Sean Chaplin

Born in Farnworth, Bolton but get grew up in Wigan. Both parents left me at 2 years old, was taken in by my grandparents. I had everything I ever wanted in terms of material things. I started experiencing sexual abuse at the age of 5. From a young age I was irritable and discontent. I first started having a snowball at Christmas around the age of 6 or 7. By the time I was 11 I tried my first bong. 12 years old I was sniffing gas and by the age of 13 I was injecting amphetamine. I smoked heroin at age 13, tried LSD, but the amphetamine blew me away and this is what I ran with for many many years. I was in set 1 for everything in school, but I just didn’t know how to deal with life. I got expelled from a normal school just before my exams and had to go to a 1:1 pupil support school where I got picked up in a taxi and taken to school. I used to have to take 2 digs of whizz with me own my sock or I wouldnt have made it to school. By this time I was already involved in the youth justice team as a result of a burglary when I was 11 years old. On the back of taking drugs, the crime increases, the drug taking increases, and I started staying away from my house and staying in drug dens or where people were actively using or committing crime - only going home when I really needed to. By the time I was 18 I had committed that many crimes and breached that many court orders that the only thing they could do was send me to prison. As soon as I landed in prison, I was straight on the phone, manipulating people at home and getting drugs brought into prison. I’ve been to prison 42 times since then - not all sentences but have been through the gates 42 times. I’ve completed so many qualifications in prison. One prison even got me a job steel fixing on release, but I didn’t know how to live and the social anxiety of being around “normal” people and the addiction stopped me from going to the job. I ended up back in the revolving doors again, in and out of prison. I hated what I was doing and how unmanageable my life had become. I kept asking for help but kept getting sent back to where I was from, Wigan, and told to stop using. None of this worked, and I just carried on using. On a prison sentence in HMP Hindley, I did a course called beating alcohol and drug disorder. This is where you write you life story and you get to see it all in front of you and see where things started to go wrong, for me this started the cogs turning in my recovery journey. Because I wasn’t ready, I went back into the madness again. I went to jail another 6-7 times since then, becoming the recovery mentor. I started doing fitness myself in jail. I came in on a methadone script and saw the lads doing circuits on the yard everyday and thought I wanted a bit of that, so I snapped off my script and went out on the yard doing circuits with the lads. I saw the beauty of fitness and a lot of the lads on the recovery wing were benefitting from coming out and doing this. But still, this wasn’t enough. I went back out again for some more pain. After another 3 times in prison, I’d had enough, and said if they don’t get someone to help I’m either getting sectioned or lying on the train tracks - somebody is going to help me. At this point I was still smoking spice everyday. Darren Laing from Acorn Recovery Services came into the prison and spoke to me and arranged to pick me up from the gates and take me to a recovery house. And that’s what happened and I went to a recovery house in Levenshulme. The conditions to stay at this house were to do the DEAP emotional attachment programme. This is run by a level 7 counsellor with lived experience which helped me to get rid of all the baggage I’ve been carrying for a lifetime. Whilst on the DEAP emotional attachment programme I also met my amazing partner Kate who started to train with me everyday. I also got introduced to NA, AA, CA, amazing meetings where a bunch of addicts are there to help other addicts get better. Since doing this, I no longer suffer from a hopeless state of body and mind - the craving has been lifted. I never think about using anymore. I’ve listened to what people say and I’ve done what’s suggested. Service has been a massive thing for me. My journey started making brews at these meetings and putting breakfast out at Phoenix Mill. I was then offered a volunteer role at the gym, being shadowed by a PT. Then I got the innovation fund to do my PT course, so big shoutout to Charlotte Berry. When I passed my PT course I witnessed the importance of connection and physical activity, so me and Kate decided to look at opening a community interest company, and this is where Rehab Fitness was born. Kate was really passionate about yoga and also got the innovation fund to train as a yoga teacher. So at first, we would do 1 gym session and 1 yoga session a week as volunteers. The gym hire was funded by CGL Manchester. We also go some funding off Step Up Manchester to pay for an additional gym day, boxing equipment, yoga equipment, camping trips and day trips. The new Victoria building paid for fishing tackle and a speaker for our session. Then we started a run club, a bike club, put an extra gym session on. We also hosted our first ever SpoGomi litter pick in Clayton last year after winning the Oldham one (first ever one in Greater Manchester) where over 600kg of litter was picked. With the help of various other organisations and connections, we’ve sustained doing fitness and wellbeing activities almost every day for the last 15 months.
We have also had many of our members come on the journey with us, with all sorts from white collar boxing, to PT courses, to volunteer with us.
Kate did the first white collar boxing as a personal challenge. Following this myself and 4 others from signed up for the next one. We had 2 more members sign up and fight in the one after this, and we have 7 people currently signed up for the next event in May this year. We are trying to raise money as part of our fundraising through this to pay for more trips, as the money I raised in mine funded campsite fees for our Kinder Scout and Mam Tor hiking trip. Recovery has given me a life way beyond my wildest dreams. The volunteering we do daily helps others to achieve this kind of life too. We watch people grow over time and built up a brilliant community.
I have been lucky enough to go back into four prisons in the last two months and share my story. I am also working with a company called revolving doors, where we are going to be piloting a scheme in Wigan this year to try and divert low risk offenders such as shoplifters away from prison and into activities that will achieve better outcomes for both them and the wider community. There are so many organisations and people out there who really want to help others achieve their goals, I didn’t know about any of these whilst I was stuck in the madness, and I just want to highlight to people that there is help.
and if anyone is struggling out there, come and connect and get involved!