Troubled Teens Resources

The typical teen of today is being bombarded from every direction.  They are under pressure to perform academically, to complete responsibilities at home, to compete athletically, and the list goes on.  It is not a widely known fact that the teen of today is more up to date on current events than generations past.  Today’s teen is aware of global problems and conflicts, the economic devastation, and the political separation that our county is currently working through.  When you add the typical teen issues to the increased information that today’s teen is receiving it is no wonder today’s teen finally reaches a boiling point.   

The teen implosion can manifest itself in many ways.  Some teens will become withdrawn and possibly work themselves into a full blown depression.  Some teens will begin to look for ways to relieve some of the pressure they are experiencing through drug abuse.  Very few will seek out a parent for help and advice.  The most frequent form of help sought by a teen comes in the way of advice from their peers.  If a teen asks a friend that is abusing drugs for advice the advice they give will obviously be to try some drugs.  The teen may begin to experiment in sexual activities.  The best advice and help is obviously the teen’s parents but if the parent does not have a close relationship with their teen they will never come to them with their problems.  It is important that a parent is vigilante to their teens changes in attitudes and moods. 

Even a good teen left unassisted will begin the downward spiral until they earn the label of troubled teen.  The troubled teen may not have a Mohawk or any visible signs of rebellion.  It is usually not until the troubled teen has hit rock bottom and is basically crying out for attention that they will begin to display extreme hair and clothing styles.   One warning signal for parents for a child that is moving in a negative direction is their choice of friends.  If you observe that your teen is hanging with kids with radical hair styles or clothing choices, it is usually only a matter of time until your child begins to dress and act like the peers he is “hanging out” with.  It is naïve to think that a teen is associating with a group of troubled teens and not engaging in the same activities the negative peers are engaging in.

He graduated school with a 4.0. He was a star athlete, chess player and avid amateur video game designer. He did volunteer work, he tutored and hadn’t touched a drug in his life.

His parents had saved and saved to put him in the best college that they could find. They had just dropped him off on campus two weeks ago with promises of phone calls and a visit home no later than Thanksgiving. And they just received a phone call informing them that their son was dead.

He hadn’t been shot, hadn’t been run over and didn’t suffer a collapse pursuing a sport. He had drunk himself to death.

Be it ignorance about the toxic properties in alcohol or the sense of inviolability present in youth, such an exemplary young man who had always exhibited such common sense can, in one raucous, out of control night, end his life.

Sometimes it isn’t a troubled teen that dies. Sometimes it isn’t drug abuse that snatches a young life. Sometimes it is simple ignorance combined with the exuberance of youth that can take away a child from parents and family forever.

Educate yourself and educate your at-risk teens not only about the consequences of drug abuse, but also about the fatal affects of one night of alcohol abuse.

Here is some basic info from Health Library Home

What Is Binge Drinking?

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, binge drinking, or heavy episodic drinking, is defined as:

• five or more drinks per sitting for males
• four or more drinks per sitting for females

Frequent binge drinking is three or more occurrences of this type of drinking per two weeks.

It should be noted, however, that the terms above are general. The size of the drink, body weight of the drinker, and length of time during the drinking experience are not taken into consideration in this definition. The assumption here is that drinking occurs within a short period of time (a few hours or less) and leads to alcohol intoxication.
Some Facts About Binge Drinking

• Binge drinking often begins around the age of 13. It tends to increase during adolescence, peak in young adulthood (ages 18-22) and then gradually decrease. (Source: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration)
• 44% of college students were classified as binge drinkers in 2001. (Source: Harvard School of Public Health, College Alcohol Study)
• One in three college students drinks primarily to get drunk. (Source: American Academy of Pediatrics)
• Students who live in a fraternity or sorority house are the heaviest drinkers. Eighty-six percent of fraternity residents and 80% of sorority residents report binge drinking. (Source: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration)
• Nearly 30,000 college students are treated for alcohol overdose each year. (Source: American College of Emergency Physicians)

Britney Spears. As parents anguish over the decision to
employ some kind of crisis intervention for their troubled teen, this former teen star flagrantly throws away the opportunity for a drug and alcohol intervention program that most parents would give their right arm to be able to afford.But there is a lesson to be learned from this sad soap opera. The teen must actually be “in crisis”.

In real life, depending on what parents can endure and afford, most troubled teenagers only have one, maybe two chances at most,to turn their lives around. There are no body guards running interference for the normal struggling teen, no chauffeured car to prevent the drunken teen from driving and no exclusive intervention program with revolving doors. Out of control behavior does not reward the average teen ager. In fact, most often,it scars them for life - if it doesn’t kill them.

For everyday folks, there are consequences and for all the sad spectacle that Britney Spears creates for herself day in and out, there have yet to be any real consequences. Not yet. Not as long as she suffers no loss or enduring pain. There are no ugly arrests nor has family services taken her children away. There are just interludes of supposed intervention between parties. And perhaps that is saddest of all. Sometimes deep pain and catastrophic loss are the most extreme interventions life can devise. Hopefully, Britney wakes up before she reaches that point of no return.

If ordinary teens with  limited access to any type of intervention or drug therapy can find their way, surely Miss Spears can as well.

The focus when considering your teenager’s drug abuse will naturally be on their emotional, psychological and spiritual states. Often times, the not readily apparent physical ramifications of ingesting what, in essence are toxins, can be overlooked. More often than not, a teenage drug abuser can mask the deleterious effects of drug consumption. The “highs” that teenagers so ardently seek out can also camouflage the toll and drain that the body endures processing these chemicals. One immediately thinks of consequences to the liver.

Detox is a necessary part of the process.

When looking at various substance abuse treatment programs for your addicted teenager, you will find a variety of programs that include detoxifying the body as a step in their treatment process. One such variation is the Narconon® New Life Detoxification Program.

“While drugs and their metabolites quickly become undetectable in blood and urine, some as rapidly as 3 days after last usage,drug metabolites remain stored in fatty tissues for years. That accumulated drug residues continue to cause adverse symptoms led L. Ron Hubbard to develop a program aimed at reducing levels of toxins in the body to assist in recovery.

The New Life Detoxification Program utilizes a combination of exercise, induced sweating in a sauna, and nutritional supplements to produce the following results.”

• Reduction or elimination of drug and alcohol cravings.
• Reduction or elimination of many symptoms associated with drug addiction and alcoholism. These can include depression, irritability, and fatigue.
• Ability to think more clearly.
• Improved memory and attention span.
• Increased energy.
• Increased sense of well being.
• Enthusiasm toward Life.

Such a program can be designed by the teenager’s physician and therapist as well. The point is to heal mind, spirit, and body, assuring a firmer purchase on sobriety as the troubled teenager progresses from rehab into a renewed life.

Putting the Pieces Together:Toward a Motivational Understanding of Change
• Miller and Rollnick suggest that one way to put together
this puzzle is to “think of motivation as fundamental to
change.”
• There is reason to believe this, since clients’ motivation
to change is often a good predictor of outcome.
• Motivation can be influenced by many naturally
occurring interpersonal and intrapersonal factors, and
by specific interventions.
• It seems particularly sensitive to interpersonal
communication styles.
• Effective brief interventions appear too short to teach
new skills or alter personality, but that they can change
motivation. (pg 2)(PDF)

The above is from a PDF found on WIRED, an excellent site that “… developed as a way of empowering people to tackle problems caused by substance use.” It is based out of the UK, very well organized, offering a bit of a different perspective on varying methods of working with the teen in crisis, and replete with small vignettes featuring both parents and teens alike finding their way through the mine fields of substance abuse, intervention and treatment. Reading these, embattled teenagers stand a chance of catching a glimpse of themselves in the words of their peers.

This statement is particularly interesting :

“ Effective brief interventions appear too short to teach
new skills or alter personality, but that they can change
motivation“

‘Brief interventions’ may seem futile when dealing with an addicted or abusing teen, but cumulatively, they rip a hole in the fabric of denial that blinds a teen to their own downward spiral. They can pierce the hardness of heart, if only briefly, that typifies an addict’s self defense. They can be very simple things, an introduction of new paradigms, comparable to planting seeds, that will bear harvest later as the teen heals.

“...they can change the motivation.” A small intervention may be something as simple as allowing your struggling teen to see and hear himself in the stories of other teenagers. There are some brutally honest stories and confession of use and abuse on the Moments of Truth Board on the Check Yourself site.

And here is another seed to plant. A quiz your teenager can take to assess the extent of his pot problem. Perhaps a series of “small interventions” will hold the worst wolves at bay until the addicted teen finds his way back home.

1. Has smoking pot stopped being fun?

2. Do you ever get high alone?

3. Is it hard for you to imagine a life without marijuana?

4. Do you find that your friends are determined by your marijuana use?

5. Do you smoke marijuana to avoid dealing with your problems?

6. Do you smoke pot to cope with your feelings?

7. Does your marijuana use let you live in a privately defined world?

8. Have you ever failed to keep promises you made about cutting down or controlling your dope smoking?

9. Has your use of marijuana caused problems with memory, concentration, motivation?

10. When your stash is nearly empty, do you feel anxious or worried about how to get more?

11. Do you plan your life around your marijuana use?

12. Have friends or relatives ever complained that your pot smoking is damaging your relationship with them?

Sweet sorrow. A parent understands that term well. The day you put your 5 year old on the bus for their first day at school. The first swim lesson, the first athletic competition. The first dance.
Every milestone brings joy, gratitude and sweet sorrow of knowing that each step taken is a step taken away from the circle of your care.

And then there is the first car.

National Fatality and Injury Statistics

Leading Cause of Death for Teenagers

* Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death among American teenagers, killing between 5,000 and 6,000 teenagers every year for the past decade (through 2003, the last year for which complete NHTSA data is available)
* From 1994 to 2003, a total of 57,142 teenagers were killed in motor vehicle crashes.
* Teenage drivers account for only 6.4 percent (12.5 million) of the total drivers in the United States , but account for 14 percent of all drivers involved in fatal crashes and 18 percent involved in police-reported crashes.
* No other kind of hazard comes close to claiming as many teenage lives, including teenage homicides (14 percent) and suicides (11 percent).
(source)

It has been said of the so called boomer generation that they too often attempt to be buddies with their teenagers. A certain nonchalance towards alcohol abuse can often be observed. Perfectly sincere but ill advised parents allow teenage drinking in their homes. For some, alcohol is somehow not a substance as menacing as pot, a six pack is less threatening than a crack pipe.

Stories such as the tragic account of Jacqueline Saburido, pictured above, belie those notions. Alcohol is an addictive substance, easily subject to abuse, with the ramifications often more immediate and severe. Teen age substance abuse can be curbed if consequences are not hidden and responsibility is taught.

If your teenager is unfamiliar with the Jacqueline Saburido story, the Austin American Statesman has written a remarkable piece that delivers the message home painfully well. I’d suggest that it be required reading for every teenager.

Here is an excerpt:

At a distance Jacqui looks old. Up close, ageless.

She has a baggy neckchin and thin crumpled lips. Her cheeks are splotchy and rough in places, smooth in others.

Where her right ear should be, she has a slender crescent of cartilage around a pea-size black hole. On the left side, she has only a hole.

Her nostrils are ragged, torn. A flap of skin hides her left eye. For more than two years, the eyeball floated naked in the socket, mostly blind but perpetually staring behind a clear plastic goggle. Her right eye sees behind a veil of scar.

Her burned skin can’t sweat or protect her from heat and cold. It feels hot and tight, like having a sunburn.

Scars run down her body, halting at her knees and before her size 7 1/2 feet, which the fire never touched. She has learned to use her feet like hands — her toes stroke a blanket’s softness and test shower water.

Her fingers are amputated between the knuckle and the first joint. On her right hand, they are fused together like a mitten.

Nerve damage has left parts of her body numb. She can make out some texture with the bottom of her right palm. Her left hand feels only pinpricks — “like a thousand needles,” she says. Her hands hurt every day, but Jacqui doesn’t take painkillers.

She likes to touch, clasping strangers’ hands with her palms. With friends, she steps forward.

“Hug me tightly,” she whispers. “I won’t break.”
David Hafetz
American-Statesman

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Your teenager:” Tonight’s gonna be hot. I’m having some cupcakes and, I think my body needs some Vitamin K”

Teenaged friend: “Dude - you stacking it? Man that’s gonna take an interplanetary mission. I’ll just stick with number 9. Glad I just got an ice cream habit, I’d be broke dude.”

If you overheard your teenager in the above dialog, you wouldn’t be listening to a discussion about diet. In fact, those basically nonsensical string of words probably wouldn’t register with most parents.

But if your teen’s conversations with friends are frequently interspersed with unusual words or phrases, I’d suggest you start Googling.

Substance abuse will educate your teenagers in the methods of stealth and secrecy. Often times,drug or alcohol abuse will have been going on for months before a parent recognizes something is off with their teenager.

It does a parent good to be prepared to recognize the signs of substance abuse long before even a hint of possible drug use surfaces. The signs and clues are there and the parent of a troubled teen simply needs to be aware of the language of addiction.

Below is a drug vocabulary test. Can you translate what these terms mean?

• Cupcakes
• Stacking
• Vitamin K
• ice cream habit
• interplanetary mission
• Kleenex
• Brewery
• Number 9
• Bumblebees
• Gangster

“The Adolescent Substance Abuse Knowledge Base will go far to furthering a parents education.

“When it comes to teen substance abuse, it seems like we’re always playing catch up. Anytime a new drug hits the streets, its popularity soars, and we find ourselves fighting against it. At the same time, drugs that have been around for years sometimes rise sharply and unexpectedly in popularity. Why is that? There seems to be no rhyme or reason to either the increase, or decrease, in drug use among teens. Though certain trends have been discovered over the years, the cause of those trends seems a mystery.”

See how you did on your drug vocabulary quiz here.