KORENNE'S STORY.

SELF CARE,
SELF LOVE,
SELF WORTH.

Trigger warning: this brave story discusses addiction, domestic violence, homelessness and trauma. Please read with care.

“I went into rehab just after Mother's Day last year; and there was a Two Good care pack, gifted especially for that day. I used it in a bath during my first week, trying to settle in, you know? Life had been so different; so fast paced. I was trying to ground myself, to try out the meditations they teach you in recovery – the care pack definitely went to good use.

I'm learning the importance of self care, self love, self worth. Last night, I decided to head straight home, do a load of washing, have a bath, read my book and get into bed…and not one day in my life has a night ever looked like that for me. But I had a better sleep, and I felt so good this morning. I’m learning that I need that stuff; that it allows me to sit and check in with myself.

“Before, I didn't see myself as worthy of self-care; I don't think I valued my life enough for it. Now, I know that I need it.”

I'm learning how to live again - and that goes deep into understanding and recognising emotions. I'm experiencing feeling things in such a different way. I've always been being able to disconnect or disassociate from those deeper emotions; I had to. I witnessed a lot of things at a young age, with my mum…I grew up in a really dysfunctional family.

My parents met in rehab; my dad was a heroin addict, my mom had a lot of addictions, but also a lot of mental health issues as well. They split up and I was back and forth between each of them; a lot of my coping mechanisms started for me at such a young age, just having to survive. And it's carried all the way through until now that I'm doing inner work; where I'm becoming aware of them as behaviors, and seeing other ways of handling myself.

As I've gotten older, I've realised I’ve never let myself feel the deeper stuff. I lost my second daughter at 30 weeks gestation; I lost my mom when I was 15. There’s been a lot of people I've lost along the way…but nothing has ever gotten past this barrier that I'd built. I'm slowly starting to do work on that. Now, I know I was hyperactive and going a hundred miles an hour to protect me from having to stop and feel, you know?

YESTERDAY,
TODAY,
TWOMORROW.

It’s nearly been a year since I went into detox; I've gone through a lot of shifts in my thinking, and I've done a lot of internal growth since then. Since I grew up knowing addiction, when I fell into it myself, it took me a long time to to even recognise that it wasn't just a lifestyle choice; that it was a problem. When I fell pregnant with my daughter, I realised that it had taken hold of my life a lot more than I’d thought.

They removed my daughter three years ago; I had been a single mom with her, because we had escaped DV with her dad when she was 1. I raised her until she was six, right up until they removed her from my care. I had tried to do everything that was asked of me to get her back, but I ended up using…I just wasn't handling life without my daughter.

It got to the point where I tried rehabs, I'd get back out in the community and I'd just pick up again. It was like everything was just not working and I lost hope. I used to tell myself, fuck it, it’s in my DNA; it's never going to change. I'd almost died a couple of times, I started committing crime…I didn't know what to do.

I'd given up on my own life and my battle against addiction…but I didn't want to die knowing I'd given up on my fight to get my daughter back. So - still in a very, very sick mind – I thought, I'll just go to rehab, I'll get that certificate because then I know like I've done everything I can. Which obviously wasn't the case, but that's how I was thinking. I stepped into Foundation House, which was the first rehab I've ever done that’s 12-step based…and everything changed for me.

The second day I was there, I stepped into my first meeting; it was a woman's meeting, with ex-residents from that rehab. They were like sharing so openly - so raw and vulnerable - talking about their struggles and about where they're at now. For me, in that moment - amidst that energy in the room - there was a little shift. That flame of hope flickered back on…and I thought, fuck it. If they can do it, I can. And from there, everything changed for me. I thought, if I want what these women have, I've got to be honest, open, and willing - and that's what I dove straight into.

My drive at that time was still to get my daughter back…but slowly, there was another shift that happened for me.

“I started to realise that I had to do this for me. To get my life back.”

I can hope that that lands my daughter back in my care one day, but that's not a guarantee. And it’s so lucky that shift happened, because at the end last year, I started doing the legal process for restoration of care - but my application was denied, because I needed more clean time in the community. Had I not had that shift, I would have picked up again then - but I was able to think, well, that's just how it is at the moment. I'll get more clean time and I'll try again.

WORK WORK.

And then Work Work came along…in rehab, we would receive Two Good meals every Thursday, and one day I saw a poster about the Work Work program. I already had gratitude for those meals – they were always such a caring, beautiful thing. But it's so much more than I realised at the time. Learning about Two Good and its history - and then being on this end and seeing the love and the quality that goes into it - I have such a better understanding what goes into it. It's so much more personal.

Feeling the love in this place is just something that you don't expect to find in a workplace. Just last week, I'd been to a funeral of somebody who came on this recovery journey with me, and unfortunately the disease took his life. I had a lot of stuff come up for me at that funeral that I wasn't expecting; because I'm getting more connected to my inner self, and it triggered a lot for me. My head was telling me to lie - to say I'm sick, to not even call, to just send a text that I can’t come in, which was how I used to be.

But I was able to really talk with Daf and tell her what was going on - she gave me a mental health day, and now I see a counsellor and I've got so much more trust in people. The support that I felt in that phone call…to open up and have her respond the way that she did, made me feel so loved and cared about. I'm learning that lying is not the way to go; that vulnerability isn't a weakness.

“This place is so much deeper than just working in a kitchen; it's giving me tools to learn how to live again, and giving me the space to learn how to use them.”

I don't even necessarily have a burning passion for working in a kitchen, but I love coming to work because I love the environment; I love learning regardless of what it is and just what we do here. It's not about seeing the finished dish or the wrap that I'm rolling, it's about where it's going and what this company does overall…the purpose of the place. It makes my heart feel chuffed.

I'm starting to feel proud of myself for putting in the work and pushing myself. To be told by the Two Good team that they're really proud of me; to be able to commit and be reliable and dependable and everything that I never thought I was. Able to turn up on time, to communicate, to be given direction and take it, to ask questions if I don't understand – all these things that seem so simple, but there just weren’t things that were a part of the life I was living before. I'm slowly discovering that I am worth it, you know? That I can do these things…that my past doesn't dictate my future.

BETTER #TWOGETHER.

I've got so much love and gratitude these days; for all the services that are around, and for the people that are out there trying to make a difference. I'm finding a lot of gratitude in the challenges that I've faced and overcome. I can even find gratitude that my daughter is in foster care - that we live in a country where she’s not just put in an orphanage, she's in a family environment, she's going to school, she's making friends.

I'm just so grateful to be alive. I don't know if I’d be able to get to that point without places like Two Good.

“I just didn't trust that there was good in the world...but now I'm getting firsthand experience that there is.”

I've got evidence that there is…and that I can be a part of that good in the world. A big part of what I've learnt in recovery is that it’s one addict helping another, and it’s about giving away what was freely given to me. I’m still involved with Detour House and the new girls that come in there; I bear support for them, go to meetings with them.

I just did a H&I at Foundation House, the first rehab I went to; I'm starting to recognise that there’s a lot in my story that can help someone else. After my talk, I had this guy approach me and he said he really related to a lot of similar childhood stuff…that I was able to give him hope.

That made me feel really good; because I remember stepping into this recovery and having no hope. But now, I can give back in the same way that others did for me.”