Candice wants to be clean

Candice Crowe started using oxys after one of her friends hung herself. The pills took away her pain and made her feel happy.
“Because when I didn’t have it, I was depressed.”
Crowe smiles a lot – a demure expression that reaches her dark eyes.
“I still feel real sick and I feel really tired. And I don’t eat that much anymore.”
Crowe is still going through withdrawal and she’s determined to stay in treatment for her family and children.
She has three boys, the youngest is five months and the oldest is six years.
“I screwed up a lot. I always thought about myself instead of thinking about them. All I wanted was oxy, nothing else.”
And just like the other women, Crowe spent all her income to feed her $500 a day habit.
“I borrowed money from family members and I used welfare and child tax. I was taking 80-milligrams or more.”
This is Crowe’s second attempt at treatment.
The first time she tried was in Thunder Bay – 600 kilometres away from home.
“I was only four days in and I just took off,” she says.
“I was alone there. I had nobody.”
But even now, while taking treatment in her home community, she struggles.
“I’m still here. But I feel like walking out of here every day.
“I miss my family, being with them. I miss my kids.”
So Crowe is grateful to have the other women here. The five support each other and do their best to encourage the others.
“It’s good they put this treatment here on the reserve. I’m with other people from here. We can talk to each other. We know each other.”
Crowe knows her addiction to oxycodone is strong, so she’s looking to the future. She wants to keep busy once she completes the program.
“I’m going to stay away from those people that do that because if I hang around with them again, I know I’m going to get into it.”
She also wants to become a mother to her oldest son.
“I’ve never really taken care of him. He’s with his grandma and that’s who’s keeping him right now because of what I’m doing.
“So when I get out, I’ll probably tell him to come back home.”