'ALIVE AND SANE TODAY' BECAUSE OF TOUGH LOVE

Former Addict Credits Resolve Of Foster Parents For Her Recovery

AN ADDICT IN THE FAMILY

It is one of the hardest decisions a parent could ever make.

A child is addicted to drugs or alcohol, and refuses to get help. For
some parents, the only answer is to tell the child to get treatment
or leave the house.

Today, we continue a three-part series looking at parents and
children who have faced that decision.

TODAY: A young woman says her foster parents' decision to turn her
away saved her life.

TOMORROW: Addictions specialists say there is no solution that works
for everyone, but when everything else has failed, telling a child he
or she is no longer welcome at home might break through the denial
that is at the heart of addiction.

Cora Goodyer was a straight-A student who took part in all kinds of
sports and had a perfect attendance record at school until age 13,
when she was molested by her sister's best friend.

"That's when my happiness ended," said Goodyer, who dropped out of
school in Grade 9.

Since then the young Victoria woman has been addicted to heroin and
cocaine, charged with assault, spent months in juvenile detention,
rehab and foster homes, been under house arrest, worked in the escort
business, had two daughters and lost a set of twins.

So how did she survive?

"I'm alive and sane today because of the tough love of my foster
parents and my adoptive mother," said the 23-year-old, who was
adopted at birth and whose adoptive parents separated when she was
four. "I lived with my [adoptive] mother who was, and still is,
mentally ill. I witnessed a lot of drug and alcohol abuse growing up."

She says she learned no coping skills in her unstable home.

"I'd looked up to this guy and when he molested me it was horrible,"
she said. She reported the offence and he was charged but later
acquitted. Anger festered inside her and she talked about suicide.

That's when a friend introduced her to heroin.

"I still remember that first hit. Every failing I'd ever had just
disappeared. I felt like a whole new person in a brand new body," she
said. Later that day, after coming down, she phoned her friend for more.

Goodyer believes a person takes drugs to mask feelings or deal with
peer pressure, fear, anxiety and loneliness. Her adoptive mom had put
her into drug education programs in school, but Goodyer couldn't
translate the lessons into real life. Besides, she had seen her
mother solve problems with drugs.

"I now understand how to help kids grow up healthy and well by being
strong, but I didn't know when I was young," said Goodyer, who hopes
to help others with her story.

Interviewed in her garden, she looked the picture of health and
happiness as she watched her daughters Emily, two, and Kendra, five,
playing nearby. Alert and attentive, she never raised her voice and
helped them settle differences with calm firmness. Their names are
tattooed on her ankles.

Goodyer was hooked on heroin the second it entered her. "It gave me a
sense of belonging," she said. At the same time, she got involved
with "some pretty heavy people" and harboured two men who had escaped
from prison. Drugs led to her own criminal record (for death threats
and assault) and she was sent to detox at the home of Janet and Mark Guthrie.

It was a turning point.

"I fell in love with them," she said simply. "Detox was hard, very
hard. Sometimes I didn't know if it was worth it. The pain of coming
off was physical, emotional, horrible dreams, night sweats. I had no
family support. Just Janet and Mark, who were strong for me."

When she finished detox, they asked her to become their foster child
and she leapt at the idea, stayed clean for a year, returned to
school, took programs at the Boys and Girls Club. "It was fantastic,"
she recalled.

But at 16 she assaulted someone. "Life was kicking me in the butt and
I got back on heroin. I tried to hide it from the two people I loved
most, but was way under the influence."

One night they said: "We're doing this because we love you," and two
policemen rang the doorbell.

"I was so mad. I yelled and screamed as they took me away. That was
the first time I'd ever been shown tough love. My foster mom was
crying. I was screaming, 'How could you do this to me?' "

Given a choice between juvenile detention and drug rehab at Williams
Lake, she chose rehab but didn't finish, so was sent back to
detention. She begged her parents to get her out, but they said she
was there because they loved her. She phoned her adoptive mom and she agreed.

"I've wasted so much time," sighed Goodyer, who wants to be a youth
corrections officer one day. "It took me a long time to understand
why my foster parents didn't come to get me."

Over the next several years she was in and out of care, back and
forth to the Guthries, in trouble with the law. "After a while my
foster parents told me I couldn't come home like I'd done twice
before." Her response was total denial. She thought she had
everything under control, was on top of the world, didn't need anybody.

"I was sleeping with random guys for drugs and felt all grown up."
She got pregnant and was in an abusive relationship. Her foster
parents relented briefly when she showed up battered at their door,
and looked after her until she got her own place. But then came more
drugs, more abusive relationships.

"I was in a rotten crowd and didn't see a way out," Goodyer said.

She started working for an escort agency, "dipping into coke, met
some pretty psychotic guys," and still thought everything was cool --
until the Ministry of Children and Families took her child away.

"I loved my baby but couldn't support her. It was devastating," she
said. She began using cocaine, spending up to $1,000 a day on the
drug and not sleeping for three or four days.

The five-foot-six woman dropped under 100 pounds and developed a hole
in her nose from snorting cocaine.

"I thought I looked like a sexy supermodel," she said.

At 19, Goodyer, met Warren Skaalrud, who saw her failings but also
the goodness in her. They moved in together and he tried to help her
recover, but she started escorting again behind his back. "It's an
addiction, too, because you can make $150 in half an hour, sometimes
10 minutes."

He found out, said, "I'm done," and left. About the same time, the
ministry said it was putting her daughter up for adoption and Cora
learned she was pregnant with twins (which she later miscarried).

Everyone was telling her the same thing. One day she went to see her
foster mom. "I told her I want what you and dad have. She said: 'Go
get it then.' "

Goodyer began fighting for her family and health. Her boyfriend
returned, and if she wavered, he showed her a picture of her daughter
to remind her.

In 15 months her daughter was back. She and Skaalrud have been
together 4 1/2 years, have one child together and another coming in January.

"I still get tough love from my foster parents and it drives me
nuts," Goodyer said with a laugh. "My husband and I are in huge
financial stress and I asked them to lend me some money. They said:
'You'll get through this.' And we are.

"Life is a long learning and I truly believe I'd be dead if not for
Janet and Mike, and my adoptive mother."