THE man spearheading a Llanelli campaign to help drug addicts and alcoholics turn their back on their addictions has spoken of his own battle with drugs, alcohol and crime.

Chooselife Centre founder Alan Andrews says he turned to drink to help forget what had happened to him as a young boy.

Thankfully, he decided to tackle his past, and now says he gets high helping others.

Speaking of himself as a wayward 13-year-old he said: "I'd been sexually abused by an older man for the past two years and was too scared and embarrassed to tell anyone.

"What if they didn't believe me? Or thought it was my fault? I couldn't trust anyone to help me. It was my grubby little secret. Alcohol became my best friend.

"This was the only thing that got me through the torment.

"I'd swallow anything I could get my hands on — cider, lager, but whisky was my favourite.

"Then I could fall into a deep, dreamless sleep where no-one's rough hands mauled me or forced me to keep terrible secrets.

"I started bunking off school. Bored, I stole to buy drink. Mum went mad.

"I became a criminal."

He said he needed to be a bad boy to cope with the shame.

Alan spent time in borstal, where the memories of his earlier abuse haunted him as he was locked up in a cell.

"When I got out, I started stealing cars, and was sent to prison," he said.

In prison he started taking drugs and "smoked as much as I could lay my hands on".

From cannabis he moved onto injecting amphetamine.

"Just as I wanted to be the best criminal, now I wanted to be the best drug-taker, taking more than anyone else."

He began stealing, between £10 and £1,000 a day.

Alan robbed a shop while carrying a baseball bat and was spotted on CCTV.

"Lying in my cell, all I saw ahead was more crimes, more drugs and more loneliness. None of it made me happy," he said.

He decided to change, and became involved in the local church.

"I didn't have any withdrawal symptoms. I felt fine, and even met a girl.

"Everyone expected me to fall back into my bad old ways, but I didn't.

"And when they saw I was really a changed man, other people started asking me how I'd done it.

"Drug addicts started turning up at my door, asking for help. 'You can sleep here,' I'd say, offering them my bed. It was better than letting them sleep on the streets."

He sought the help of professionals. Word got round that Alan could help.

"I didn't turn anyone away. How could I?

"I'd been one of them. One week I had five drug addicts living in my house because there was nowhere else for them to go."

Then came the idea of helping people full-time.

"I needed to do something to really help," he said. "I decided to start a help group for drug users. I called it Chooselife."

He went round the town collecting, and was given a small building to use.

It meant people who had been misusing drugs and alcohol had somewhere to go for support.

Alan got married and had children, but the bug for helping people remained strong.

"If I stop one person overdosing or committing a crime to buy drugs, then it's worth it," he said.