THE STORY OF FATIMA - ADDICT TO PUNDIT

Many of you could still remember the story of shanawole, the eleven years old hack man who belonged to the Eiye fraternity, that I shared right about this same time last year.

Read full story here==>

In 2006, the Freedom Foundation, a faith-based and non-profit making organizorgan visited various communities across Lagos to get a forehand experience of challenges people face just trying to survive in the city. The organisation got forehand experiences of what some people go through to stay alive.

After years of sorting and archiving the footage, Freedom Foundation decided to launch a diary-like documentary of a few stories they encountered.

The documentary, “My Lagos Diaries,” tells real stories of rehabilitated prostitutes, armed robbers, drug addicts, beggars and other neglected individuals in the society.

Some weeks ago, “My Lagos Diaries”, a thirteen week video journal by Dr Tony Rapu, debuted across Nigerian TV stations and the first episode featured the touching story of Fatima and her real-life  struggle with drug addiction.

In a longitudinal study over a period of 9 years, the foundation followed Fatima and watched as she went through detoxification, rehabilitation and reintegration into the society.

Fatima was born somewhere in Lagos. She narrated how she had to drop from school when she was in class four and she was forced into marriage as against her will. This led her to elope from Ilorin in Kwara State where she ran back to Lagos because her heart then belonged to someone else. This issue led to separation between her parents and which left her caught up in the middle. And as they will always say, when your friends disown, your family would be there for you.

But when your family disown you, of course, your friends would be there to accept you. That was how she got entrapped by so called friends who led her into taking hard drugs and finally became a bumper drug addict!

Her story showed how hard it is to break the cycle of addiction but with support and encouragement, she was made whole again.

Watch the full inspiring video