Pubdate: Mon, 02 May 2005
Source: Province, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2005 The Province
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/vancouver/theprovince/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476
Author: Matthew Ramsey
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

PREGNANT METH ABUSER FOUND HELP AT SALLY ANN

New Mom Recalls Dumpster Diving For Habit

Jenny Jones came to with a gun pointed in her face.

It was a hot morning in 2002. All she recalls is being with her
boyfriend in a half-stripped Dodge truck they'd stolen and pulling
over in someone's driveway.

Perhaps it was the quiet after the rush of the theft and the slamming
drop after days spinning on crystal meth. Perhaps it was the baby in
her belly draining her energy -- for some reason, they fell asleep
there.

She blinked awake to a police officer's gun aimed at her
head.

That was how Jones' new life began.

Tonight in Victoria the 28-year-old will tell her story and answer
questions at a Province-sponsored forum on methamphetamine.

Her meth run lasted three years and might have been fatal if not for
two strangers who cared.

The addiction started when her long-term boyfriend died in a car
crash. Jones, then 24, was living in Kelowna cleaning herself up after
kicking cocaine. She left the city in mourning to see the house her
boyfriend had bought for them in the Lower Mainland before he died.

She stopped for one day in Maple Ridge. She tried meth.

"It just made me not feel," she said. "I wasn't hurting any more. I
never made it home."

Jones stayed up for 18 days doing the drug. She didn't stop for nearly
three years.

Within weeks she was on the street digging through dumpsters to find
stuff to sell.

She lived in patches of bush and forest. When it rained or got too
cold, she'd crawl into a clothing donation box.

Her life took on a desperate simplicity.

"Drugs, drugs, drugs. You don't think you've got a problem," she
said.

The new boyfriend beat her. They stole cars together. He was in and
out of jail. She got pregnant. Then came the Dodge and the bright hot
morning.

In the cell, she threw herself against the bars, intentionally
injuring herself so she could get out. It worked.

And then, sleeping on the floor of the Maple Ridge Salvation Army
shelter, she met businessman Gord Robson, a member of the local Rotary
Club.

Robson and his wife helped her quit.

Erin, Jones' daughter, is now 18 months old and healthy. The Robsons
are her godparents.

"Without them, I couldn't have done it," Jones said. "They saved me
and Erin."

Gord Robson will speak at tonight's forum, along with drug awareness
co-ordinator Const. Kim Basi. The forum is free and starts at 7 p.m.
in the west building theatre at Oak Bay High, 2101 Cadboro Bay Rd.
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