Brian Pennie is an author, speaker, PhD candidate, university lecturer, and life-change strategist but his life used to be very different. For 15 years he lived with an addiction to heroin, an addiction that almost killed him. Fortunately, with support and great effort he used heroin for the final time in October 2013 and changed his life completely. Brian has won several academic awards including a fully funded (€100,000) PhD scholarship in Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience. He has also secured lecturing positions at both Trinity College and University College Dublin where he teaches the neuroscience of mindfulness and addiction. He shared with us how hearing the word ‘junkie’ makes him feel and how it dehumanises people who are in most need of our compassion. 

Follow Sonya here, Brendan here and Lennon Courtney here.

This series was produced by Esther O'Moore Donohoe.