Angela Taylor, a former drug addict living near St Austell has a grim story to tell.
And so terrifying is her life story that it caught the attention of writer Julie Fisher, who turned her biography into one of the ten best-selling books in the United Kingdom.
Born in a broken family in Surrey, Angela, hoped to escape her stifling background finding an outlet in cannabis.
"I couldn't cope with my family, I was a desperate teenager. At that time the hippy era was very fashionable and everybody smoked cannabis", she said.
"I thought it was not addictive and hoped so much that it would save me from the thoughts I couldn't cope with.".
At 22, after a wrecked marriage, two miscarriages, and suffering from severe panic attacks, she decided to push her limits and try heroine.
"My marriage was on the rocks, I had two miscarriages, my third child died three months after he was born and I didn't have the strength to cope with anything. The only easy option which could block out everything was cannabis and heroin.I had no money, so I started to rob chemists, old ladies and became a prostitute.
"But I was such a mess that no man would give me any money for sex. At 24 I ended up in prison at Holloway in London and stayed there for two years", she recalled.
Angela Taylor is 52 now. She lives at Coombe near St Austell, and gave up her addiction completely.
But she said: "Drugs destroy lives.I wish to God I had my life back. I have walked 20,000 miles across the UK to tell people it's wrong to take drugs."" .