Mum shakes heroin habit after viral overdose photo inspires recovery
A US mother has shared a photo from when she was a drug addict to celebrate one year of sobriety.
The chilling photo shows Erika Hurt passed out in the front seat of her car in Indiana with a syringe in her hand.
At the time the photo was taken of her near-fatal heroin overdose, her infant son was asleep in the back of the car.
The photo was taken by a police officer just before medics revived her with a shot of Narcan.
"I've seriously debated for the past month, on whether I should repost such a painful picture displaying the absolute worst moment of my life," Ms Hurt wrote alongside the photo on Facebook.
"I've decided to repost the picture simply because it displays exactly what heroin addiction is.
"Also because I do not want to ever forget where the road of addiction has taken me. Little did I know that day, my life was about to change, drastically."
On the weekend, Ms Hurt celebrated a year of sobriety, a journey that began after she saw that photo.
The officer who took the photo, Marshal Matt Tallent, says he wanted to raise awareness of the dangers of heroin and what it can do to a person.
"For this girl to have her life ripped up and then come back and be sober after everything that's happened to her, that's a story of success," Tallent said.
Couple 'on heroin' pass out with four-year-old in the backseat
Toddler taken into care after pair found passed out in car with child, drugs
Ms Hurt's addiction began when she contracted a staph infection when she was just 15 and was prescribed pain killers.
She became addicted and eventually took to heroin, stealing to feed her habit.
She says she managed to stop when she got pregnant and stayed clean through to the December 2015 birth of her son, Parker.
It wasn't long until she relapsed.
Ms Hurt made it just two weeks in rehab and returned home last October.
She bought a packet of heroin but didn't get high until the next day, when she was driving around town with her son asleep in his car seat.
She pulled into the parking lot of a Dollar General Store and shot up.
Ms Hurt remembers coming to in an ambulance and learned that heroin had been laced with morphine.
She went from hospital to jail and during that time, the photo was released to local media.
Australia's east coast set to be battered by intense storm cell
Mother mauled to death by pet dog was trying to protect friend
Razor blades hidden in returned same-sex marriage survey envelope
It went viral.
"I was so hurt and embarrassed. I had no clue that the picture had even been taken," Ms Hurt told NBC.
"But at the same time, it was kind of a really big eye opener to see myself like that."
Ms Hurt says today, she's "able to focus on the good that came from that picture".
"Today, I am a mother to my son, again," she wrote on Facebook.
"Today, I am able to be grateful to actually have solid proof where addiction will only lead you, and today I am able to say that I am ONE YEAR SOBER!"
Ms Hurt ended up pleading guilty to neglect of a dependent and was given a two-year suspended jail sentence that required her to go to an inpatient drug rehab program at the jail.
She signed temporary custody of her son over to her mother.
When the inpatient program ended, Ms Hurt was allowed to live at her mother's under house arrest.
She was reunited with Parker, who will turn two in December, and found a job in a plastic moulding plant.
