“When mother came to terms with the fact that I was a drug addict, she changed. From early in her life she had been an independent women. Father never contributed to the family and she was the one who single-handedly took on the responsibility of providing for the family. I remember that she had many friends and she was socially active. But when I brought home a lot of trouble the shame and guilt made her lonely and to avoid the uncomfortable questions about me, she stopped going out with her friends and socialising altogether. I remember every morning she left for work, she would leave 100-200 rupees for me just to make sure I ate and did not get into any trouble with people. And with it she also left a note. And it read, ‘Enough is enough!’. For a fraction of a moment, it would pinch me and make me question my actions but my addiction was so powerful that those moments of sanity were only momentary. My addiction had taken away everything from me. And it had taken away the happiness of my mother. Life had become unmanageable. I was sleeping in the streets with the homeless when I had a home. The abscess from the continuous injection in my groin had killed my veins and at time I could barely walk. My addiction had gone too far and and this suffering was unbearable. I wanted to stop but I could not. Lost and exhausted, sometime during the summer of 2008, I checked myself into the rehab.” (Karma Sherpa, Kathmandu)