When I came into recovery, the idea of sharing my story seemed completely pointless to me, how could sharing my thoughts and feelings honestly in all their depth and detail help me stop drinking and taking drugs? I wanted a quick, hard, fast solution and sharing my story just seemed too fuzzy and futile.

Where Fallen Angels differ from other peer support groups and talking therapies is that the parts of my story I can’t put into words can actually be conveyed through movement.

I find it really difficult to express the pain and torture of active addiction through words – dance helps to tease out these knots and the experience of active addiction, not only helping non-addicts understand addiction, but also helping me understand and make sense of my own story.

What’s so amazing about Fallen Angels is that through movement Paul Bayes-Kitcher has been able to take our inner experiences and choreograph them into something that no longer has to be hidden.

This has given me a way of sharing who I am with others rather than hiding my addiction and feeling ashamed. Dance has definitely made me feel more confident about who I am and has made sharing my experience with non-addicts a million times easier.