HAVING survived the misery of drug addiction and total despair, Song Dongmei started a new life with help from others and is offering the same crucial "lifeline" to addicts to get through stages of self-hate and rejection, Nancy Zhang reports

Song Dongmei used to spend up to 12 hours a day sleeping during the depths of her heroin addiction. In her waking hours, she was either in a zombie-like state or out looking for money to pay for the next hit. It allowed her to escape a life in ruins.

For 11 long years, from 1993 to 2004, Song was addicted to inhaling the white powder. She has been clean for the past five years and now, at age 33, has a successful life, marriage and a baby.

Today Song, who is Shanghainese, gives back to the community by helping other recovering addicts, a mission she called "the work of angels."

"I used to feed my needs by using drugs, but I have replaced that sort of 'satisfaction' with the good things in my life and helping others," she said.

Song is a mentor at Ziqiang Group, a local non-government organization that helps recovering addicts reintegrate into society. It operates an experimental self-help group.

Both Song and the group are remarkable. There are few self-help groups in the city as most people want to hide their former addiction and families are reluctant for their children to mix again with other addicts. It's not something to talk about, but talking is exactly what's needed.

The NGO, founded by Ye Xiong, a Shanghai heroin addict for 10 years, was honored last year by the city as one of the 10 best social service organizations in Shanghai.

Song, who joined Ziqiang five years ago, is one of its most successful cases.

Because of more open international borders and the social malaise of rapid economic and social development, drug use is up in China. Last year official reports said there were more than 1 million registered drug addicts, 80 percent of them addicted to heroin.

Song is now healthy and optimistic but there's a toughness about her just beneath an open and friendly exterior. The scars are psychological rather than physical, she said. Speaking emphatically and thoughtfully, she seems to have a deep source of unswerving confidence.

Life is good nowadays. She lives in a comfortable apartment in Xuhui District with her German husband, a business consultant she met after state-run drug rehab, and has just had a baby. When we met her, the baby was being cradled by Song's mother who had stood by her daughter in her darkest hours.

The key to recovery, said Song, is human relationships - from close family to the wider society. In this regard Song was lucky. Even the closest family of many addicts eventually gives up on them, resulting in a spiral of self-loathing, self-destruction and continued addiction or relapse.

"Support is really crucial," said Song. "No one can beat addiction by themselves; it's not just difficult, it's impossible."

Song fell into heroin use largely through ignorance. It was the early 1990s, she had a stressful job selling imported wines and her first husband (now divorced) was a gambler.

She suffered recurring migraines, and a friend suggested a certain white powder could alleviate the symptoms.

Describing her ignorance at the time, Song said she had no concept of drugs except for opium, which was imported by foreign traders in the 1850s and enslaved many Chinese. Though China has been wiping out the drug problem, with economic reforms and opening up, drugs re-entered China and the victims included many urbanites - not just poor people in southern border provinces.

Song was hooked in just one week. Seven years later she was consuming up to 200 grams of heroine costing 700 yuan (US$102) a day. She borrowed the money from her parents, friends and neighbors or pawned possessions. It was like "throwing money into a furnace" she said.

She had not committed a crime to support her habit, but first got into trouble in 1998 when watchers in her neighborhood committee noticed that she never went out during the daytime, only at night. That seemed strange, so they alerted the police who invited Song in for a "talk." It became clear she was an addict and she was taken into custody. She was arrested again in 2002.

At the time, ignorance about drugs applied to police and addicts alike. Dong remembers lying in her cell, going through painful withdrawal and vomiting yellow bile for a week. Police thought she was just simply ill.

Authorities eventually realized the truth, and sent her to a government detoxification center in Qingpu District that was "similar to prison," said Song. Some drug users who have run-ins with the police are sent to these compulsory centers that reeducate addicts through labor and enforced abstinence.

Lasting three to six months, they have been criticized for being too short, harsh and not providing meaningful treatment. There are some exceptions and experimental programs.

Since 2007 more humane community centers and voluntary detox centers have been established, some of them run by the private sector. They treat drug users both psychologically and medically.

However Song's first encounter with an old-style detox center left her feeling isolated and rejected, as underlying psychological issues were not addressed.

She remembers friends and neighbors would avoid her or turn aside to whisper and gossip when they saw her coming, afraid that she was after more money.

In 2001, she tried to start a new life by learning to drive a taxi. Having borrowed money to pay for lessons and a driving test, she applied for an official stamp to finalize the license. But her addiction records were discovered and the stamp was refused.

"I got down on my knees and begged," she said. "But when even that didn't work, I felt I had been completely rejected by society and I turned to heroin again."

She remembers her darkest moment. Zombie-like from heroin, she had fallen and split her head open, requiring seven stitches.

After returning from the hospital she was tied up by her parents in a room to prevent her from harming herself. Again she went through withdrawal, moaning, sweating, shivering and being unable to control her bodily functions. Her mother stayed with her day and night, wiping away the perspiration and attending to her needs.

Even her parents thought about giving up - they later told the recovered Song that they had once wished she would die and end the suffering for everyone involved.

At this point, her mother looks up from playing with the baby and a far away look comes to her eyes. She has the same toughness as her daughter when she speaks. "It still makes me sad to think of those times," she said.

Song's parents were factory workers who struggled and saved their entire lives for the little they had - an apartment and being able to bring up their two children. But even as their black hair turned white, and her mother lost her job, they were still supporting Song through all her addictions, arrests and attempts at rebuilding her life.

The reality of what she was doing to them hit Song after her second arrest. As she spent her 30th birthday inside a detox center, she felt ashamed of the burden she was placing on her aging parents.

"I thought nothing has to be the way it is. I can change," she said of that definitive moment. Thereafter she established more relationships that pulled her back to health.

In 2004, she used her English-language skills to find another job selling imported wines. There she met the man who later became her husband. He was concerned that she always appeared unhappy and preoccupied.

As their friendship grew she confided in him about her past, and asked if he could accept a relationship with her. His unconditional acceptance and support gave her impetus and strength to continue her recovery.

In 2005 she met Ye, another ex-addict who had become famous in China for her social work in drug rehabilitation. Song was introduced to Ye through her rehabilitation officer and the contact with the Ziqiang Group has helped her stay clean.

As a mentor in this self-help (non-12-step) group, Song establishes with other sufferers the human relationships that she found to be her lifeline.

Last year Song was a mentor/facilitator in a course of innovative small, self-help group sessions organized by Ziqiang. Consisting of 11 members, it's like Alanon, but without 12 steps or a religious component, said Song.

Her group went through sessions together and now meets occasionally during festivals and on important occasions, such as weddings, the birth of a child and so on.

All former addicts, they are mostly men aged from 27 to their 50s. Some ran businesses and restaurants before their lives went down hill. All have found new jobs, including security guards, messengers and newspaper delivery boys.

The program includes group discussion, regular health checks, educational games, and sessions to train future mentors. Only two of the 11 have relapsed.

"It wasn't easy to start these groups," said Ye. "A lot of people were suspicious, especially families. They thought, 'our child has already recovered, we don't want him/her mixing with other addicts again'."

Though formal sessions ended last September, members still keep in touch, and Ye plans to start a new group this September.

She envisions similar small groups rolled out at district level across Shanghai. But this depends on whether they can get support from local governments.

Newcomers to the group are unwilling to talk, and contact is first made by letter. Sometimes it takes years of correspondence before they are willing to go to group meetings.

"But even if they don't reply to the letters we keep sending them, to let them know they haven't been abandoned," said Song.

A typical meeting begins with reading aloud the mission statement:

"To respect our lives we must value ourselves, so we have chosen to be here together. With self-help we need not despair over today, but embrace the hope of a better tomorrow."

Then there are games. In one game, Song leads a blindfolded person around an obstacle course.

The blindfold represents the darkness of addiction, and the only thing that can lead them out of the darkness is trust in another human being.