “I was in psychiatric care, proper locked ward, shut door … I kind of just done the two week stint in there because I was gone mad like. I was very sick”. Caitlyn returned to her family home at the point of discharge but quickly relapsed after reconnecting with an “old circle of friends” in her home neighbourhood. It was at this point that she decided to leave home and move to a different county in an effort to remove herself from an environment that she felt was exacerbating her drug use. In the following quote, she reflects on her experience of leaving home and becoming homeless for the first time when she was 25 years old. “I moved to get clean, I just thought, ‘If I stay here home neighbourhood, I am just going to continue using and I’ll end up dead’. I just kind of packed my bags and came to county name. There wasn’t much of a plan and not a whole lot of money … I didn’t know where I was going, I didn’t even know there was a homeless hostel and I was terrified. All I could do was cry.” With the help of staff members in a student hostel where she stayed for a period, she was referred to homeless support services almost immediately. From this point on, Caitlyn reported greater stability after a brief stay in emergency hostel accommodation followed by a stay in high support housing that lasted for several years: “It was an adjustment moving in with people you don’t know but I really enjoyed living there. I needed all the support”. During this time, Caitlyn availed of specialist medical care and also took part in numerous courses including relapse prevention and nutritional support programmes.
Women, Homelessness and Service Provision
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