Facing the demons

On September 17, 2003, Mark felt a shiver of excitement as he got ready to celebrate his 16th birthday with friends, washing down an ecstasy tablet with vodka and orange. Gripped by teenage angst and an innate sense of adventure, he bought his first drug with the cocky self-assurance that he was in control of his life and had enough will-power to say no. But in fact he was hooked to the thrill.

Four years later and drugs had become his master. Each morning he woke up in a cold sweat, forced to go out and steal in his frantic attempt to get his next fix.

"I wasn't taking drugs for fun anymore. Now I was taking them to be normal and to go to work. I just couldn't function without them," he says taking a deep drag on his Rothmans Red.

Mark smokes one cigarette after another, knowing that once he entered rehab he would only be allowed the luxury of one cigarette every hour.

Wearing a bright pink T-shirt, blazoned with the word 'Yankie', over a long-sleeved top, Mark is your typical cool dude; a 20-year-old brimming with such energy that it's hard to visualise the inner strength he is summoning to conquer his four-year habit.

Taking a sip of orange juice, Mark speaks matter-of-factly about his childhood, living in the shadow of a father who was a well-known criminal and thug in the 1980s.

"I can honestly say that I don't refer to him as my father, but 'that man'. I don't have any memories of a father who did fun things with me or my sister. He just brought us into this world, that's it. He was never there and his behaviour clearly showed he didn't care - his addiction to gambling came before any one of us," he says.

His memories are punctuated by his parents' constant bickering and violent arguments, broken up by the frequent, peaceful trips the family (minus the father) took to his grandmother's.

Mark describes his 53-year-old mother as a "living saint", who desperately tried to give her children's life some semblance of normality, whenever the storm hit and threatened to blow them off their feet.

"He was a violent man, always trying to push his weight around and show he's the man of the house. My mother suffered a lot because of him. As a boy it hurt to see my father treat her this way - I swore I would never be like him."

Throughout his childhood, a ripple of murmurs would follow Mark wherever he went... "He's the son of so and so", raced the whispers.

"It's hard to deal with, but you shrug it off. I swore to myself that I would never inherit my father's nickname or follow in his footsteps. Sadly, when I started taking drugs I realised I wasn't succeeding," he admits.

Mark broke the pact with himself when he parted with Lm5 (€11.65) for his first ecstasy tablet on his 16th birthday. He didn't want the wonderful feeling to end.

"To be honest I still love the rush of drugs to this day. They're a sensation like no other," he admits. Adventurous by nature and always willing to try out new things, Mark soon got his first sniff of cocaine. Within a matter of weeks, Mark was galloping through the life of a junkie and his weekend habit became a five-day-a-week addiction.

Nothing could beat the ecstatic world he entered whenever he took drugs. At home, he'd unscrew the light bulb and replace it with a red-coloured one to set the scene. Then he'd throw in a CD with techno and house music, and get wasted with his cousins.

At the time, he was working part-time with his uncle, earning €11.65 (Lm5) every time he helped out. At the beginning of each week he'd budget accordingly and then once he had the cash in hand he would approach a barman who had a 'menu' of drugs readily available.

"I refused to accept that I was on the path of addiction. I would tell myself that I was capable of going to a party and not popping pills, but in truth I wasn't," he says, slouching back into the chair as he recounts his downfall through poly drug use.

Before parties, Mark would pop an ecstasy tablet and then sniff a couple of lines of cocaine when it began to wear off, ending the evening with a joint to calm him down.

Police raids never scared him and he quickly learnt how to conceal the drugs. On one occasion, he went to a party and craftily hid a gramme of cocaine in a scrap of foil and wrapped it in chewing gum. While the police strip-searched him, he remained calm, smugly chewing the gum.

He remained in control of his life during the day, except that winding down with cannabis was leading to a 'suicidal depression' the morning after. One day he heard someone say that taking heroin to chill out was better.

"I knew I was entering dangerous territory, but I wanted to try it out. When I broached the subject with my friends they got so upset at me that I decided not to breathe a word to anyone. I bought a packet (0.1 grammes) of smack for Lm5 and slept like a baby that night," he says.

Taking smack quickly became a habit he indulged in daily and after parties to wipe out the adrenaline rush of ecstasy. Each time, he was taking a cocktail of incompatible uppers and downers that played havoc on his body.

One night, when he laid his head on the pillow, his heart began to skip a beat. Each time he'd get a rush through his body and he'd get flashbacks of his childhood.

"At that moment I was convinced I was going to die. I prayed to the Lord: I know I sinned, but please take me to heaven," he says, recalling the worst night of his life.

The next morning, assured of the promise of confidentiality, Mark went to the Detox Centre. The ECG results were sobering - his drug habit had damaged a valve in his heart.

He sobered up and three months later, feeling healthy and on top of the world, he resorted to his old habits, though this time he began injecting heroin.

"I was warned that the second I'd use the needle I'd hit rock bottom, but I pooh-poohed this," he says, rolling up the sleeves of his T-shirt to expose black lines snaking along his arm where his healthy, throbbing veins used to be. In one area, his skin bulges over where he had missed his vein.

He would fill the 100ml syringe with 95ml of smack, leaving a space of five millimetres for the blood to trickle in - a sign that the needle was in a vein. At times it would take him two hours to find a vein he could use.

Once the veins of his arms and legs became blocked and unusable, he began injecting the veins in his neck, an area which is considered highly dangerous.

By this time his life began to spiral downwards and just before his 20th birthday last September he lost everything - the love of his life, a €1,400-a-month (Lm600) job, the trust of his friends, and his mother had kicked him out of home for stealing her gold to fund his €1,900-a-month (Lm815) habit.

The bank also began to chase him when the monthly repayments for his car loan were not forthcoming. To get them off his back he decided to sell it and he got €7,454 (Lm3,200) for it. However, in a momentary lapse of reason he blew all the money on coke and smack in eight days flat.

"I was going through a major depression. Each time I injected myself I prayed to the Lord to take my life, but each time I resurfaced into my horrible reality. I was leading (an awful) life. Nobody could trust me and I had lost everything," he says, describing how he began stealing every day to feed his habit.

Interrupting the interview to meet the photographer, I dash out leaving the mobile phone, digital recorder and handbag on the kitchen table. Back in five minutes, Mark is pacing nervously up and down.

"I have to tell you something. Just a few weeks ago I would have disappeared with your recorder and mobile. The temptation is still strong, and I had to go out in the garden to smoke a cigarette and try to distract myself," he confesses, as he takes another drag.

The turning point came last month, when he was introduced to a rich couple who lived in his neighbourhood. His intentions behind the friendship were far from noble - all he could see was the opportunity to steal.

Instead of judging him, the couple, aware of his bad habits, showered him with attention and trust, which rekindled a feeling of worth in his desolate life. Three weeks ago, encouraged by their support and his mother's and sister's backing he began taking methadone to wean himself off the drugs, and on Thursday he checked himself into San Blas, a rehabilitation residence run by Caritas.

"Now I have to face my demons. Before, the drugs disguised my emotions, but now everything is amplified. The programme will help me rediscover who I am and resolve my childhood issues. I have to accept who my father was," he says, leaping on the chance to shake off the shackles of his father's reputation.

"I know there will be pain, suffering and tears ahead, but I'm adamant this is the end to drugs. It's time to make amends. I'm now voracious for life."

* Names have been changed to protect the person's identity.