Self Help Recovery Groups

Blue Cross Congo Brazzaville has started Self Help Groups in 2023 and it is encouraging to hear these testimonials after the first year.

It has not been easy to get people to attend and there are many challenges for people with addiction to understand why they should join. This is why these testimonials are so important for spreading the word of this life changing opportunity.

"Since I started attending the group, I don't drink like I used to. My usual entourage is surprised and appreciates me for having regained my weight (because I had become skinny) and the fact that I have now become clean (because I no longer wore anything but dirty and wrinkled clothes). I understood that God loves me very much because at the beginning of this year 2023, I was almost a dead man. I had fallen into an alcoholic coma after drinking. I lost consciousness and fell to the side of the avenue, more than 300 m from my home. I was taken to the hospital and that's where I was resuscitated. Fortunately for me that day I had fallen into the hands of doctors. My children told me that one of them had suggested that I be taken directly to the morgue. It is the love of God that has been shown to me, it is the love that the Blue Cross is also showing me today. Thank you very much. (B.Cyr)

Since coming to the group, I have stopped taking drugs and alcohol. My friends are surprised and don't believeme. They see me having lost a little weight and I feel it myself, they think that surely I continue to drink insecret or I suffer from an illness which prevents me from drinking. Many times I invite them to the group, they do not yet decide. (B.M.Herdi)

Thank you for your support. In our partner countries self help groups are often the only way towards recovery and new life!

IBC is very happy to see the grassroots Self Help and mutual support groups being delivered in 7 countries!

Blue Cross Ring of Hope in Uganda writtes:

Thanks to the support of IBC, we was able to start two self help groups. Our target it’s to reach four groups, and another one already was settle down in Kivubuka B, with a view to enlarge the services of Ring of Hope Uganda.
From May to August 2023, group activities addressed especially values and emotions and attitudes. Persons with substance use disorders find new perspectives and feel included is society when they can feel the support of people in similar circumstances. Groups help them in changing ideas, supporting positive value development and creating health promoting attitudes in their life. 
The SHG meetings, online trainings were organized, in order to increase the community awareness. These meetings were participatory in nature, and people had the opportunity to share their experience and their knowledge. The meetings helps members to know each other, interacting freely about their social situation and their behaviors, leading to the mutual support.
Self help group is important approach helping people with substance use disorders. Groups help to promote inclusiveness in the recovery journey.

Your support to this work truly makes an impact and we need it in order to give people an opportunity for new life!

Thank you for your commitment to IBC!

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