Mt Isa celebrates first graduates from Indigenous recovery service
Bob O’Heir (left) with staff and clients of Mt Isa Recovery Services. Robbie Katter, Member for Mt Isa, stands on the right. (Photo courtesy of the Mt Isa electoral office)
[I] really enjoy doing this recovery because I have learned a lot. And I hope and pray that one day my loved ones … still in this mess will open their eyes and realise that there is a better life and future for them.
- Mount Isa Recover Services client
Eight months after The Salvation Army Recovery Services took over the operation of an Indigenous rehabilitation centre at Mount Isa, the first four participants have completed stage one of the Bridge Program.
The group will now continue the recovery program with the service by entering stage two.
It is expected that in the months to come, the number of people going through the centre will steadily increase as participants from the first intake work through the program.
Mt Isa Recovery Services (MIRS) manager Bob O’Heir says use of the flexible Salvation Army Bridge Program is proving effective. He added that additional input into content and delivery from a range of sources including staff and local communities, Aboriginal services, homelessness services and the Murri Court elders (court sentencing advisors) has further enriched the program.
The first participants have also gone on to offer insight into service delivery methods and content.
MIRS caters for men and women, including couples, and was recently expanded to allow children to live with parents or carers who are clients. The participants come from diverse locations including Mornington Island, Normanton, the Mt Isa region and the Northern Territory.
“There are a range of clients, some who may have lived in town, others have been homeless and lived on the local riverbed, and others have worked on stations,” says Bob.
To meet educational diversity needs the program is offered in a number of ways, from verbal delivery, to classroom style learning, to audiovisual presentations. Numeracy and literacy courses are also provided in partnership with the local TAFE.
MIRS provides flexible support to ensure that kinship ties and family needs are met and clients are actively choosing to re-explore their cultural heritages and share such skills as traditional art and dance.
A client who recently completed Recovery Phase Level 1, shared her story at her graduation. She spoke about loving school in her early years before being taken from her family and placed into foster care, losing a son and then living much of her adult life in alcohol addiction.
“I went too far to alcohol [and] it put me through a life and death situation,” she says.
“So that is why I am out in this recovery program, to better myself and life, and that one day I will teach my family and others that there is more to life than destroying it.”
She plans to begin her certificate II in drug and alcohol social work and then continue with the service as a volunteer graduate. Bob says she has gone from someone who was drinking excessively, to someone who sees herself being a drug and alcohol worker “and she’d be very, very good at it!”
Bob, who has moved to Mt Isa from the Army’s Recovery Services centre in Canberra, says his time with the new service has been “an honour”.
“What amazes me is the level of creativity and collaboration required to make it work, plus the level of receptivity of the highly-motivated clients,” he says.
“Their strength of character and their resolve for recovery to make a difference in their own lives, for their families and communities is inspiring!”
Comments
It is wonderful to hear this good news, and be able to add some faces to my thoughts and prayers for you all at the Mt Isa centre!
May the effort and determination of each of you be blessed with success, both for yourselves and those around you. I give thanks to God for you.
With love and respect from Fiona McEwan