An under-threat social enterprise right in the heart of Ayr has stepped in to help recovering drug addicts access support.
Tsukure Hub have placed mental health and keeping support avenues open at the top of their priority list but face an anxious three months as they fight to survive.
Despite jumping to the rescue of NHS workers by producing PPE in the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic, the hub is now struggling to stay open with its main revenue streams shut down.
Born out of a huge cannabis bust on the High Street in 2019, the site has been transformed by co-founders Adam Short, 47, and Euan Shields, 50, into a tech lab, cafe, and winter wonderland for a Christmas children’s charity.
Recently, the hub has become a home for boosting mental health with groups permitted to meet under guidelines.
Included in these groups is a drug addiction fellowship who are helping users tackle their demons with cocaine, alcohol, heroin and other substances.
Adam, of Tsukure Hub, told the Ayrshire Post: “Mental health is a big issue in the town and it always has been.
“A lot of support groups have had to stop because where they are held have been closed due to Covid restrictions.
“The drug addiction fellowship approached their churches which had closed down, without us providing the facilities for them, they would slip back towards taking drugs.”
Thanks to the hub, support was provided throughout the festive season with the regular meetings held on Fridays taking place on Christmas Day and New Years Day.
Adam added: “The meetings are regular as clockwork – they need that regularity in order to help cope with the addiction.
"We opened up on Christmas Day for anyone who was lonely or isolated.
"We had a group of people here on Christmas day just hanging out.
“Then later on in the evening we had the addiction fellowship in.”
Adam Holland, 52, runs the drug fellowship group and has stressed the importance of the groups, often a ‘lifeline’ for addicts, being able to continue to meet up.
He said: “We’ve had several premises before. We were using the Riverside Church up until this next lockdown started.
“When the lockdown started the Riverside church wasn’t available and we were left in limbo.”
“A lot of folk were struggling to get by. There have been deaths right through the addiction services and mental health services because people have not been able to cope.
As a recovering alcoholic of 32 years, Adam [Holland] has turned his life around to help others and knows all too well how vital the meetings can be.
Now sober for nine years he has urged people to help out Tsukure Hub to secure their future.
Adam added: “The hub has been brilliant providing us somewhere.”
