Gary’s Story.

Gary* moved down to the Midlands from Newcastle after losing his mum, brother and uncle all within a short space of time. He noticed his grief was turning into alcoholism so moved for a fresh start.

Once he moved, Gary managed to find work for a couple of years, but once that dried up, he found himself lost and turned to his council for help. He decided to start living in a tent for eight months, living in the woods, he describes ‘making fires and building camp – I love the wild, but we live in a society now where that is classed as scum.’

Gary mentions how he did have family members near him, ‘but didn’t want to put them out.’ So, while he lived in the wild, he’d still go to his grandmothers to clean himself up and wash his clothes – he stresses ‘I wasn’t a scruff. I just lived in the woods.’

Revealing that the longer he stayed the woods, the scarier rejoining society became, Gary was scared to think about how he found his mum dead after a seizure, and how it kickstarted his addiction. ‘I’d be at the shop waiting for them to open every day. It was my coping mechanism.’ It worsened once his brother died of an overdose and his uncle of cirrhosis to the liver.

Gary recalls the frustration he had at not being able to cope without the drink – he came to the realisation ‘if you think about it every single day, you’ll never be happy.’

He started a health kick; Gary is resolute he does not want to die like his loved ones. You can hear the sadness in his voice when he says ‘you see Mam was unhealthy. She was having MRI scans for blood clots, she was quite a big lady, bless her. She was beautiful though. My brother was addicted to drugs. And my uncle was addicted to alcohol. And now here I am, I don’t smoke, I don’t eat unhealthily, I don’t take drugs, I don’t drink – coming to P3 was part of that.’

In P3 accommodation for two months, Gary is feeling settled. He can look to the future and see the opportunities around him. Hoping to work on the oil rigs, he looks forward to having his own house one day.

For now, he prides himself on staying healthy, keeping on top of fitness and steering clear from drink. His advice to others experiencing grief at such a young age: ‘you learn life lessons. Blossom and learn from it.’