Troubled Teens Resources

Teen crisis intervention has become a familiar topic to the general public due to the popular A&E show, ‘Intervention’. And for most people, it is a drama that they would prefer to confine to the small screen. For those parents of teenagers caught up in teen drug abuse or alcoholism, the very idea of confronting their always sullen, often hostile teens is more than intimidating.

And it is if you go it alone. That is never advised. In fact, a great deal of counseling, talking, organizing and research goes into laying the groundwork for an intervention. The following example is an excerpt from one family’s intervention for their alcoholic father.

“Anyone who is close to the addicted person…can initiate an intervention. Typically, those involved will meet with a counselor to learn about their loved one’s addiction. Then they discuss how the addict’s behavior has affected them. This discussion helps everyone to focus on the consequences of addiction and not on judging or blaming the addicted person.
[…]
“First of all, we met for months with a social worker, Barry, who specialized in addiction counseling. We learned from him what alcoholism is all about. That’s really important, because it helped us understand what was going on with Dad.

“Then Barry got all of us to talk about how Dad’s alcoholism affected each of us. These stories helped us concentrate on what we wanted Dad to understand about what his alcoholism was doing to us. Barry explained that it was important that the intervention wouldn’t put Dad on the defensive. It wasn’t about calling Dad a bad person, it was just talking about how the alcoholism had affected the family.”
(source)