�� (Male, 39, desisted for 1 year)A minority of the respondents was involved in offending in a way which was not strictly related to their drug use. They had had several contacts with the police and with judicial authorities. Unlike the previously mentioned persons, these respondents experienced desistance from offending as a conscious process. selleck chemicals They grew to see their involvement in offending as being at odds with their new responsibilities and life styles. They wanted to avoid going to prison, not so much because they fear prison in itself but rather because a stay in prison would jeopardize their lives as a partner or as a parent.You have a certain responsibility now. Why don’t you want to commit offences anymore? Because you don’t want to leave your partner behind on her own.

I am not afraid of prison, but I would be afraid of leaving her on her own. It frightens me more than prison. I chose consciously not to commit offences ever again. I had already stopped offending when I stopped using drugs. I don’t think that they had a very strong influence on one another. It was the sense of responsibility that made the ��click��. (Male, 38, desisted for 4 years)To conclude, most of our respondents (four out of five) consider their desistance from offending to be subordinate to their drug use ��desistance�� (so recovery). Their first goal was starting to recover from drug use. They were convinced that recovery from drug use would lead them to a stop in their offending. After all, as seen in the literature, commitment to recovery is related to one’s quality of life which in turn can be enhanced by (re)gaining and maintaining certain desired needs in life (e.

g., stable housing, education and work, family, well-being, stable financial situation) [32, 33]. In the interviews, they could not answer the question how their desistance process from offending developed. For them, desistance from offending is not a conscious process of making the choice for change, but rather a consequence of their new life style, namely, a drug-free life. As a consequence, for the analysis of the key concepts of Giordano’s cognitive theory, we focus on the recovery from drug use rather than on desistance from crime in the remainder of the section.3.2. Openness to ChangeSeveral respondents indicated that at a particular time in their lives they ��reformed,�� they made a change which they describe as a ��click.

�� They found the motivation to change their life. For most respondents the exact cause of that motivation is difficult to identify. Carfilzomib They cannot explain what the trigger was to make the decision to stop using drugs. They can only say that they wanted to change themselves and their lives.It couldn’t last anymore, it was not livable. Waking up, against my will, never fully awake, working, money. Never enough money because you have spend too much on partying.