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


17th August 2026

Being Part of a Family: James Deakin

‘You've got to approach this from a humble point of view, that you don't know everything. That you’ve just got this idea for how it should be, but you've got to be prepared to adapt and switch with the demands of what the community wants, and everything that comes with that.'
8th August 2026

Flipped It!: A Film That Changed Lives, Part 2

’All the fear, all the anxiety, all the pain left me. The emotions were still there, I was still raw, I was still crying. I was still coming to terms with the person I was, the person I was becoming, but all the pain had gone.'
7th August 2026

Flipped It!: A Film That Changed Lives, Part 1

Nick explains that ‘through his life, one pain-in-the-backside officer, Alec Owen,’ an inspector with Merseyside police, never gave up on him. Whenever he was arrested, Alec turned up to see him, just wanting to help him.

People


14th September 2023

James Deakin

James Deakin describes his drug-dealing days in Manchester and cocaine addiction. He begins his recovery journey after moving to Bangor, and spends ten years as a chef before becoming a mental health worker and then a Drug Interventions Programme (DIP) worker. He becomes disillusioned with the treatment system...
12th February 2024

Rhoda Emlyn-Jones OBE

What is so remarkable about this interview, and in a sense what I continue to learn from Rhoda, is how the best of practice is built on the most obvious, but often neglected, cornerstones of honesty, respect and understanding.... Rhoda provides us with a clear message about the value of hope and strengths over negative...
15th March 2024

Tim Leighton

Tim is someone I have always admired ever since first encountering him in the stimulating environment of New Directions. In this interview, Tim shares with us his own journey into drug use, counselling, education and academia.  At its heart, however, this is very much a conversation about 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

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...
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...

Stories


14th September 2023

A Family Trauma: Huseyin Djemil

Huseyin’s earliest memory, from when he was three or four years old, was being terrified whilst he stood in his pyjamas in a hallway with lots of commotion going on around him. Someone picks him up and whisks him away. Later, he learns that his father had just killed someone in their house. As he grows up, he hears stories of that day...
6th October 2024

A 36-Year Journey: Tim Leighton

Around 1990, Tim met Dr Tony Ryle, one of the most remarkable people that he has ever met. Tony invited him to join a group of people who were helping to develop Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT). Tim started spending a day a week at St Thomas’s Hospital in London where Tony was offering supervised practice in the...
8th September 2023

Dealing, Addiction & Torture: James Deakin

James can’t sell his supply of the drug, for which he has not paid. Realising he is in serious trouble, he does a bunk to Bangor in North Wales. However, the dealers track him down and bundle him into the boot of a car. He is shipped back to Manchester and tortured over a period of days.

Themes


28th November 2023

Recovery Advocacy, Part 3

After seeing one person deciding to take the journey to recovery (successfully) after visiting the Towards Recovery cafe and talking with half a dozen people, Huseyin Djemil wondered what would the impact be of having a recovery conference in Henley. The first Towards Recovery conference took place in 2013.
21st September 2023

Shame

Shame often plays an important role when a person is developing and/or has developed a drinking problem. In the first clip here, David McCartney describes how shame was part of a major epiphany in his life. He was asked by a woman if he would see her brother and talk about his drinking problem. On the way home after seeing her...
9th July 2026

What Makes NWRC Work?: Rob Havelock & Lianne Jones

In her early days at Penrhyn, people there loved Lianne when she didn’t love herself. They gave her encouragement that she had never previously received. All the good things she experienced added up over time and helped her get more and more involved in the...

Extras


8th September 2023

12 Principles of Indigenous Healing

Many Indigenous people have healed from trauma and its consequences, showing the necessary coping mechanisms, skills and knowledge, to rise above adversity. Their personal narratives are of considerable value, since they inspire other people and help them understand how they too can overcome their problems.
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...'
18th September 2023

Kevin and Kerry’s Recovery Story: ‘A Family’s Journey’, Part 1

As I got further involved in the world of drugs, the part of me that would say, ‘This is wrong’ was being squashed. In that environment, with everyone around you using, the drugs take over your whole life and you take more and more risks. I hated what I was, and years went by before...

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)