Robert Campbell is a God loving, happily married man and father of four. He lives in Kent and runs his own home improvement business, but his formative years were not quite so idyllic. His rocky start to life put him on the road to self destruction, but a church community event radically changed his life.

“My upbringing was disastrous. My Jamaican father and English mother split up when I was one. I had a sister and brother but later on there were many of us because my parents had children from different relationships.

When they split up, another lady became my stepmother and my siblings and I went backwards and forwards to different carers. I found it hard to accept authority because everyone had different rules and regulations. I constantly had to learn new rules and it was tough knowing what was right and wrong. I had no continuity.

I grew up feeling unloved and unwanted. There wasn’t any real care or cuddles. I don’t recall my mother or father actually telling me that they loved me. My real mum didn’t love me like she loved my half brothers and sisters because of the resentment she had towards my father. There was always sibling rivalry and distance between my family.

My father was strict and beatings were a regular occurrence. He would buy me new clothes and beat me before I wore them so I wouldn’t ruin them. When he locked me in my bedroom when they went out, I would bite my nails. He would give me the belt for biting them and when that didn’t work he would tie my hands to the chair. My mum was just as violent. My father would use his belt but she would just punch me in my face. I was going through turmoil – I hated the world.

Sexual Abuse

At 13 I ran away because my father was due to give me yet another beating for smoking. I found a derelict house behind Brixton Prison and decided to camp there. At night my friends and I would chat to prisoners over the wall, then one day a man appeared outside my makeshift home. He’d just been released and tried to befriend us.

He took us out for a Wimpy. I told him my story and he promised me a new life in Scotland. I was really scared and just wanted to get as far away from my parents as possible. I was very naïve and stupid. His promises were false and he sexually abused me for two days. What he made me do was nasty. I felt so dirty, so embarrassed and ashamed, I didn’t tell anyone for 27 years. Eventually I went home but I was in such a state.

At school I was uncontrollable and rebellious. I was disruptive and skipped lessons most of the time. I was always seeking attention and always in trouble. I would start fires or flood places out. I’d go shoplifting with my friends instead of learning. I hated teachers – any form of authority in fact. I would be abusive and wouldn’t do my work. Anything that was not right, I would be doing it. I was expelled at 15.
I adored my step mum but she left my father – I was heartbroken. When I was 17 my father’s new partner moved in. She was only 28 and had destroyed the previous relationship I had with my step mum. Before she came along I used to have friends over every evening and we’d play music. My dad wouldn’t come home until midnight and my former step mum used to leave food out for us.

My father painted a bad picture of me to his new partner and she wanted to change everything including me. We ended up arguing all the time – there was no reasoning. Finally my father kicked me out on the street and he didn’t care where I went. The council put me in a B&B and on my 18th birthday, I got my own private tenancy.

Slippery Slope

By the time I was 18 my friends and I smoked cannabis regularly. Three or four times a day I would be the one to buy it and we’d smoke all day long. I become a cannabis dealer and my house became a nightclub. 20 people or so would be smoking and drinking in my home. Now I had an abundance of cannabis and inevitably I became a heavy smoker.

I became a father at 21 but the smoking and drinking continued and I got involved with DJing. With the parties and clubs came the women. I was promiscuous even though I had a partner. I was seeking love and just kept having affairs. Whenever I was shown affection I grabbed hold of it. As soon as a relationship went stale, I would look for the next one – it was a cycle. I had two more sons and a daughter with multiple partners.

My relationship with my father had improved and we were doing building jobs together. I learnt a lot from his trade and it was my dream that we would start a building company together, but he always said no. Once we had a big argument on a job because I thought he did something wrong. He didn’t like that and said he never made mistakes. He took me off the job.

He called a week later and said he wanted to talk. I thought this was our chance to put an end to the feud and finally get together as a family. I thought everything was going to be wonderful. I bought him the best cigars and a crate of Pills and I cooked him a beautiful meal. My father turned up with my sister and brother and told my partner, holding my one-year-old son, to get out of the living room. He disowned me in front of my siblings.

“I’m no longer your father and you’re no longer my son. I no longer wish to have anything more to do with you or your family,” he said.

Self destruct

I was completely heartbroken and fell to bits. How could he say that to his son? What massive crime had I committed against him? I didn’t speak to him for 15 years. My father didn’t know how to love me. For him, the best way to deal with me was to get me out of his life. That sent me right off the rails. I went into self-destruct mode and didn’t care anymore.

After years of using cannabis I moved onto harder drugs. In 1989 I began feeding myself with crack cocaine. I had made quite a lot of money from selling cannabis, DJing and building work but once I got into crack, it devastated me and everything around me. One year I blew 30K on my habit.

I found a joy in my drug taking – I felt kind of healed. The concoction of drugs and alcohol completely took me out of the world I didn’t want to be in. I had so much anger – I hated the world. What started as weekend recreation became something more sinister. I would lock myself up for days on end without contact. My partner would go backwards and forwards to her mum’s because of our arguments.

Eventually I had no money left and the crack made depressed. I couldn’t afford my habit even though I was addicted so I started drinking heavily. It helped numb the craving. Every day I drank and every penny I had was spent on drink. I was living a horrible life.

I felt distressed, angry and depressed all the time. There was nobody I could talk to about my feelings not even my partner – I shut her out. I wondered why my parents didn’t love me. Every day I used to think about what my father said: “You’re no longer my son, you’re no longer my son,” used to ring in my ears. It hurt so much, I wanted to get rid of the pain.

Banged Up

I rebuilt my life to some extent and I stopped taking hard drugs. I started working again for myself because I couldn’t stand anyone telling me what to do. In 1995 the rave scene was big and alongside my club promoting, I started selling Ecstasy. I got caught.

I was arrested when my partner was 7 months pregnant. I served 12 months and was released in 1996. Doing time in itself wasn’t a problem but being away from my family was hard. Being incarcerated in Belmarsh Prison during my daughter’s birth was the saddest part of my life. She was 9 months old when I came out.

Being on the inside made me more cautious on the outside – I continued smoking cannabis and dealing drugs. I didn’t feel any moral responsibility. Even though I was doing wrong, everybody I knew was involved in drugs. When you’re surrounded by them, living that life seems quite natural.

Even though I managed to survive prison, my mind was really messed up. I couldn’t trust anybody. I went to prison because somebody grassed me up and I was never able to trust my own parents. I wondered who I could trust, even my own partner. I didn’t even trust myself.

Rehab

I fell into a massive depression and started drinking heavily again. At 7.30am my body would shake and sweat if I didn’t have a drink. I needed to continuously drink just to keep my body from fitting. It was horrible. I went to the local authorities for help but I got kicked out of my first detox unit for smoking cannabis. Then I was kicked out of a rehabilitation centre after a week. It seemed impossible to recover in London as I had too many connections so they sent me to the coast.

After 8 months of treatment I returned to my partner. Everything was wonderful at first but she hadn’t changed and neither had my surroundings. She felt she didn’t have a problem but we both needed to change. My name wasn’t on the rent book, so she had power over me. We had so many fights and if I refused to leave she’d call the police and have me removed. This happened many times and I despised her for not supporting me after everything I had been through. I went into a downward spiral and started drinking again.

I drank myself into oblivion to blot everything out. That’s when I felt suicidal. I just wanted my life to end. I hated my partner so much I even thought about taking my own daughter’s life. I wanted to punish my partner and the world. I thought about hanging, carbon monoxide, jumping off buildings or under trains. It was as if Satan was giving me all these plans. I just wanted the pain to end.

Eventually I had a nervous breakdown. I came home from work one day ill with flu. My partner and I had had another row and she had disappeared again. On top of my flu remedies I drank cans and cans of really strong lager. I just flipped and smashed up the whole house and broke all the windows. I got arrested. Only after sobering up in a prison cell and returning to a boarded up house, did I realise what I had done. I was homeless and ended up wandering the streets. My life was a massive disaster.

I was in and out of treatment from 2001 until 2007. I just couldn’t cope and kept falling off the wagon. I stayed with a friend but she was a heavy drinker too. I didn’t care, I just needed somewhere to live. All I wanted to do was buy beer, drink, hide under my quilt, sleep and repeat it all over again.

Soul Searching

In my depression I knew there was something missing in my life. Even though I wanted to commit suicide, something was telling me not to do it. I sensed I was missing faith and that maybe I needed God. I joined a local library and came back with a pile of books on different religions. I read as much as I could and silently prayed for help.

One year later on a beautiful sunny day on 5th August 2006, my friend and I went to the off licence. For some reason I insisted on walking the long way round and we passed the very house where I’d read all about God. Suddenly two lovely young ladies came up to me. I thought my luck had changed but they just wanted to give me their “last flyer,” they said. I instantly thought of the club scene but didn’t realise they were advertising their church’s community fun day in a park up the road.

We bought our beers and decided to go. On that day, World Wide Mission Fellowship decided to reach out to their community. Everyone in the church played their part – there was a gospel choir, food, stalls and lots of activities for the family. Their pastor had a passion for community and a heart for prostitutes, drug addicts and alcoholics – people like me and I was their biggest fish! I was pretty merry and started talking to people about my predicament. I agreed to be interviewed on camera. I had heard about Jesus but knew I needed help. They seemed so wonderful and warm – a feeling I hadn’t experienced from anyone before. On that day I found love, which I had been looking for my whole life. On that day I met Jesus.

I was invited to their Sunday service the following day. I woke up with a hang over but still decided to go. I used to curse a church near where I used to live because I could never park anywhere on a Sunday morning when I’d get back from a rave. The church I used to curse was the same church I’d been invited to -I couldn’t believe it!
I sat at the back near the door so I could easily escape if necessary. Suddenly I saw myself dancing in the middle of their screen from the day before. I jumped up and shouted, “that’s me!” I got a standing ovation!

Road to recovery

Although I started to attend church every Sunday, I still had my drink problem. I probably stunk of alcohol and my appearance was pretty bad but still my brothers and sisters from church would ring me every day and pray over the phone. I really felt their love.

I was a tough cookie for them and needed help. I met with the pastor for three hours and was open and honest about my life. He decided to mentor me and called me regularly. We’d play table tennis together but he never went on about Jesus or hit me over the head with a Bible. He knew that wasn’t going to work. I needed love and care and someone to look up to.

With my pastor’s help I completed the final stage of my treatment. We became close and I started reading the Bible for myself. A year after I got saved, I got baptised. I got my first flat on my own in 2007. I had never been by myself before but I had support from my wonderful church family and more importantly Christ was with me.

The biggest lesson I’ve learnt is to love and respect others and control my anger. I used to be such an angry person but now I try to love everyone and think before I speak! I have no doubt that there is a God and I’m so grateful for what his son has done for me. I‘ve rebuilt the relationship with my daughter but sadly there’s still a massive distance between me and my boys which needs to be healed. I’m leaving it in God’s hands.

I’m really involved with my church and have even found a beautiful Christian wife! I’ve started my own home improvement business and I’m addicted to tools now! I’m also a drug educator at Hope UK – my experience is able to help others.

A church isn’t just about turning up and singing hymns, it’s about being part of your community and caring for each other. Churches really need to get out there and do more for their communities especially for the youth as they seem so lost. We need to hit them with love, not the Bible. I was a tough case but a church initiative transformed me. Churches need to bring unity to broken families. We need to show more love. If it wasn’t for World Wide Mission Fellowship, I would be dead by now.”

How will you Love London?