Our Team

Click on the images to learn more about the wonderful staff and volunteers of SUIT.

Staff

Marcus Johnson

Jason Spreckley

Fallon Burnett

Cody Jenkins

Michelle Lane

Charlotte Hawkes

Karolina Sowinska

Vijay Sahota

Christiane Jenkins

Matt Whittall

Volunteers

Sabrina Ellis

Richard Felton

Drew Scott

I have the absolute privilege of managing the most incredible team of staff and volunteers at SUIT. We all possess the very unique and special gift of lived experience from drug and alcohol addiction, whether that be a personal journey or family related. Every single person within the team are totally committed to our inclusive vision of delivering the most unique and tailored wraparound recovery support package to each of our service users.  

I have been in recovery from alcoholism for over 8 years now and 5 years ago I came to volunteer at SUIT offering my time for 8 hours a week. Things have evolved quite a lot since then… 

We’ve been working alongside Recovery Near You (RNY) for 5 years, currently into a 7-year contract. Our directive; to combine clinical treatment with service-user involvement. We are offering individuals suffering from drug and alcohol addiction the greatest opportunity to rehabilitate themselves and break free of the chains of addiction.  

As we look forward, we are committed to evolving our service; growing the core staff team so that we can continue to press on with our passion for supporting people within recovery. Everyone deserves the opportunity to change, people just need encouragement to find the willingness to change. At SUIT we consistently listen and offer our personal experiences in relation to our individual client needs.  

We have worked extensively during the last 2 years since Covid-19 restrictions to re-establish our connections within the West Midlands and beyond. Attending a great number of outreach events, radio interviews and through the platforms provided through social media. Our ‘Voices of Recovery’ project that was initiated by volunteer Christiane, has gone from strength to strength. What began as a University of Wolverhampton research project has now become part of the bedrock that makes SUIT what it is today. Allowing our clients the opportunity to express themselves through art whilst also providing a space for clients to share experiences of their individual recovery paths so far. 

To steal a phrase, “extending the weekly art group setting to visits of creative interest, workshops and informal meetings with artists has allowed the collective to experience opportunity in spaces previously unavailable to them” (Jenkins, 2023).  

The next 18 months will be a busy but exciting time for SUIT as we forge new links with community partners, all with the intention of offering new and creative opportunities for our clients, prioritising them always at the centre of our work.  

Lived experience service-user involvement working alongside clinical treatment is undoubtedly the most important ingredient for the optimum outcome in the battle against addiction. 

Marcus Johnson

Project Manager

Jason Spreckley

Volunteer Coordinator

I run the structured volunteer programme for SUIT, and across Recovery Near You, and I’ve done this for over 11 years. I have lived experience of addiction and I value peer-support. I am living testament that sharing knowledge and experience to find strength in recovery really does work. My aim is to help as many people as possible in reaching their recovery goals.  

I support volunteers to develop confidence, reduce the stigma of addiction, and promote education and employment. I believe that you gain confidence from learning and positive environments. Other people can give you motivation, support, and skills that teach you to be in control and think for yourself. My drug use was always influenced by others, but when I started listening to support workers in recovery, they taught me how to decision make, and turned me into who I am now; someone with goals and direction.  

Until you become inspired by someone else, the change can’t happen. We have to see it through our own eyes.   

 

Fallon Burnett

Project Outreach Worker

I had been volunteering for SUIT for about 8 months before I secured a job, and I’ve been working as a member of staff now for a year and a half. I support clients on a one-to-one basis, and I support our skilled group of volunteers with service-user interventions in the office and help deliver SUIT’s valuable community outreach.  

I love working with the SUIT team. I’m passionate about the dynamic and unique service we provide, and I have always felt comfortable with supporting our most vulnerable clients. I am strongly embedded in our community and find my role of community support very fulfilling. Support services are an essential part of any community, and within Wolverhampton, SUIT offers crucial help to the people and families struggling through addiction. We provide much needed wrap-around support and assist with the social circumstances and effects of addiction including complex needs, poverty, homelessness, exploitation, and contact with criminal justice. Wolverhampton’s diverse community has many characteristics associated with increased levels of vulnerability, including areas of deprivation, low educational attainment, high concentrations of BAME communities and the largest percentage of population under 25 of any UK counties.  

I am a champion of diversity, and want to break down barriers, remove societal stigma, and bring the community together. 

 

Michelle Lane

Project Development Officer

I had a successful career as an English Lead Learning Support in secondary education for over 15 years, but during that time I had always drank heavily. I found that my drinking escalated over time and following a number of difficult life challenges I turned to alcohol more to manage my emotions. Eventually, I had to take voluntary redundancy.  

I lost all sense of purpose or routine and found myself alcohol dependent. I had spiralled into full blown addiction. I was being medicated for anxiety and depression and had developed irreparable nerve damage to my hands and feet, caused by extreme alcohol consumption. 

I was fortunate to get a place in the BAC O’Connor Rehabilitation centre, Burton-Upon-Trent in October 2020, which was where my recovery journey began. After spending eight weeks in residential rehabilitation I returned home but recognised that I would need to find recovery connections within my local area. 

I registered with Wolverhampton Voluntary Service (now WVCA) and was soon given the opportunity to volunteer at SUIT. Although my recovery was going well, I felt unemployable due to the widespread stigma around addiction and had lost my self-confidence. At SUIT, I was able to re-gain my confidence at a pace in which I felt safe. I was instantly welcomed into the team and was made to feel valued. The support I received allowed me to recognise that I had transferable skills and lived experience, qualities that have allowed me to support clients and volunteers. I was also given opportunities for training and development, specific to my needs and the volunteering role.  

At SUIT, I am surrounded by like-minded people also in recovery. It has made me feel normal and helped me to regain my self-respect. After volunteering for just over a year, I was fortunate enough to be offered employment as a Support Worker by SUIT. It is a vastly rewarding, dynamic, and often challenging role. The support given to me by the SUIT team has enabled me to maintain my recovery and get my life back on track. 

I went from feeling like an outsider, to someone who had found their tribe. The value of understanding that you get from someone who has experienced similar issues cannot be underestimated. 

Christiane Jenkins

Creative Arts and Research Lead

My role as Creative Arts & Research Lead with SUIT has opened opportunity to people traditionally sidelined from society by promoting the creative arts as an uncensored and free practice. Art provides a pure freedom of expression that people with complex experiences can embrace as a non-verbal form of communication. My mission, alongside the contributions of volunteers in my creative outreach team, opens opportunity to vulnerable people that they would never have received otherwise, and my position at SUIT embraces a new energy; one that embodies art & drama with a progressive and powerful attitude.

 

I’m almost 8 years into recovery, and have come a long way since walking into support services feeling exhausted, ashamed, and terrified. When I quit drink and drugs, I thought I was going to be missing out on something. But I didn’t realise what I was going to gain.

I found confidence when I started volunteering for SUIT in 2018, supported by peer-led staff and volunteers, and I was encouraged to take on a position of guidance to clients, providing advice and delivering outreach. It gave me worth and value knowing that my experiences, however difficult, could support others suffering as I had, and give them optimism and ambition.

Around this time, I decided to start an undergraduate degree at the University of Wolverhampton. I challenged myself, working past the panic attacks, depression, and feeling like I didn’t belong.  I graduated with a First with Honours, winning the Politics Prize and the Dean’s Award for Volunteering, continued on to my master’s where I graduated with a distinction and I’m now doing my PhD.

I believe that we need to challenge the current power balance by celebrating and reporting biographical, lived experience. Society can remove stigma by understanding the individual settings, relations and meanings of drug use that medical research overlooks.

Using art for support in recovery introduces vibrant and productive networks, environments, and opportunities. SUIT clients and volunteers take part in the annual Wolverhampton Literature Festival, Wolves Arts Festival, public art projects alongside Asylum Artist Quarter, community projects with the incredible Geese Theatre, Arts Council funded collaborations with the Good Shepherd’s Kate Penman, alongside a well-attended and established weekly art group.  

All forms of creativity help to communicate our complex journeys of addiction, recovery, and lived experience. The creative arts help us reflect; they contribute to purpose, happiness, and place value towards health, wellbeing, and recovery.

Appreciate connections & social interactions…we are not alone in our emotions

 

Cody Jenkins

Data Illustrator

I work as SUIT's Data illustrator, after volunteering for 6 months I was lucky enough to get a job as a Data Illustrator. A family member went through their recovery with SUIT so I saw firsthand the support given and how we here at SUIT help vulnerable people. In my job role I keep track of all the support we give to people and see how I can improve the efficiency of the office by tracking the amount of people we see and the amount of help we give out to people. I also provide IT support if anybody in the office needs it.

Charlotte Hawkes

Project Support Worker

Vijay Sahota

Punjabi Speaking Project Worker

Karolina Sowinska

Polish Speaking Project Worker

Matthew Whittall

Drug and Alcohol Liaison Team Project Worker

Richard Felton

Volunteer Support Worker

Volunteering for SUIT was the best choice I ever made. I have friendships and support in their community, and it has made my recovery from drink and cannabis use easier and more stable. I’m now almost 2 years drink and drug free! I want to say a huge thank you to my SUIT family, who deserve the highest praise for the important work they do.  

SUIT make recovery possible for everyone. I’m so grateful to be part of the team, changing lives for the better each day.    

Drew Scott

Volunteer Support Worker

I’m new to the SUIT team and have lived experience of addiction; I struggled for over 15 years with substance use, but I’m happy to say I’ve been in stable recovery since 2021. Volunteering at SUIT has given me worth and purpose. It’s a fantastic environment to develop and grow. I’m gaining confidence, unlocking skills I never knew I had, and using my knowledge to help others on their recovery journey.  

I started to write poetry early on in my recovery and regularly use creative writing to identify my feelings. I found it difficult to express my emotions to others and learnt that writing out my demons really helped me. Writing out my feelings with freedom is a way of discovering and understanding the person I am now.   

It can be hard work getting the know the person you are without the mask of drink and drugs. Writing has helped me get to know myself and understand what I need to lead a happy life.  

Sabrina Ellis

Volunteer Health and Wellbeing Coach

Hello everyone! I’m Sabrina, and I’m thrilled to be a part of the incredible team here at SUIT. Let me share a little about my journey with you.

From the tender age of 9, I stepped into the role of a caregiver for my mom, navigating the challenges of her dependency with alcohol amidst various life traumas. Back then, I didn’t realise I was a young carer I was just doing what I could to help my mom. Growing up, I faced the silent struggles of a disrupted home life, impacting on my mental health.

As an adult, I’ve channelled my experiences into training to be a Registered Mental Health Nurse and Work Psychologist and have become a founder of a non-profit organisation empowering people with a lived experience of mental health and additional needs to live their best lives. I support people to understand their strengths beyond a label.

Now as a volunteer at SUIT, I passionately facilitate a weekly support group for family members and loved ones at Recovery Near You. I also support fellow volunteers through their recovery, particularly those with mental health challenges or neurodevelopmental conditions such as Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia and more. My goal is to help individuals recognise their worth and live their best lives.

So here I am, excited to contribute to the wonderful work at SUIT fuelled by my passion to support those facing life’s challenges.