Tom Harrison House Claimed

Tom Harrison House provides a specialist addiction recovery programme for former and still-serving UK Armed Forces and emergency services personnel.

Our bespoke 12-week residential programme is designed specifically for those who have served and who may struggle to engage with mainstream, civilian rehabilitation services.

The programme is grounded in a supportive community of people with shared experiences and includes a range of therapeutic groups and activities to help restore our clients’ physical, emotional and psychological wellbeing.

Our individualised, trauma-informed approach addresses the unique needs of ex-service personnel and is the first of its kind in the UK.

Open Access

Our Open Access service is designed to connect addicted ex-service personnel with the support of our community, and acts as a hub for referrals, signposting, interaction, engagement and support.

Get in touch if you’d like to meet our community and find out more about the project. Attending one of our open access drop in sessions or events is a great way to begin your recovery journey with Tom Harrison House.

Clients, family members or professionals can refer from anywhere in the UK. If you’d like more information or to make a referral, please get in touch with our admissions team who will arrange your assessment, in person or over the phone, at a time to suit you.

Our Programme

We offer a 12-week residential programme of therapies, experiences and activities. The programme, designed in consultation with veterans in recovery and the only one of its kind in the UK, is based upon finding a  balance between emotional, physical and mental recovery. In the pre-admission stage, we work with all clients to achieve abstinence prior to embarking on the programme.

In a typical week, the community will take part in an art therapy session, practice mindfulness, go swimming, participate in equine therapy, work with a personal trainer at the gym, experience a variety of therapeutic and educational groups, support one another in completing recovery assignments and work on their individual recovery and resettlement plans. Core to our programme are three interpersonal Group Therapy sessions and one-to-one counselling sessions for each client every week.

The team works closely with partners such as Mersey Care, The Royal British Legion, Liverpool Veterans’ HQ, BNENC, Everton in the Community, Shy Lowen Sanctuary, FACT, Rydal Hall and a host of others to make sure that the programme remains rich and varied and provides experiences that foster openness, exploration and connection.

We work with each client to begin to develop and embed the mindset, resilience and resources, in other words the “recovery capital”, necessary to build a strong, stable and robust ongoing recovery. By providing a supportive community, education, therapies and opportunities for real self-development, the programme works as a foundation for a new life, and not just a way to overcome the immediate issue of physical dependence on drugs or alcohol.

It is through this bespoke model, with an emphasis on the role of co-occurring trauma, safety, confidentiality and camaraderie, as well as reintegration into “civilian” communities, that a community of ex-servicepeople who possess shared experiences, perspectives and resources, is built.

Family Support

On offer to all those clients who access our service is an additional layer of Family Support, through our MFARE (Military Families Addiction Recovery Experience) programme, developed with support from the Armed Forces Covenant Fund.

The aim of MFARE is to engage with and involve the family members of the addicted client in the recovery process, to improve the understanding, wellbeing and resilience of families of ex-servicepeople recovering from addiction.

It provides family members with the opportunity, through education and support, to begin their own journey of healing and recovery from the impact of alcohol or drug addiction. By including those closest to the client in the recovery process, we aim to ensure that, post-programme, the family can work together in support of their recovery.

Our dedicated MFARE support worker delivers weekly individual family meetings, monthly family groups and quarterly residential sessions. Working alongside the core Tom Harrison House team, our Families Worker is able to provide insight into the clients’ wider recovery process and to highlight additional needs from the broader family perspective.

The service also offers access to an online support group to ensure on-going and out-of-hours support.