Apology and What’s Coming Next Month

August 13, 2023 by

First of all, my apologies that I have not been posting on this blog recently. I’ve been very busy working on the new Recovery Voices project and have been developing the new website with my long-term partner in crime, Ash Whitney from Cilfrew in South Wales.

Ash and I launched our first website, Daily Dose, back in February 2001 and this was followed by others whilst I was living in the UK. Ash developed this website for me back in 2013 and then The Carrolup Story website for John Stanton and I in 2018. It’s always great fun working with Ash and good to share our interests in sport. Check out Ash’s work at Wired Up Wales.

I’ve been thrilled working with Wulf Livingston of North Wales on the Recovery Voices project. We’ve both been interviewing various people in the recovery field and I’ve been doing a great deal of film editing. Some of you will have seen some of the work we’ve been doing with our collaborators in my blog posts and our Recovery Voices page.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , ,

Ten Year Anniversary of Recovery Stories

May 22, 2023 by

Ten years ago today I launched these words into the virtual ether:

‘I’d like to welcome you to Recovery Stories, a new website that is focused on helping individuals and families recover from serious problems caused by drug and alcohol use.

We’ll not just be trying to help people directly affected by drug and alcohol addiction, but also help people whose lives have been indirectly affected by the substance use problems of a loved one. Family members and friends also need to find recovery.

One important feature of this website is that it will carry the ‘voice’ of recovering people. Solutions to serious substance use problems are manifested in the lives of millions of people who are in long-term recovery. These lived solutions can provide important insights into principles and practices that underlie recovery from addiction.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , ,

My Journey: 8. Wired In’s Early Online Presence

May 8, 2023 by

Development of a strong online presence was one of my key aims with Wired In (initially known as WIRED). With the help of website developer Ash Whitney, I launched Daily Dose, a drugs and alcohol news portal, in early 2001. This website was followed by substancemisuse.net—which contained sections for people suffering from substance use problems, practitioners, and members of the general public—and the news portal Drugs in Sport. We later built wiredinitiative.com, which focused on the range of work that Wired In was conducting. (1,036 words)

I’ve often been asked why I came up with the name WIRED, the original name for Wired In. I could say that it was because I wanted to connect people, which I now consider the main ‘power’ of the name Wired In. In fact, the reason was that I initially saw WIRED as a way of providing people with information about drug and alcohol use problems, and how they could be overcome. WIRED was quite simply an acronym: Web-based Information REsource on Drugs—alcohol is, of course, a drug.

I had initially received funding from the Welsh Development Agency, which at the time was the economic development agency for Wales, to develop and maintain an online resource that would help people in Wales better understand the nature of drug and alcohol use problems and how they could be overcome. Use of illegal drugs, in particular heroin, and excessive drinking were major problems in parts of Wales, particularly in areas suffering economic and social problems such as in the Welsh valleys. These problems had increased as coal mines in the valleys closed. 

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , ,

Visiting UK Recovery Friends: Part 4 (Ash Whitney)

December 6, 2022 by

After leaving Wynford Ellis Owen and his lovely wife Meira in Creigiau (South Wales), I headed to Cilfrew, located close to Neath, to visit my great friend Ash Whitney, of Wired Up Wales, and his parents. Ash and I have worked together on-and-off for over 20 years now, starting not long after I launched WIRED (Web-based Information REsource on Drugs), which later became known as Wired In.

At the beginning of the new millennium, I received a small level of funding from the Welsh Development Agency, which at the time was the economic development agency for Wales, to develop and maintain an online resource that would help people in Wales better understand the nature of drug and alcohol use problems and how they could be overcome. Use of illegal drugs, in particular heroin, and excessive drinking were major problems in parts of Wales, particularly in areas suffering economic and social problems such as in the Welsh valleys. These problems had increased as coal mines in the valleys closed. 

A technician in my university department, Neil Carter, suggested I approach a web-developer friend of his, Ash Whitney, to see if he would build me a website.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , ,

Ash Whitney and Wired In Websites

May 14, 2021 by

This blog post continues the story of my ‘change in career’ early in the new millennium, from neuroscientist working in my research laboratory in a university, to addiction recovery advocate working in the community in Swansea and beyond.

When I first developed Wired In, a primary aim of our grassroots initiative was to provide information and tools that help people better understand and use the options they have to overcome the problems caused by their own, or a loved one’s, substance use. I also wanted to help ensure that practitioners working in the addiction field, be they specialists or generalists, had access to high quality information about addiction to drugs and alcohol and how it could be overcome.

I wanted to develop a strong Wired In presence on the internet. My aim was realised once I met web designer Ash Whitney in 2000. Ash, who lives in Cilfrew, near Neath in South Wales, built the first Wired In website. Daily Dose was a news and information portal that focused on drug and alcohol problems.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , ,

Recovery Stories Blog

March 29, 2021 by

As some of you know, I first launched Recovery Stories in May 2013, with the aim of helping individuals and families recover from addiction and mental health problems. A core element of the website was a series of 15 Recovery Stories related by people who had been affected by a serious substance use problem, either directly or indirectly.

In addition to these Stories, I uploaded over 700 posts on my blog, as well as a wealth of other content over the following two years. Although the website was still available for viewing after that time, I stopped posting on my blog whilst I worked on other projects, including the educational initiative Sharing Culture which focused on the healing of intergenerational trauma. Addiction and mental health problems are two consequences of trauma.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , ,