On International Women’s Day 2026, the Scottish Recovery Consortium brought people together for a dedicated session focused on Women in Recovery — a space to reflect on the work so far, share learning, and continue shaping what meaningful, gender‑responsive recovery support looks like in Scotland.
The session formed part of our wider Women in Recovery programme, which has been building over the past year through a combination of research, engagement, and collective learning. It was an opportunity to bring all of that together — connecting evidence, lived and living experience, and practice.
Throughout the session, we shared the journey of this work so far. This has included a rapid evidence review, a growing body of engagement with women across Scotland, and deeper exploration of how policies do — and don’t — respond to women’s needs. What has become clear through each stage is that women’s experiences of substance use and recovery are often shaped by multiple, overlapping factors, and cannot be understood in isolation.
Conversations on the day reflected this complexity. Key areas of focus included the impact of child removal, domestic abuse, justice involvement, menopause, gambling, and neurodiversity, and how these experiences connect directly to recovery journeys. Across all of these themes, one message remained consistent: recovery systems must become more trauma‑informed, gender‑responsive, and rooted in lived experience.
A particularly important part of the session looked at how we move beyond traditional research approaches and ensure that women’s voices are not just included, but actively shape the evidence itself. Learning from international approaches such as Photovoice highlighted the power of women telling their own stories — not only as a form of personal recovery, but as a way to influence systems, challenge stigma, and create meaningful change.
Alongside the presentations, participants generously shared a wide range of resources, research, and learning materials through the chat. We’ve included these below so others can explore them:
🔗 Resources shared during the session
- https://youtu.be/w5WdM2bsZ9k?si=rXbkOecHe86yf8FQ
- https://www.youthlink.scot/policy-influence/research/youth-led-research/imagine-a-man/
- https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/
- Shaw A, Reith G and Pickering L (2022) Paying Attention to Women’s Ageing Bodies in Recovery From Substance Use. Frontiers in Psychiatry
- https://aila-scotland.co.uk/
- https://www.neurodiversityweek.com/events-2026
- https://www.aberlour.org.uk/publications/gendered-nature-public-debt
- https://bymyside.simonscotland.org/filters
- https://www.shaap.org.uk/publication/cultivating-cultural-recovery-pathways-for-black-and-asian-communities-in-scotland/
- https://www.mcas-scotland.co.uk/about_us
- https://haveawordwithyourself.co.uk/whispers-from-the-heart/
- https://www.aberlour.org.uk/publications/aberlours-families-voices-project-report
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybcGb8oZqCc
These resources reflect the breadth of knowledge and experience within the room — from academic research and policy reports to lived experience projects and community‑led work.
If you weren’t able to join us on the day, you can download the full presentation below to explore the detail and learning that was shared:
👉 Download the Women in Recovery – International Women’s Day 2026 presentation
This session marked another important step in SRC’s ongoing commitment to ensuring that women’s experiences of recovery are visible, understood, and acted upon. The work continues — through research, partnership, and, most importantly, through listening to women themselves.
