Amy Winehouse Foundation Opens Amy’s Place
Amy’s Place, a home for women recovering from alcohol and substance abuse, was opened in London today (1 August) by the Amy Winehouse Foundation, which funded the new initiative. Its partner in the scheme is Centra Group, whose main work is in providing care and support to help older people live independently. The Foundation is, of course, named for the singer who died of accidental alcohol poisoning in 2011.
The facility is only the second women-only recovery house in the British capital, and there are only half a dozen or so across the whole country. Amy’s Place focuses not only on recovery, but subsequent rehabilitation, with programmes designed to help former rehab patients to stay clean.
Dominic Ruffy, special project director at the Amy Winehouse Foundation, told the Guardian: “Picture a person who is 14 years old, has come from a broken home, hasn’t engaged at school, ends on a path of addiction and winds up at 25-26 years old going to rehab, learning how to get clean, and then leaving rehab and being told to get on with it. It can be as simple as not knowing how to go about getting your benefits or engaging in college.
“Our experience shows if you give people an extended period of time post-traditional rehabilitation treatment, you will improve the percentage of people who stay clean [in the] long term,” Ruffy goes on. “We have a saying in recovery that the drink and drugs aren’t our problem, it’s living life clean and sober.”
Jane Winehouse, stepmother of the late singer, added: “This project will make such a profound difference to so many young women, enabling them to have a safe environment in which to rebuild their lives and put into practice all the learning they have acquired through their treatment journey. Fresh starts are difficult to make, full of challenges, but at Amy’s Place, we will give young women the tools and support to help make this a reality.”
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