September 3rd, 2007 by Ann Walker
The most powerful form of teen crisis intervention is when a former addict uses their life as a testimony to the power of choice and the possibility for change. In terms of intervention in the lives of those troubled teenagers that are caught up in gangs, it is extremely effective for them to hear from one of their own who succeeded in escaping gang life. Leaving drugs and crime is one thing. Leaving a gang is another proposition.
“…eventually the life of a gang member wore on him. And on his family. He tried leaving the gang, but leaving a gang is like leaving a cult, Lilly said. The members are brainwashed. One night, men jumped him and beat him for trying to leave.
“I had a blood clot in my head from the beating,” said Lilly, now 31. “My eyes were so swollen I couldn’t see.”
Through the beating and other incidents, Lilly saw his mother Janet’s disappointment.
“She came to the hospital every day crying,” Lilly said. “And she left every day crying. I realized I had to make a change. It’s a terrible thing to shatter a mother’s dreams.”
Lilly returned to running, an early passion in life. He did it minus the use of one leg, an old gang shooting had deprived him of his other one. He has gone on to become a world class athlete.
“Lilly is now a professional wheelchair racer and motivational speaker. He speaks to kids about the importance of choices.
“I tell them life is about what kinds of choices you make, and how your choices will affect you for the rest of your life,” Lilly said before the race began in Fairbanks last Friday. “I’m a living example of that.”
(Source)
Relevant Tags:crisis intervention, drugs and crime, gang life, gang member, teen crisis intervention, teen crisis, troubled teenagers, wheelchair racer, world class athlete
April 20th, 2007 by Ann Walker
What happens when a teenager never breaks free of drugs? They function, they graduate, and all the while they fall in and out of substance abuse. They are functioning addicts. Typically, at some point, an addict will hit bottom and turn their lives around. As hard as it is for a teen to hit bottom, they have far less to loose than what they will loose as an adult with a business and family.
Though the concentration of this site focuses on teen crisis intervention, addicted adults often began as functioning teen addicts and the teen crisis migrates into a chronic adult crisis. Ex-user,convict,and ex gang member Ronnie Kaplan is making a lot of money keeping these, now, fuctioning adult addicts on the straight and narrow.
“He is 36 and successful, the owner of a high-tech company who also finances music and film productions. But sometimes, in the middle of the night, he’s assaulted by nightmares and cold sweats. That’s when he reaches for the phone to call Ronnie Kaplan.
“I get there and I sit him down and relax his mind,” Kaplan said. “I ask him ‘What brought this on?’ It’s always something.” Once they figure out the trigger, “It’s over.”
“It” is the drug craving. The businessman is a drug addict, and Kaplan is a sober companion, a combination big brother, baby sitter and spiritual guide who uses motivation, prayer and exercise to keep his clients away from alcohol and drugs.”
There is no magical boundary between the age 19 and the age 20, just like there is nothing between age 12 and age 13. We are horrified as drug use drops down below age 13, but there is horror also to be had for those teens that enter adulthood still struggling with a demon that they can’t kill and that hasn’t yet killed them.
Drug addiction is for life. If only the 12 year old could understand that.
Relevant Tags:alcohol and drugs, crisis intervention, drug addict, drug addiction, drug craving, drug use, gang member, teen crisis intervention, teen crisis
