A Leeds mum who used to sleep on the streets "with one eye open" and has battled eating disorders and drug addiction has spoken out about how she turned it all around.
"I was terrified. I just felt violated but at the same time, on some level, it was good to get the care I needed. I definitely was in a cry for help.” Miranda became so unwell social services considered she was a “risk to herself” and she was sectioned in the former Highroyds Mental Hospital, under the mental health act. She says she remained there for nine months - the minimum term at the time - but felt “punished rather than comforted”.
After Miranda was evicted from a bedsit, she slept on a bench on the roadside near Woodhouse Moor as she felt it was “safer sleeping where cars were driving”. Over several years Miranda would move around, sleeping in various waiting rooms, including Leeds Bus Station , sofa surfing in friends’ living rooms, moving in with an ex-boyfriend and living in a hostel.
It was after he daughter was born when Miranda was 22 that she decided it was time to turn her life around. She named her little girl after her friend Robin, a bassist in her first band. Miranda said: “You are not your pain that you’ve created around yourself as a response to the difficult circumstances around your life. That does not define who you are. Recovery is always possible. We all have the power to take our pain and make into purpose.”