Who says good, obedient girls cannot fall into this dark pit?

They say that adversity introduces a man to himself. For Fatuma Musau, 41, it took 10 years of drug addiction to help her see herself in a new light: confident, strong-willed, optimistic and capable of leading a normal life.

Fatuma was 12 when she had her first tentative puff of bhang, a puff that would go on to trigger a 10-year battle with drug addiction.

“I smoked out of a sense of adventure and curiosity, and also because most of the children in my neighbourhood did it,” she explains.

The general assumption is that children who abuse drugs, or those that get into crime, prostitution and other vices, come from unstable, poor households. If Fatuma’s is a case to go by, this is far from the truth.

“I am the last born and only daughter, and my parents and siblings loved me. I also grew up in a good neighbourhood, and never lacked anything. I was the perfect daughter. I was obedient, helped out at home, and topped my class. My future was bright.”

By the time she was 14, she had graduated to benzodiazepines. These are a class of drugs primarily used for treating anxiety. She soon outgrew bhang and benzodiazepines, and her ‘big brothers’, the older boys in her neighbourhood who were her suppliers, suggested that she try something more potent.

“One of them suggested heroin, which I readily agreed to. My first experience with it was awful. My body started itching immediately – I also remember sweating profusely and vomiting, but even this did not stop me from trying it a second time because despite the side effects, the feeling of euphoria was like nothing I had experienced before,” she explains.

She started absconding school, and to hide this, would ask her friends to answer in her place when the teacher called out the class register.

“In our school, each student had a number, and when your number was called out, you would simply say, “present.”

To sustain her drug habit, she started stealing from her father.

“I did not see it as stealing though, I saw it as thanking myself for my hard work in school. My father trusted me, and would often give me money to pay my school fees. I would inflate the amount required and keep the extra cash.”

Her drug habit continued well after high school. By then, she had discovered a den where you could partake of your choice drugs, and would rush there whenever she had money to spend.

Her parents eventually found out about her drug habit when she was arrested during a police raid at the den.

“They were shaken, my mother especially. She could not believe that the daughter she had brought up in a solid Christian background was a junkie. She was devastated.”

When fervent prayers failed to work, she got Fatuma arrested, hoping that this would frighten her enough to stop the habit. It did not.

“I understand now that my mother was desperate, especially when I started hanging out with criminals. But I was sick, a sickness that could not be healed by prayers or police intimidation.”

At the time, she says that her family’s main concern was what people would say about them, which she understands. Her parents also felt that they had failed as parents, and felt ashamed and embarrassed.”

Eventually, she was taken for counselling.

 “The counsellor showed me that something good could still come from me, and for the first time in many years, I saw light at the dark tunnel that was my life.”

HOW LOW CAN IT GET?

One day, just like that, she left home and went to live in the streets, an act that confounded her family, because they believed she was on her way to recovery.

“I felt that home was curtailing my freedom, so I decided to leave,” she explains.

Street life, she says, was brutal, but since she was in a daze most of the time, she barely registered this fact. She was arrested and locked up in jail numerous time. Once, she served eight months in Lang’ata Women’s Prison, where her friends still managed to sneak in drugs to her. “By then, the addiction had become so bad, that not even watching a friend die in my arms shook me.”

The worst case though, was when one of her friends, a fellow addict, lost her baby, only for Fatuma to tie the child on her back and walk around the city centre begging, telling everyone she came across that her child was sick.

“I made Sh3,000 that day - I gave the mother Sh1,000 and kept the rest. We then went to refresh our supply before the mother took the body to the mortuary - addiction degrades you to the lowest level possible.”

She also remembers sometimes being so desperate to get arrested because she would at least be assured of a cup of tea, a meal and a roof over her head.

Several times, she attempted suicide, and even once tried to jump from a flyover but was stopped by a friend in the nick of time.

“Each time I went to bed, I would ‘arrange’ myself properly on the bed so that in case I died, I would at least look dignified. I had spent five years in the streets and had done everything, short of selling my soul, to fund my addiction. I felt that I would be doing the world a favour by leaving it. I had hit the level after rock bottom, and I wanted out.”

Fatuma had a journal, and would occasionally write when she was lucid enough. One day though, she picked up a pen, only to realise that she could not write.

“My fingers were shaking uncontrollably, and all I could manage were scribblings that looked nothing like the handwriting I had always prided myself in.

I had been eloquent in English, but I found that I could barely express myself in the language anymore, and because of that, I felt worthless. This, and my good handwriting had kept me validated as a human being throughout my addiction, and not having that anymore sunk me to a new low.”

In this absolute feeling of worthlessness, she decided to go back home.

“I knew then that I needed help. I wanted out of this miserable life, and I promised God that if I came out alive, then I would help others in their journey to recovery as well,” she says.

She spent the night at her elder brother’s house that night. The following day, he gave her money to travel to their rural home in Ukambani, where her parents had earlier moved to.

She went home to an emotional reunion with her parents, who she had not seen in over five years. With her, she carried a copy of a small book given to her by a counsellor, which explained in detail how to beat addiction using the Cold Turkey approach.

“Cold turkey” describes the abrupt cessation of substance dependence, and the resulting unpleasant experience, as opposed to gradually easing the process through reduction over time or by using replacement medication.

She prepared her parents for what would follow: nausea, vomiting, high fever, pneumonia, diarrhoea among a host of other complications. She was determined to beat the habit, and was ready to die doing it.

IT WAS EXCRUCIATING

It was excruciating. Her condition deteriorated to the point where her mother started planning for her funeral, convinced that she would not survive.

“My mother cooked for me, fed me and bathed me. I was too weak to do anything for myself. I would tell her that the only thing I wanted highlighted in my eulogy in case I died was that I had died clean,” she says.

It was a long, hard battle, one she fought for years, but it was worth it because she finally emerged victorious.

She celebrates the anniversary of her recovery on July 5th of every year, because that is the day she had her last drug and went home. Fatuma has been clean for 20 years now.

When she came off addiction, she went back to her local church, but found the environment too judgmental for her.

“I wanted to make myself useful, but there was a lot of finger pointing, especially because these were people who had known me when I was at my lowest. I was looking for acceptance, and decided to try out Islam; my father had always encouraged us to worship anywhere we found God. I found peace in Islam, and so I converted,” she explains.

An interview at a local TV station years ago motivated her to become a counsellor, her aim to use her experience to help others who had walked the same path. She went back to school and studied counselling, and when she graduated, worked in several  established addiction centres in the country.

“I also underwent the necessary therapy that made me believe that I could actually lead a normal life, a life of purpose. I had never been in a relationship, or even envisioned myself in one, yet here I am now, married to the most loving man alive, and with two adorable sons.”

Fatuma has been a practicing counsellor for 15 years now, and together with a friend, Jane Mbugua, who has studied social work, started Care-Tech Medical Ltd, a year-and-a-half ago. Fatuma is the programme director.

“I derive great pleasure in seeing even just one of our patients walk away much better than they came in,” she adds.

The National authority for Campaign Against Alcohol and Drug Abuse, NACADA, recently asked her to start a support group for drug addicts at Lang’ata Women’s Prison, a role that she is very passionate about – she has no doubt that there are many desperate women there, who will be inspired by her story.

“I wasted away my youth in addiction, but God gave me a second chance; he spared me for a reason, and I am sure this is it. This is what God had intended for me all along. I needed to go through what I did to become the person I am today.”

COULD YOUR CHILD BE ABUSING DRUGS?

 PHYSICAL SIGNS

• Physical deterioration: Malnutrition

• Unhealthy eating habits: Skipping meals or not eating at all. Heroin addicts prefer sweet foods. Fatuma lived on cakes and juice.

• Losing interest in activities your child once enjoyed, disregarding time, not keeping appointments, and procrastinating.

• Stealing: If you start losing money and other valuable items, sit up and take notice.

• Frequent suspensions/expulsions: This should raise a red flag. Do not assume that peer pressure is to blame. Dig further.

• Poor hygiene: Unkempt appearance, poor dental hygiene, sloppiness.

EMOTIONAL SIGNS

• Inability to cope, and feeling overwhelmed

• Creating a mountain out of a molehill: blowing situations out of proportion.

• Inability to express oneself: poor communication skills

• Emotional outburst: inability to manage his feelings in an appropriate way.