Troubled Teens Resources

Parents researching schools for troubled teens are naturally apprehensive. How to discern good advice from bad, how to determine which programs being offered are appropriate for their teen’s issues? Should the school be close to home, or far away? What will their insurance cover? How often will they see their teens? Is there follow up?

Teen Options offers an informative podcast that will help parents sort through their options. In fact, all of Troubled Teen Resource’s sites are replete with information for parents of troubled teens. But how do you evaluate the staff? These are the people who will study the teens in their charge in order to motivate, counsel and instruct them. What constitutes a good leader for youth?

Just so happens, I’ve run into some suggestions for that answer:

“…the five characteristics present in those who most effectively work with young people:

• they see genuine potential in youth.
• They put youth at the center of their programs.
• They believe they can make a difference with youth.
• They feel they are contributing to the community something they owe.
• They are “unyieldingly authentic.”

(source)

Having worked with youth, and long ago, having been one of those youth who were “worked with”, I can vouch for the desirability of the above traits. Authenticity can permeate even the most determined defenses. Teens may yet resist what they are being taught, but they have an instinct for detecting hypocrisy, at least they do when they take measure of those who will tell them how they need to live.

Likewise, passion for youth is almost mandatory, and you’ll find evidence of that passion in the resumes of the counselors and teachers at professionally staffed schools.

Teen crisis intervention typically targets troubled teens. A new program circulating through the nation targets the parents of those teens. Many parents simply have no clue what to look for beyond easily recognized drug paraphanilia, such as pipes and bongs.

Some parents are very removed from anything to do with teen drug abuse because they can’t imagine their own teens using. Word to the wise - all teens are at risk and parents need to be drug educated regardless of how confident they are that their teen is “clean”.

“The program featured a mock bedroom of a teenage drug user and around 70 items or indicators were placed throughout it. Parents had the opportunity to walk through and try to identify possible signs of drug use.

In addition the Department of Public Safety provided a teenage drug user’s car exhibit out in front of the high schools so parents could also find possible signs there too.
[…]
“Our goal is that hopefully a parent will see something during the event and a voice inside their head will be screaming to them that something is not right. Even if we just reach one parent, that could be one teen that we save,” Teresa Burnett said.

Gregory Flores, of Port Arthur, admitted he has always had little knowledge as to what drugs are out there, but feels he is not alone.

“It’s alarming. I knew kids were doing some of this. After seeing all the ways that they can hide what they are doing shows that they are smart, but we need to get them focused on being smart in school,” he said. “Parents also need to educate themselves so that they can see what is really going on.”

(source)

Teen age drug abuse, a huge issue in and of itself, is but a symptom of a general troubled teens’ emotional malaise that can manifest in other harmful practices besides just drug consumption. One group of teens dwell in the nether worlds of a sub-culture known as Emos. If you haven’t heard of Emos, you’ll perhaps have heard of “cutting” or self-harm, a practice that is at the heart of this sad, self-absorbed group of teens who choose darkness over light, tragedy over hope.

“One of the most annoying characteristics.. is their refusal to open their curtains. Their world is dark and airless.

If this environment is coupled with the psychological traits of self-pity, introspection, self-dramatisation and hormone imbalance, you have a fully-fledged Emo…”

More or less, Emo teens are the offspring of the Goth culture, participants of which are noted for their fixation on black, death and morbidity. The difference, however, is that Emo’s have as a centerpiece of their world a fixation with hurting themselves.

“The Emos - short for Emotional - regard themselves as a cool, young sub-set of the Goths.

Although the look is similar, the point of distinction, frightening for schools and parents, is a celebration of self harm.

Emos exchange competitive messages on their teenage websites about the scars on their wrists and how best to display them. Girls’ secondary schools have for some time been concerned about the increase in self harm.

One governor of a famous boarding school told me that it was as serious a problem as binge drinking, but rarely discussed for fear of encouraging more girls to do it.”
(source)

Related:

• Private Boarding Schools for Depressed Teen Girls
  

If you overhear one of your teens talking about some good “skunk”, they were not referring to the animal of that name. An obstacle that those who fight against teenage drug abuse must continually overcome is the notion that marijuana is a harmless recreational drug, without any lasting ill side effects. However, if you read about troubled teens and drugs a good deal, you’ll have noticed more and more mention of reports surfacing in Great Britain that suggest otherwise. Potent weed is referred to as “skunk” and it isn’t your father’s marijuana anymore.

“The devastating effects of skunk cannabis on the nation’s mental health are revealed here for the first time, showing where the drug has hit hardest around the country.

Some areas have suffered a tenfold increase in people mentally ill from using the drug.

Nationally, skunk smokers are ending up ill in hospital in record numbers, with admissions soaring 73 per cent. The number of adults recorded as suffering mental illness as a result of cannabis use has risen sharply from 430 in 1996 to 743 in 2006.

The government data shows how the damaging effects of the drug have swept across England…as the debate over the drug’s dangers continues, figures released by the National Treatment Agency for Substance Abuse (NTA) show that more than 24,500 people are in drug treatment programmes for cannabis – the highest ever.

It is the most commonly misused drug by children, accounting for 75 per cent of those requiring treatment. That’s 11,582 under-18s – more than double those in treatment for cannabis abuse in 2005.

And more adults (13,087) are in drug treatment programmes for cannabis abuse than for crack or cocaine.”
(source)

It is amazing that childhood remedies - simple medicines designed to alleviate the discomforts of the common cold, are now a target in the campaign against teen age drug abuse. But when troubled teens are determined to get high, they will find any possible method available to do so.

DXM is the primary ingredient in cough medicines that teens seek as an intoxicant. It can be found in your medicine shelf and at your local drug store. But as parents wise up and start putting these simple medicines under lock and key, as are drug stores, teens are simply turning to the internet.

“There are a number of disreputable websites that provide “how-to” guides to get high off of DXM. These sites include information recommending how much DXM to use, suggest other drugs to combine with DXM, provide instructions on how to extract DXM from cough medicines, promote drug abuse in general, and even offer for purchase a raw, unfinished form of DXM for snorting.”

Recent legislation passed in the house,the Dextromethorphan Distribution Act of 2007, is designed to thwart the sale of bulk DMX.

“In 2005, two teenagers in my district died after overdosing on unfinished DXM they bought on the Internet,” said Congressman Rick Larsen. “The loss of these children is a tragedy that will be forever felt by their families and communities. We cannot continue to allow this dangerous drug to be only a click of the mouse away from our homes and our children. I urge the Senate to act quickly and approve this common sense measure to protect our kids.”
(source)

There is teen crisis intervention for drugs, alcohol, sexual offenses and robbery. But there really isn’t a program that specifically addresses how to make a teen comprehend the value of a life. It seems sort of self-evident to most of us and in times past, teens understood that killing another human being was a serious line to cross. Not so much anymore.

“Researcher John DiIulio Jr. from the University of Pennsylvania talked of juvenile facilities where “the buzz of impulsive violence, the vacant stares and smiles, and the remorseless eyes were at once too frightening and too depressing”.

These are observations made in the nineties when it was predicted that a new type of teen criminal was on the rise, the “superpredators.” Well, they are emerging, not when predicted, but now, in the new century, when you would have thought that crime associated with out-of-control and troubled teens would have diminished.

“Corzine divides juvenile offenders into three groups — those who can turn their lives around, those who most closely resemble DiIulio’s superpredators, and those on the bubble. The superpredators, or violent repeat offenders, comprise less than 10 percent of juvenile criminals.

We could all agree to lock them up. But a state study indicates that for other young offenders, adult prisons may only make them more prone to become violent once released.

Getting too tough can turn a salvageable kid into a hardened felon.

But not getting tough enough can turn loose a superpredator who will blow away a store clerk for $35.”
(source)

The first and foremost objective of effective teen crisis intervention is prevention. The best weapon in the prevention arsenal is information. Teen Transitions accomplishes both by disseminating information to adolescents in transition from middle school to high school. Given that data suggests that kids start using drugs and drinking as early as middle school, they might have to move this program back to elementary school.

Troubled teens grow right in front of your eyes. They had no more intention of becoming classified as troubled than their parents had expectations that they would become trouble. The earlier a teen learns the power of choice in forming their lives, the better chance that teen has of steering clear of destructive behavior.

It is continually repeated in reports on juveniles that they actually do value what a parent advises, even if they appear to dismiss it. Helping a teen to understand the nature of drugs, alcohol and addiction provides him viable defenses against peer pressure. Making it clear to the teen how absolutely adamant you are that they never use gives them the stability and assurance of clear boundaries, even if they moan and groan about the restraints.

“Entering high school can be an exciting but challenging time for teenagers and their parents,” said Heather Fortin, a social worker at the high school. “The goal of Transitions 2007 is to bring parents and teens together to focus on important issues, increase awareness of what teens may be facing today, and ultimately open the door to future discussions in the home.”
(source)

It seems like a long road from a teenager worried about their weight to becoming a teenager sentenced to time in schools for troubled teens. Unfortunately, in a culture that puts extreme value on personal appearance, those teens who feel that their body just doesn’t cut it will often use drastic measures to meet the standard that they imagine they must reach.

Unfortunately, some troubled teens will seek to lose weight as quickly as possible and therein lays the path to possible behavioral problems later on. That is because the fastest track to losing weight that many teens seek are amphetamines, or other stimulant drugs that can spin the teen out of control.

“In a five-year study of more than 2,500 teenagers, researchers found that 44 percent of girls and 29 percent of boys were overweight, habitual binge-eaters or had taken unhealthy measures to lose weight — such as abusing laxatives, using diet pills or vomiting.

In many cases, these problems overlapped. Among overweight girls, 40 percent reported binge-eating, extreme dieting or both…

“We usually look for these behaviors in very thin girls, but here we see a very high prevalence in overweight girls…
What’s more, she and her colleagues found, some of the same factors seemed to underlie the risks of becoming overweight, binge-eating or taking extreme measures to shed pounds.

In particular, being teased by a family member appeared to raise the risk of all three problems in girls…
Among the other risk factors were preoccupation with weight, having a mother who dieted, and frequently reading magazine articles on weight loss.”

(source)

Teen age drug abuse can be fought using huge sweeping media campaigns, such as the barrage of anti-meth commercials and programs sweeping across many states in the West, or, it can be fought by making six beds available to teen meth users crippled by their addiction. All efforts, small or large, are critical in fighting this particularly insidious drug.

So this Salvation Army’s outreach of six beds here and another dozen here may not seem like much, they are just as valuable as multi-million dollar ad campaigns for the troubled teens whose lives are impacted.

“The Salvation Army in Victoria, BC has opened a new residential treatment program for drug-addicted youth.

Beacon of Hope House is located in the manse of St. Saviour’s Anglican Church in Victoria West, and it has room six male addicts, each with his own bedroom. Two staff members are on duty at all times, so that supervision is continuous, and clients are not allowed outside without accompanying staff.

The Salvation Army hopes to have a similar facility for females within eighteen months.”
(source)

Unlike other drugs, meth can take it’s addictive grip rapidly. And the downward spiral of the addict is just as rapid. More to the point, recovery is a very hard for the meth addict to maintain. Programs like that above are necessary because they offer the addict a means to separate themselves from their addiction while gaining ways and strength to fight it once they are out of treatment.

Troubled teens constantly harp about how they want to be trusted and treated more like adults. So it is ironic to read about the many colleges that have been forced to establish stringent controls on alcohol consumption on campus. It is because incoming students appear to still need about as much teen crisis intervention as a freshman in high school - or so their obsession with binge drinking would indicate.

One example is Rider University where binge drinking brought about the death of a co-ed last year. A night of ingesting vanilla vodka and beer took this student to an alcohol level five times the limit. Her friends had left her to “sleep it off”.They found her body the next morning.

“Even before classes began, the school’s 3,700 students were learning about the school’s tougher stance. Alcohol has been banned on campus, with the exception of certain areas like a pub in the student union. Freshmen must take a seminar on the dangers of drinking. So-called watchdogs now reside in fraternity and sorority houses. There are new penalties for those who break the rules.

Previously, students were given up to two warnings for alcohol possession or intoxication before their parents were notified. Parents now will be notified immediately, and students will be required to complete an alcohol education program or face expulsion.

Students who were interviewed on campus said they were keenly aware of changes in the university’s alcohol policy. Freshmen described sitting through a 90-minute lecture on the dangers of alcohol and agreeing in writing to make good decisions.”
(source)