Former alcoholic shares experience in new book

A former alcoholic who lives in Methil has published a book about his journey to sobriety in the hope of showing people the struggles addicts face.

Liam Mimnaugh is sharing his story in the hopes of raising awareness of what life is really like for people battling addiction. The book, 'Many Places to Save One Life' is Liam's life story, and he hopes it could help to change addiction support practices.

He believes current measures are ineffective and wishes he could have found the right help sooner.

"My first taste of alcohol was probably when I was six or seven years old".

"By the time I got into my teens I ended up living with my grandfather, and I found him dead when I was 14. Around about that time I had already started dabbling with cannabis and alcohol, but (after) his death I threw myself right into drinking".

"I refused to go back to my parents, I took on a house myself when I was 16 and it was more or less party central...but by the time I was 20 I would say I was more or less a full-blown alcoholic".

Liam was a "functioning alcoholic" as he worked as a joiner, maintained his own home and had a child when he was 19. However he took a job working away from home which led his drinking problem to become worse.

"Long story short I ended up losing my house, my job...and at that time I started dabbling with cocaine".

He ended up homeless and was in and out of hostels and homeless shelters as well as living on the street.

"It's not that my family didn't want me, I was just ashamed".

Liam's alcoholism became worse and he began to have seizures, at this point he began attending rehab centres but found it difficult as the privately run clinics were expensive. He was able to stay at a facility in Peebles, but found the psychiatrists and healthcare professionals could not relate to his experiences. After six months his funding to stay in the facility was stopped and he ended up back on the streets still suffering with addiction.

He continued moving in and out of temporary accommodations, during which he suffered physical abuse, further seizures and finding friends in addiction housing dead. Eventually his mother got him to attend a rehab facility in Dundee, this was run by volunteers, some of whom were former addicts, and Liam said being supported by people who had suffered like him made all the difference.

"Dealing with them was like night and day compared to all of these expensive rehabs I'd been in, I could sit and talk through everything".

"That place saved my life". 

He has now been sober for 13 years, is married with children and has able to reconnect with his estranged children. He believes that the Scottish Government need to do more to tackle the problem of addiction to prevent more people ending up the way he used to be. His view is that they could pay former addicts to work in government-run rehabilitation centres.

"They can find the money...they go on on the news about Scotland having the highest (number) of addicts but they're not doing anything about it".

"Addiction still doesn't get treated as an illness in this country, and it needs to be treated as an illness in this country because it is an illness. No one in their right mind would choose to live the way that I was living".

Further information on alcohol addiction and warning signs to look for in yourself and others can be found on the NHS website.