Last updated 22:01, Thursday, 03 July 2008

FIVE years ago Sharon Stamper was a divorced mother-of-three addicted to amphetamines and anti-depressants, with a no qualifications and a bleak future.

Today, the 38-year-old from Ewanrigg, Maryport, is an outreach worker for the Rising Sun Trust’s Maryport branch, and a master practitioner of neuro-linguistic programming, and uses her experiences to help others.

Neuro-linguistics is the study of human brain mechanisms underlying language use and comprehension.

Sharon, who gained her masters through Cockermouth practitioner Jane Hafren through a Routes to Work programme, is now establishing herself as a trainer.

It was a different story 12 years ago when she and her husband divorced and she was left with three children aged nine months, 27 months and six years old.

She says: “I had no support. I was depressed. I was introduced to drugs, anti depressants at first, and they made me feel better. So I thought the more I had the better I would feel.”

She began taking amphetamines and experienced bursts of energy followed by lows, and came to the notice of the police and social services for minor convictions.

Sharon said the support of social services and the police helped her.

“The police would often pop in to see how I was. They were great,” she said.

She tried to come off drugs with varying success until September 13 2003. She said: “I crashed my car and realised I was not invincible, that I could have killed myself or someone else. I never took another drug from that day.”

She escaped with a small hole in her head and the dent is still there to remind her.

Now Sharon is there to help others in their fight back from drug and alcohol abuse. She operates a Rising Sun outreach service at Our Lady and St Patrick’s Church hall, Kirby Street, Maryport, on Mondays and Wednesdays and is at the Rising Sun headquarters in Workington the rest of the week.

To contact the charity, call 01900 870034.