In the depth of his addiction, John McCabe was homeless and trapped in a cycle of drug use.
Today, he is drug free and helping other people struggling with housing issues as a peer mentor with Shelter Scotland.
And he is urging others dealing with addiction to try volunteering themselves.
John, 34, was hooked on heroin for more than a decade, having initially started dealing. After completing a detox treatment, he is clean for the first time in 13 years.
A former schoolboy international footballer, he is now involved with Street Soccer Scotland, which provides training and personal development opportunities for socially disadvantaged people across the country.
He also became a peer mentor with Shelter Scotland in January, using his own experiences with homelessness to help those struggling.
John, from Lochee, said: “I started taking heroin at 21. I went to a pal’s house one day and he had a shoebox with £30,000 that he told me he’d made from selling heroin – I couldn’t believe it. I started dealing, then after six months I started taking it and became hooked.”
John became homeless after a relationship broke down.
Despite registering as homeless, he still didn’t have a permanent home three and a half years later.
“I was jumping from house to house, heavily involved with drugs,” he said. “Whoever I was selling drugs with, I was living with. They would be putting me up, either on the couch or the spare room.”
By November 2015, John was in a permanent home in the city and in the midst of his recovery from heroin addiction.
He said: “Once I got my own house, I was able to work on getting better – that was my foundation.
“I could set goals for myself and that got me into volunteering.
“With that, my drug use was coming down and I asked for help. I got a 13-month detox, which finished on Friday past. It’s hard going but I’ve got a positive attitude and if I’ve got stuff to keep my mind occupied I’m OK.
“Routine is the big thing. If you’ve got something to do and are able to throw yourself into that, do it.
“I got involved with Street Soccer because I played for Scotland when I was younger at under-14 and under-15 level. It helps people with addictions to make changes. For Shelter, it’s things such as collecting information for them from questionnaires, all around Dundee.
“You have four people a day becoming homeless in Dundee. When you hear that, you’re hurt, you feel raw, knowing it’s families and children that are affected. When you see you’ve helped them get a roof over their head for the night it’s an amazing feeling.
“Shelter and other charities can change people’s lives – I’m living proof of it.”
Chris Conacher, 57, is also a peer mentor. He was brought up in Dundee, but his first taste of homelessness was in Edinburgh, where he found himself “sofa surfing”.
He said: “Last year I moved back to Dundee when my mother became ill, and then was made redundant.
“I couldn’t afford to live in my flat any more, so I was pointed towards Shelter. They were great at getting me rehoused, showing me all the routes and people to see about housing.
“It made my life a lot easier and took the strain off my other issues. For me, the work I’m doing for Shelter is all about payback. They gave me an awful lot of help and I wanted to give that back.”
Gillian Reid, operations manager at Shelter Scotland, said: “Sometimes people can feel hopeless but our peer mentors will be able to encourage them because they’ve been through similar experiences and know that getting help works.”
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