Please find below a selection of stories from the participants on the TRP programme both past and present.
Participant’s Stories 2011
THE RINN VOYAGER
I enjoyed the Rinn Voyager it was a good day out.
To see all the ships come in come in and out and to RELAX.
It was AMAZING seen all the cargo getting taken out of the ship and we did a bit of fishing and it was RELAXING and we enjoyed the luas back home.
I was thinking about it all day
IT WAS AMAZING
Thanks to the staff for a wonderful day.
THE RINN VOYAGER
It started when we met for breakfast it was a lovely sunny day. I never thought I’d find myself on a boat in the middle of Dublin bay taking din the sights.
The atmosphere was great we went out as far as Dalkey and we just drifted for about two hours. I was very peaceful. We cast our rods and talked and drank tea it was great bonding with all staff and participants. It was a day I’ll always remember in TRP its days like that day that make me appreciate been clean and living
THE RINN VOYAGER
It was good the day we went out on the Rinn Voyager, we went out early that morning. The lads met up at the square and had a good laugh; we got the luas into town and met up with two staff. It was good to have that different relationship with staff as well.
The two men on the boat were very nice, it was very relaxing on the boat. The two men told us about how the boat was built by people in recovery; it was a sailing yacht. It was a different experience for the group and the staff and I believe we bonded in a different way.
It is a good memory and I will always remember OUR day on the RINN VOYAGER good day to be clean and sober.
GENDER WOMEN
I found the women’s Gender Group was great. I learned more about me and my body also you are what you eat. A woman came in called Ruth and showed us how to make smoothies I’ve NEVER tasted them or made them. They don’t look the best but they are lovely to drink. They’re very healthy for you.
A nurse called Pat came into us last week she was lovely. The information I’ve learned from her about everyday stuff like getting to know how my body works every month even though I have two kids age nine and fourteen (boys). It was great just to have all women in the group it was much easier to talk out loud about how you are and feel.
GENDER WOMEN
From the session I was at I took a few different things,
1. One was on self-care because its important to look after yourself cause if you don’t look after yourself you cant look after your children.
2. I loved that it was all girls it was different.
3. I especially loved the last session with Pat on women’s health. I learned a lot that I taught I knew but I didn’t.
GENDER WOMEN
I found out useful information, for one self-care, how to look after myself a lot more. Eating, sleeping and time out for myself, and I found it a lot easier and comfortable to talk about myself in front of women.
GENDER WOMEN
I really enjoyed my gender group. I found it really easy to talk, especially when it is about women’s problems we have a great laugh and sometimes it can be intense. I found out about parts of my body that I never even knew about.
The Dash Poem
By Linda Ellis
I read of a man who stood to speak
At the funeral of a friend
He referred to the dates of her tombstone
From the beginning to the end
He noted that first came the date for her birth
And spoke the following date with tears,
But he said what mattered most of all
Was the dash between those years.
For that dash represents all the time
That she spent alive on earth.
And now only those who loved her
Know what that little line is worth
For it matters not how much we own;
The cars, the house, the cash,
What matters is how we live and love
And how we spend our dash.
So think about this long and hard.
Are there things you’d like to change?
For you never know how much time is left,
That can still be rearranged.
If we could just slow down enough
To consider what’s true and real
And always try to understand
The way other people feel.
And be less quick to anger,
And show appreciation more
And love the people in our lives
Like we’ve never loved before.
If we treat each other with respect,
And more often wear a smile
Remembering that this special dash
Might only last a little while.
So, when your eulogy is being read
With your life’s actions to rehash
Would you be proud of the things they say
About how you spent your dash?
My new dash in sobriety feels great
With the learning I get here everyday
I am now on a journey of rearranging my dash
It will not be easy
But in “NEED” to finish this journey
It’s so good to love again.
It’s been three short years since I walked through that door and oh my god what I’ve come to explore just like so many that have come and gone I thought I would detox in no time at all. I hadn’t a clue of all that’s involved, I really didn’t know how much life would change I struggled at first and even thought of leaving but thanks to my key worker I decided I’m staying and I’m so glad now I did because I’ve learnt so much. T.R.P has helped me to get out of a rut, they’ve helped open my eyes to my own talents painting, writing and even drama I’ve even learnt about money management but most important of all has been my personal development, workshops on parenting and interview skills have brightened my future as well as my kids. I love this place it’s been like a second home but the time has come for me to move on which means, I’ll be leaving here someday soon and as you might guess I won’t be over the moon but I know I have the aftercare which is second to none.
So to the staff and my peer’s thanks very much you’s really are the most amazing bunch.
MK 2010
To all my peers at T.R.P.
You are all so strong for the work that you are doing
We all have our up’s and down’s But by hanging on in there it’s so worth while
I hope all of you do really well; it has been so great to be on my journey with you
I want to thank all of you for being part of it and letting me be part of you
You have all been a great support and pear support is so important
so I hope all of you support each other in the rest of your own journey
What you put in you get out, every one said it but it is so true
Mind, support and challenge each other because that’s all we have to keep us safe
its special we need each other.
Try mind each other and take what you can and put what you can in because
when it comes to the end of your time at T.R.P. which is does,
take all you’re training with you because T.R.P. is the training so train well.
Thank you my big T.R.P. Family
The Battle of the Sinking Ship
I drank a lot in my past, as the years went on I knew it could not last.
So this is my story about my drinking, I felt like a ship that was sinking.
I could not cope when my nerves got bad, I felt a failure and very sad.
I drink to blank out my guilt and my fears, and tried to get my nerves into gear,
I knew my drinking was killing me, and hurting the whole family.
I wanted to stop all this pain, but I felt I was really going insane,
I prayed to god that he’d stop me drinking, that’s when my mind started thinking.
If I did not give up, It would pull me down, I’d be like that ship - I would drown.
That’s when I made my decision, I started on my little mission.
I am going to A.A. meetings where I can get help and care, it really has made me become very aware.
I sit and listen to people of all kinds, like me they thought they were losing their minds.
They were like me, they lived in fear, but they are all getting themselves into gear.
They’re happy people now, they don’t need a drink. Not like the ship that’s about to sink.
I am only learning now how to cope, dont live in fear but live for hope.
I still feel unwell, but not as bad, I don’t feel as lonely, and I dont feel as sad.
I feel I don’t need a drink, I really need god, for a drink to most people is only a cod.
It fools your mind in every way, it brings you down day by day.
If you can’t remember the night before, when you drink to much you become a bore.
I lost the respect of people when I drank, an my own feelings just sank.
I can bring my children to school and feel pride, because I do not drink anymore, I have nothing to hide.
To see their happy faces, I missed out on for so long, makes me feel so happy that my drinking days are finally gone.
I hope and pray to god each night, to keep me sober and give me the strength to fight.
I know if I started to drink today, my fears would be here and not gone away.
So I thank god and my friends and my family for this, only for them a lot of life I would miss.
By A.M.S.
Tallaght Rehabilitation Project
What T.R.P. is doing for me , teaching me to live a good life, let go of my past and to become free.
When I started T.R.P. it really meant alot to me, helping me along in my recovery.
From the support from my key worker, facilitators and my peers, helping me so much to overcome my fears.
I am tought how to manage anxiety, panic and low self asteam together we do this as a team.
We used drink and drugs as we were people in dispear, we belive nobody bothered about us or even cared.
But now in T.R.P. were using our copeing skills, we put in the work as our lives fullfil.
I like many was reaching out for help, for years until i found T.R.P. dealing with the outside world not projecting into my fears.
Im learning now to cope, don’t live in fear, live in hope.
T.R.P. has given me the tools, all I have to do is listen and learn and abide by the rules.
We work on anxiety, parenting, self esteem, arts and crafts as a team.
only for T.R.P. taking me on for the first time in my life I feel like I belong.
Its like the battle of the sinking ship that I wrote, If I wasn’t apart of T.R.P. I’d still feel like the wreackage of that boat.
T.R.P. has helped me in so many ways, as I am looking forward to sober happier days.
T.R.P. has brought people together as a team, and all of those people followed their dream.
Some people became councellers, facilitators, what they wanted to be, all because of being a member of T.R.P.
by A.M.S.
The Camera
In the darkest room, on our darkest night,
it’s possible to find that light,
To help enable our development,
Exposure is needed to heal our past,
Focus is needed to seal our future,
Our picture will remain the same in the eves of those that know us best
Therefore we must provide a new lense to alter the clarity of what they believe they see,
One click of a button,
One mistake in time,
Trapped on paper for ever,
Immortalized in their mind,
Until the paper is exposed to the chemicals and the dark it remains blank,
Most people only get one chance and follow the path they find, until they find their end,
Yet here we sit, with a blank undeveloped sheet,
Exposed to either few or no chemicals,
A second chance, a second path,
Help the person next to you both find and remain on that second path,
For each person that deviates is yet another unexposed photograph,
And each non-exposure endangers the picture next to you,
Life through a lense is a very hard thing indeed,
Yet it is still definitely a life worth living.
by RD