DESCENT TO DESPAIR

Addiction Drags Once-Beautiful Woman Into Life Spent Chasing Drug

It's a sad, alarming fact that crack cocaine affects every single
Calgarian. From the obvious addicts, to the victims of the crimes
crackheads commit to buy their dope, to rising health-care costs and
the overtaxed resources needed to deal with the problem; we're all on
the hook and involved in some way with the little off-white rock that
controls so many lives. In this second installment of a six-part
series, Sun crime reporter Mike D'Amour takes a hard, unflinching look
at the crisis plaguing our city. And don't miss CFCN News tonight, as
reporter Bill Marks examines the crack epidemic.

Side-by-side, the pictures are shocking. In the first, she's a pretty
18-year-old with her whole life ahead of her. In the second snapshot,
taken about six years ago, Nancy smiles into the camera.

She has nicely coiffed hair, a healthy complexion and a glint of fiery
life in her eyes.

The third picture shows what drugs, mainly crack cocaine, have done to
the once-beautiful woman. Hollow cheeks, dead eyes and a runny nose
now frame the shot.

She still dresses nicely, wearing clothes that hug her emaciated
body.

She walks with a permanent forward bent to her back like she could
topple at any moment. She has the same jerky movements all heavy crack
users display.

"All in all though, I think I look pretty damn good for the lifestyle
I've led and the abuse I put my body through," she said.

It's been an eventful life for the 43-year-old. The only girl and
youngest from a good family, tragedy struck almost 25 years ago when
her oldest brother was murdered in B.C.

Soon afterwards, Nancy said she went to the U.S., where she spent most
of the 1980s working as a hooker.

It was in the U.S. where she married her pimp and developed a cocaine
problem.

She figures she's spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on the drug
and the money to buy it was easy to find.

"I worked as a prostitute in Las Vegas, where I'd use knockout drops
supplied by a dentist friend to rob johns," she said. "The stuff I had
would knock them out for about 15 hours, then I'd take everything they
had."

She moved back to Canada in 1989, but predictably ran into legal
problems four years later.

"I was sentenced to three years for trafficking," she
said.

Now living on an $891 monthly disability cheque and the profits she
said she made from selling her condo, Nancy's days are usually spent
alone in her apartment, getting high.

"I have been clean twice," she said, pausing to take a hit from the
crack pipe that's never too far away.

"The longest was three years."

The run of sobriety ended when her 11-month relationship with a
Calgary man ended. "He told me to (leave) and I went straight to a
dealer," she said.

While she describes herself as a "hermit," Nancy said she wants to get
clean and desires what most people do.

"I know I'm worth saving and I just want someone to love and someone
to love me," she said.

"Right now, I've never felt less a woman -- I miss holding hands," she
said, her voice cracking with emotion.

Nancy said she's finally come to terms with her life, but sincerely
hopes others don't end up like she did.

"I might be able to help somebody by telling my story and I hope they
listen," she said. "The best piece of advice I could offer any girl
thinking about a life like mine is to turn around.

"Turn around and be a kid, be your parents' kid and be a brother or a
sister."