Stuart was both abused and neglected by his parents for as long as he could remember. At 16 he couldn’t bear it any longer, so he left home to live on the streets with his dog, Boris. He begged for money and would scrape by each day with just enough to keep him and his dog from starving.
Boris meant the world to him, as he was the only one who had never let him down. As long as they were together, life was bearable.
As the weather got colder, Stuart would spend more and more of his money on alcohol to help him cope. He made friends with other homeless people, who eventually enticed him to try methamphetamine.
“The high I got was like nothing I had experienced before. All of my pain and misery just melted away—I felt euphoric and in control.”
Stuart took an instant liking to the drug and started to seek it out regularly. It wasn’t long before he became dependent on this awful substance.
As his addiction escalated, he hadn’t noticed that his dog Boris, had become incredibly frail. He had been so neglected that one night, Boris died in his sleep.
This was a lot for Stuart to deal with, as he was now truly alone in the world. The next day, while coming down from drugs, his pain and anger reached a crescendo, and Stuart attempted to take his own life.
Stuart ended up in hospital, where for the first time, he had a team of youth workers who could help him find the help he needed. The first step was to detox his body from these substances so that he could start to think more clearly.
After a fortnight in hospital, Stuart was accepted in to Triple Care Farm where, thanks to your support, he was able to start working through a lifetime of pain, neglect and anger. He made friends with some of the young people there and built enough trust with the psychologists to open up about his past.
Over the course of three months, Stuart learned so many new skills, from cooking to landscaping to mindfulness. He completed his high school certificate and even earned himself a forklift license. More importantly though, Stuart was able to awaken to the beauty of life, and accept that his past had given him insight into how resilient he truly was. He became focused on using this power to help others to overcome similar challenges.
After his time at Triple Care Farm, Stuart landed a job at a homeless shelter in Melbourne where he still works today, helping others in crisis.
When asked, Stuart always says, “the thing that helped me turn my life around was my time at Triple Care Farm because for the first time, I felt like I had people there who believed in him and I didn’t want to let them down”. Over time, Stuart started seeing his own self-worth and before he knew it, life was not only worth living, it was not to be taken for granted.
This is the life-affirming miracle that your support makes possible. Please, if you can, help others like Stuart by making another donation today.
