{"id":820658,"date":"2026-11-01T10:52:09","date_gmt":"2026-11-01T10:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/820658\/"},"modified":"2026-11-01T10:52:09","modified_gmt":"2026-11-01T10:52:09","slug":"bristol-drugs-project-changing-lives-for-40-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/820658\/","title":{"rendered":"Bristol Drugs Project: Changing lives for 40 years"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Through BDP&#8217;s Creative Communities programme he has been learning how to play the drums, write and perform poetry and take part in theatre and hip-hop groups &#8211; a life far removed from what he was living in his early 20s.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Crack cocaine brought me to my knees,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I kept that a secret for around three years until I ran out of excuses. It was like hell,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">When he reached out, BDP helped him access a treatment centre, but he explained his journey was not &#8220;straightforward&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;It took many attempts, but at each relapse BDP was always there,&#8221; Decordova said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Now with support from BDP and a focus on performing he said he understands who he is again.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;The ability to express yourself though art is paramount to many addicts because they&#8217;ve spent to so many years suppressing themselves,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;It holds up a beacon of light that says, &#8216;anything is possible&#8217;.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Through BDP&#8217;s Creative Communities programme he has been learning how to play the drums, write and perform poetry&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":820659,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[96,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-820658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=820658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820658\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/820659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=820658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=820658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=820658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}