Sailaday OK: Recovery from addictions through marine-based adventure psychotherapy

Sailaday OK tells the story of how I built on my personal experiences of addictions and recovery to create a charity to provide a marine based adventure therapy programme to help recovering addicts to return and to find their place back in the world, to reunite with their family and friends and to become, once again, positive members of the community.

It is a remarkable and inspiring story as I suffered 25 years of multiple drug and alcohol abuse and drew on my experiences of recovery to create this unique and successful charity. I am continuing to embrace the resolution of all my addictions and how developing an understanding and deepening relationship with nature helped to resolve my difficulties.

My passion for sailing and understanding of recovery from addiction was the inspiration for creating Sailaday OK, in order to pass on knowledge, give healing, inspiration and hope to those struggling to recover. During the 15 years of the charity's active lifespan, I worked to develop a unique residential programme of interventions and exercises based on psychotherapy and adventure therapy, theory and practice.

This book includes case histories and stories of individuals' experiences on the boat, descriptions of the exercises and interventions developed over this time, and the theory behind the programme and exercises. I have come to understand addictive behaviour as symptomatic of the underlying issues of trauma and shame, and you will read how experiential sailing therapy brings about significant positive changes in the lives of those who at one time or another had lost all hope.

In 2016 I was honoured to be awarded the BEM, the British Empire Medal. The Award was 'for services to adventure therapy and addiction services in the south west UK.' This was the part of the Order of the British Empire awarded for either Meritorious Service or 'Gallantry'.

I believe my book to be a valuable piece of work for practitioners involved in Outdoor Education, Adventure and Eco-therapy, and anybody who understands sailing as more than just a hobby. This story is compelling evidence of how this form of therapy can help those professionals involved in addiction recovery. It is an inspiring story for those caught in the turmoil and struggle and users of addictions, proof that your dreams are perfectly achievable if you are prepared to change and set a course that is in harmony with the conditions around you.