NARANON ESTABLISHED

Sherwood Park News - NarAnon, short for narcotics anonymous, has been
established by a drug awareness committee as a means to offer support for
friends and relatives of drug addicts.

As the sponsor, the Fort Saskatchewan Drug Awareness Steering Committee is
confident the service is a valuable one.

"I think it will be used," said Penny Siminiuk, youth and family counsellor
out of the Fort Boys and Girls Club. "Some support groups in Sherwood Park
have expressed some interest in the program after hearing about it."

Siminiuk is hoping to draw people in from other communities and expand the
program to the areas including Sherwood Park, Gibbons, Bruderheim, and
Lamont. In response to discovering a need for such a group, Siminiuk began
searching Web sites of local support groups, and drug abuse counselling
centres. Eventually she came across the United States based NarAnon located
in California. But simply typing in the NarAnon name will pull up various
Web sites, including a similar religious sector with the same name and goal.

Siminiuk wants to make it clear that the program has no ties to any
specific religious group.

"This is not a religious organization, treatment centre, or counselling
agency," she assures. "It's simply a non-professional organization where
members, on a first name basis only, can share their experiences, and
discuss methods they can use to solve common problems."

"In the NarAnon program, we learn that drug addiction is a disease that we
are not responsible for," said Siminiuk. "A family member or friend may be
using drugs and at first some try to ignore it. We then try to compensate,
we adjust our lives, our attitudes and personalities to the behavior of the
person."

Although a drug user is often not willing to quit despite being confronted
with facts, Siminiuk said NarAnon will cater to the friends and family
members of a user, "who are not ready to watch someone they care about
disappear into their addiction."

"This is a program with the single purpose of helping relatives and friends
of an addict, whether that addict is still using or not," she said.

The NarAnon program will start in March, and is free of charge. For more
information call Siminiuk at 992-0103.