Born a Crack Addict.... Leah Forney

My guest this week is an incredible woman – a Queen as she calls herself and quite rightly too!

Both Leah’s parents were addicts and she was actually born with crack cocaine in her system.

Not many of us would even survive such a start in life but Leah not only survived she thrived..

She survived being born as a crack babyShe survived a sexual assault andShe survived alcohol dependence

These days she is an Activist and Public Speaker - campaigning against sexual violence

In this episode:

• Brought up by her maternal grandparents Leah felt different from her friends as school…
• As she gradually began to learn more about her mom she felt abandoned and resentful
• Especially as her grandma didn’t ever want to talk about her mom
• Leah struggled to understand her parents addictions until she began her own healing journey
• Then she realised that in fact her parents had done their best with the tools available to them at the time
• Considering her tough start in life Leah was doing ok until she got sexually assaulted
• By a guy she had dated once and then rejected
• Angry about his rejection he began to stalk her and one day he got into her apartment and raped her
• She felt the cops wouldn’t help her so didn’t report it at the time
• Leah felt angry, frustrated, guilty but had no coping skills so she turned to alcohol
• She’d stayed away from drugs and alcohol because of her parents but this event just pushed her over the edge
• As a child of addicts it was the only coping technique she knew
• She spent a whole year drinking heavily to numb out her feelings
• Eventually she did report her rape to the cops but they blamed her as it was someone she knew – that just made everything worse
• As she sank further into alcohol dependence a friend convinced her to go to therapy to process her feelings
• She also went to Al Anon to try to understand her parents better
• Leah managed to stop drinking and has been sober for a decade
• 8 years after her rape she was astonished to receive the results of her rape kit
• The rape kit contained the evidence collected by the police when she reported the crime
• Apparently the police hadn’t passed on the kit for testing as she knew her assailant
• In spite of the fact that 57% of rape victims know their perpetrator!
• This led her to do some research on the incredible backlog of rape kits in the US – hundreds of thousands of them sitting on shelves untested while the assailants walk free
• Leah decided to become an Activist in the fight against sexual violence
• These days she has a voice and is raising awareness by campaigning and public speaking
• Leah has written an incredible 8 books!
• Her latest one "Unapologetically Me" is about the internal conflict of being the daughter of addicts – and the love/hate relationship with her parents
• Writing is part of her healing journey
• Leah talked about the difference between surviving and thriving
• At Tribe Sober we say we want people to thrive in their sobriety, not just survive
• The difference between those two states is of course that:-
• Surviving means just staying afloat, getting by without drinking, just existing and meeting basic needs whereas
• Thriving in sobriety means flourishing -  experiencing positive growth and progress in various aspects of life.
• Leah has turned her Pain into Power which is what many of us at the Tribe have done and is why we say that
• Sobriety is our Superpower!
• Leah said something interesting about trauma…
• If you don’t do the work to heal you can often feel as if you are just “waiting for the other shoe to drop” 
• Step into a place of healing and the shoe won’t drop
• Leah got through the worst and is now ready for the best!
• You can follow this incredible woman on social media and her website is https://www.leahmforney.com/ 

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