About the Project

Recovery Voices, developed by David Clark and Wulf Livingston, captures conversations about what works in supporting recovery from addiction, and in the development of peer-led recovery communities, from a range of individuals with lived experience, as well as friends of recovery.

We highlight common messages and learnings that come from these conversations, providing a resource for people working with, and supporting, recovery and recovery communities.

We celebrate the lives and successes of recovering people and recovery communities, and in doing so enhance the visibility of recovery and highlight what can be achieved.

We encourage the development of new peer-led recovery communities and their interaction with other initiatives.

Blogs


27th September 2026

My North Wales Visit, Part 2

My main talk included describing some of the elements that facilitate recovery at NWRC, using quotes from people who had attended Penrhyn House. Such elements include hope, safety, belonging, connection, relationships, reciprocity, choice, opportunity, and story.
20th September 2026

My North Wales Visit, Part 1

On Friday morning, I attended the Service of Remembrance and Hope at St Deiniol's Cathedral in Bangor, a service 'In memory for those who have died,  and as a symbol of hope for everyone affected by addiction.' The Welcome and Opening Address were...
3rd September 2026

Recovery Carriers

North Wales Recovery Communities have been ‘feeding’ the community ‘petri dish’ with charismatic Recovery Carriers. Each one of these individuals is helping change the lives of other people in the wider community, both in terms of the present, but also the future.

People


18th September 2023

Wulf Livingston

Wulf Livingston talks about his early hedonistic drug and alcohol use, life as a successful chef, and qualification as a social worker. He then worked with the drug and alcohol charity Lifeline in England, CAIS and later the Probation Service in North Wales. Wulf later joined academia, eventually becoming Professor of Alcohol...
9th February 2025

Professor David Best

David Best is one of the United Kingdom’s (UK's), if not global, leading authorities on community-based recovery. Our conversation is a rich conveying of David’s involvement in various organisations and recovery initiatives, through which we have seized lots of his understanding about what is recovery and how it works...
20th September 2023

Wulf Livingston, Part 2

Wulf Livingston initially describes the national addiction recovery movement which grew up in the UK between 2008-12, and then how this initiative faded at a national level over later years. What we see today in terms of recovery is very different to what occurred at this earlier time. Wulf goes on to talk about North Wales Recovery...

A RECOVERY COMMUNITY PROVIDES:

Hope
Understanding
A sense of belonging
Acceptance and support
Engagement in meaningful activities
Opportunity to give back to others

A RECOVERING PERSON:

Gains a stronger motivation to change
Possesses an enhanced self-esteem
Becomes an empowered citizen
Overcomes stigma (shame)
Finds a sense of purpose
Acquires a new identity

Communities


10th August 2023

Towards Recovery

Towards Recovery offers a Recovery Cafe in Henley-on-Thames, as well as an online Recovery Cafe, where people recovering from addiction, can get support and encouragement. It aims to help people connect with others, re-connect with themselves and the world around them, and make sustainable changes to create a life of...
10th August 2023

Eternal Media

Eternal Media is a media production social enterprise and charity, located in Wrexham, that makes high impact documentary films. Their professional, award-winning producers empower and mentor volunteer film crews, which comprise people who are rebuilding their lives and are recovering from addiction and/or an involvement in...
10th August 2023

North Wales Recovery Communities

North Wales Recovery Communities (NWRC) comprises a number of communities, including a residential rehab at Penrhyn House, Growing for Change, with its gardens and allotments, and Bwyd Da Bangor (Good Food Bangor), a community cafe/restaurant that provides the best food on the High Street. Penrhyn House offers space for various...

Stories


20th November 2023

A Miraculous Discovery!?: David McCartney

After a few months, David stopped taking his pills. He thought he could have a social drink, but this turned out to be a disaster. He went back to work, but the craving continued. One day, David found that if he took codeine his craving for alcohol disappeared. He thought he had...
16th September 2023

Development of Towards Recovery: Huseyin Djemil

Huseyin describes how he first set up Towards Recovery in 2012, starting out by renting a church coffee shop for monthly evening gatherings. He and his colleagues wanted to make recovery visible, letting people see ‘it’ and decide whether they wanted to connect to it.
22nd November 2023

Working in the Treatment System: James Deakin

James Deakin spent a number of years working in the mental health and addiction field before deciding that he had become disillusioned by the organisations and the commissioning process. At the same time, he loved working with 'clients' and was inspired by people like...

Themes


9th July 2026

How Outside Activities Facilitate Recovery: Rob Havelock & Lianne Jones

When he was on a mountain, all Rob’s senses seemed to be opening up. There was something there that he can’t explain in relation to that spiritual aspect that all people need to find in recovery, in some form or other. Rob got in a spiritual state from being in the mountains.
31st March 2024

An Identity Shift: Gary Rutherford

‘… my identity started to shift from being somebody struggling with addiction, to being somebody who focused on their health and who loved to run. And I was surrounded by people who saw me through this different lens, and that was refreshing for me because I had always been under the impression throughout my recovery that this long-term condition was going to follow me...
1st December 2023

Identity: Dr. David McCartney

Dr. David McCartney describes that as his drinking problem was becoming worse he developed the ability to split what he was drinking from what his patients with alcohol problems were drinking. The amounts weren't that different. However, David rationalised that he couldn't have a problem, as he was in a suit and seeing...

Extras


19th September 2023

Key Steps in Healing: Judy Atkinson

‘The study found that the most essential step in healing is to establish a culturally safe environment to do the deeper work, which enables people to change their lives. The next step is to find and explore, both individually and collectively, the stories that make people who they are...'
14th September 2023

The Healing Forest

'It means that we must actively heal the community and its institutions at the same time an individual works on his or her own healing from alcohol or drugs or other unwell behaviours. The individual affects the community and the community affects the individual. They are inseparable from the point of view of addiction recovery.'
15th September 2023

The Nature of Healing: Voices of We Al-li

'My medicine is listening to other people too. First time I as in a meeting like this, and I listened to others talking, I though they were talking about my life, their experiences were like my experiences. Their feelings were like my feelings. They were stealing my story—I wanted to know how did they know my story and what it felt like to be...'

About us


Testimonials


  • David’s work across many decades has laid the groundwork for words and practices that today trip off the tongue, such as ‘recovery movement’ and ‘cultural trauma’. The Recovery Voices website brings his insights from the field into one home. It also invites us to the meal table within that house. He and his collaborator Wulf Livingston rightly reserve a special seat for the people and communities whose stories we must hear into full expression to move towards genuine reconciliation. Thank you, David, for your continued groundbreaking work and the wholehearted way you convene us into the heartland of an alternative future. Cormac Russell, Author of Rekindling Democracy and Co-author of The Connected Community.

  • I’m glad that this new website has been launched—it’ll help people share their experience of what it means to be human and help remind them of the simplicity of the recovery journey to wholeness. Congratulations to my friends David, Wulf, and colleagues—their dedication to helping others navigate their humanness is something I’ve long admired. Wynford Ellis Owen, Former CEO at Living Room Cardiff, Wales
  • Congratulations on the new website! Bill White (Addiction Recovery Advocate, Historian and Researcher)
  • The new resource Recovery Voices digs into the lives and experiences of people who, in recovery themselves, spend time with others seeking, or in, recovery from addictions. In identifying themes, it draws out the rich diversity of experiences, showing how there is no single 'grand narrative' of recovery, no single 'recipe', just lots of people living out their own authentic lives in ways that they greatly prefer. The site represents a tonne of voluntary work from David Clark in Australia and Wulf Livingston in Wales. Their collaboration in itself shows how recovery seeds in, and spreads from, the spaces between people in relationships. Professor Wendy Dossett, University of Chester, England
  • I’ve been learning from David’s websites for over 20 years now, and his new Recovery Voices initiative with Wulf Livingston has added a new dimension to my experiences. I love the films and through them I am ‘meeting’ new people, discovering exciting recovery community initiatives, and learning even more about recovery and related matters. It’s a little university… and it’s only just begun! Michael Scott, Australia (45 years in recovery from alcohol addiction, 40 years as a drug and alcohol treatment practitioner)