Testimonial

Fitter and stronger in Christ I am completing the Teen Challenge SA program for the second time here at Strathalbyn in 2022. The first time was in 2007 in Elizabeth, 15 years ago. When I completed the program for the first time, it was wonderful. I learnt much about myself and life, but it was…

Kingsley is the father of Oscar, one of the participants of our Living Free program. Together, they recently celebrated Oscar’s baptism, which Kingsley says was a dramatic change from the ‘toughest, roughest days of hell [they] endured over the previous decade’. I had the privilege of raising Oscar as a single father. Our family loved…

FROM DEATH TO LIFE I don’t have much in the way of people, concepts or situations to blame for why I was the way I was. I grew up with a loving family who left me wanting for nothing. I had a couple of brothers who only wanted the best for me, grandparents who would…

A time to let go I always knew there was something better than what I had going for me. I just didn’t really understand how to step towards that better side of life. For me, the number of times I went around that mountain without actually taking a step upwards in the right direction is…

God had other plans My journey to Christ is a little different from many others. I first discovered that God was real when I found myself angry with him. I grew up in a standard family – a mum, a dad and an older brother. There was a Christian foundation in our family values. We…

‘My relationship with my children is being restored.’ I am a 46-year-old gentleman with dreams, hopes, health and a purpose in life. Of course, it wasn’t always this way. Not so long ago, I was a deadbeat dad. I was unemployable, and I was a raging alcoholic. It took me 30 years to get that…

Stepping up I was born a river boy to the Ngarrindjeri Nation in the late 1970s. My mother is of the Hunter Clan, and my father is of the Kropinyeri Clan. Growing up, I was introduced to various substances, both ingestible and visual. These proved very detrimental to the shaping of a 12-year-old boy. I…

My journey of addiction didn’t begin in the way many people perceive someone with an addiction starts. I grew up in a loving family with support, with my grandfather filling the father role in my life. So for all intents and purposes, it was a normal childhood.

Trystram’s new identity in Christ I came to Teen Challenge SA because I thought that there was something wrong with me. I didn’t know what it was, but I knew that I wanted to learn how to be more assertive, and I thought that would fix everything. I told people that I didn’t want to…

The power of friendship Addiction can isolate and alienate people from society, which only exacerbates feelings of loneliness. One benefit of our rehab program is that it facilitates reconnection out of this isolation through joining a supportive community of likeminded men who are also going through addiction. Both suffering from alcohol addictions, Shane (pictured left)…