TEEN TURNS LIFE AROUND

One can only wonder what furtive demons lurk beneath Julie's bluff and
hearty exterior.

At 19, the Nanaimo youth has already done more things than most adults
wouldn't care to do in a lifetime.

Like many young people with substance-abuse problems, Julie admits it was
peer pressure, or her wanting to fit in, that led to a life of sexual
exploitation and heroin addiction.

Although her dad was an alcoholic and her parents divorced when she was
six, Julie had received a fairly typical upbringing.

But at age 14 she started drinking with older boys from a nearby high
school. At one point, a group of young men befriended Julie and her best
friend at a Nanaimo mall and bought them clothes.

Within a few months the two girls were hooked on heroin.

In debt to the drug pushers, who had at first supplied heroin for free,
Julie became a sex trade worker. At age 15, using fake ID, she signed on
with local escort agencies and eventually hit the streets of Nanaimo and
Vancouver.

By 16 she had overdosed and landed in the psychiatric ward, and was so
malnourished she checked herself into a detox centre every month just to
stay alive. Still, the feisty teen didn't think she had a problem.

"I thought I looked good and this was how life was supposed to be," she said.

Luckily, during one of the times Julie managed to stay drug-free, an ADAPT
counsellor convinced her to see a doctor. That was when Julie learned she
was hepatitis C positive.

"The doctor said if you just use again you're gonna die," she recalled.

Julie has now been clean for more than two years, although she has to
constantly monitor her damaged liver. She hopes to become a mentor and help
other young women get off the streets.

"I believe there has to be an addictive gene," Julie said, warning anyone
who exhibits obsessive behaviour - whether it be with video games or binge
eating - to avoid drugs.

"You don't have to be the life of the party all the time," she advised
teens. "You don't have to go out and drink or do drugs every weekend."

"If you want to fit in with people, you'll just fit in."