SCENARIO: You suspect your teenage kid may be using marijuana or drugs

[UdoKier]

This question is provoked by the fact that I have noticed that pharmacies are now selling drug test kits that are clearly aimed at parents who want to test their teens. I have a major problem with this approach for several reasons. First, some amount of experimentation during the teen years is NORMAL - DEAL WITH IT!, Second drug testing kids (especially surreptitiously) shows an appalling lack of trust, and does nothing to help equip them for adult life, when nobody will be there to police them and make sure they fly right. Last there is the equation in the minds of many of marijuana with other, more dangerous narcotic drugs - it is an her that grows in the ground, people!



How do you expect your kids to show responsibility, when you don't show any trust in their ability to do the right thing?


SCENARIO: You suspect your teenage kid may be using marijuana or drugs.

What do you do?

[mr blur]

1. Just a point, but,

when you say "him" I guess you mean "him"/"her"?

(edit for sp.)

[UdoKier]

4. Yes.

But I get sick of writing that. It's understood and him/her is so inelegant. Besides, it's usually boys that are being drug tested. It's ALWAYS a boy with a backward baseball cap on the package...

[Kazak]

15. I use...

s/he. It's a little simpler.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

6. Seriously though...

if anyone's self esteem is truly diminished because someone didn't use "him/her", I think that person needs help in other areas of their life first. It's really not a big deal.

[mr blur]

31. No, it's not a big deal,

and my self-esteem is fine. I just wondered, actually, if there was a feeling that it was boys who were more likely - for whatever reason - to get involved with drugs. Or whether boys were more likely to be targeted by drugs tests. That's all.

[UdoKier]

2. I'm about 100% sure that the results would be the opposite...

If I had posted this at FreakRepukelick.

They think that people are inherently evil and would drug-test their kid in a second.

[m_welby]

3. definitely other

..well, first of all I wouldn't drug test the kids, but that being said if I found out my child was on drugs I'd do what the local police do, give them a talking to and confiscate it (now I wonder what to do with it after that?)...lol

Seriously, my kids are more likely to suspect me of doing drugs and test me. Besides, if i couldn't tell without a drug test that my kid was wasted I would have to have forgotten way too much of my youth.

[UdoKier]

10. I would make a strong distinction between "drugs" and marijuana.

I personally don't use MJ, but I tried it enough during HS and college, and have read enough about it that I don't believe it to be dangerous. I don't mind my kids experimenting a bit, so long as they know how to behave responsibly. My wife and I don't smoke and seldom drink, so hopefully, we've set a good example.

[ET Awful]

5. You forgot about a choice for . . .

"You find out his connection because all of yours dried up years ago." :evilgrin:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

8. LOL, turn your kid into your hookup.

Great idea. New reason to have kids! :evilgrin:

[Swamp Rat]

16. LOL! n/t

[mongo]

19. Ya know, that not a bad idea....

Ha!

[LynzM]

7. Good question, and also...

I voted #3, because that's what I'd do. But some of these tests are also aimed at people who want to make sure they're clean before they get company-drug tested. Not that that invalidates your question, just another tidbit...

[UdoKier]

12. In case of the urine tests, yes.

But I'm pretty sure that the hair tests are used by suspicious parents, mostly.

[immoderate]

14. That's what I did.

I tested myself, and used the home drug test to test the masking agent that I bought at the head shop.

I used Xxtra Clean, expensive, but it worked.

--IMM

[RevolutionaryActs]

9. As a teenager, if you go behind your kids back you're violating all trust

and alienating them. If you talk to us about drugs, in a frank way, from the beginning. We'll listen.

If you go behind our backs, we will feel we can't trust you. Then if we do make a mistake(which will happen, because we're human) and something goes wrong, we won't call you and ask for help, because that trust is gone.

Well, that's just how I feel anyway. :)


Edited for clarity.

[Kazak]

11. Wait. Marijuana? Or, drugs?

Big diff in my book.

Also, piss tests (which I believe is what they sell at the drug stores, right, not hair tests?) aren't really effective in testing for much of anything other than marijuana. Big whoop.

[UdoKier]

I think they sell both.

The hair test can be done surreptitiously. It may be that you have to collect the hair and send it to a lab.

[m0nkeyneck]

13. tell them 2 share ;-)

[Swamp Rat]

17. I was thinking, take her/his stash and bus'up!

:smoke:

... psych!!! :D

[Solly Mack]

18. I ground him for not sharing

Duh...

[aeolian]

20. Well...

I'd take said offspring to a club downtown some night. Then I'd do a nature-documentary type thing:

"that's a coke-head. you don't want to be like that."

"that's a crackhead. I don't have to tell you that you don't want to be like that."

"Over there is a junkie. Would you sleep with that? Neither would I. You wanna get laid, stay off the horse."

"There's an acid-head. Go fuck with him and see if you want to do acid."

"She's had holes burned in her brain from all that ecstacy. She thinks she's dancing. Cute, huh?"

"That guy's just drunk off his ass. Go easy on the sauce."



Then, when we've filled our little guidebook with genuine drug addict sightings, and maybe some audubon-society-type drawings, we'd go home and discuss what we've learned over a joint and some beer.

[seabeyond]

21. without any secrecy at all i get the hair/pee and test him

if i have gotten to the point of feeling the need to test my child he has lost my trust. trust has to be earned. not given, when there is no reason for it

i have already made clear to boys this is my right as a parent as long as they are in my house. they follow rules, they break rules they reap the consequences. period. not a democracy, a dictatorship

also. having a drug kit in the house and the children well aware that i will use it allows them the opportunity to stand up to peer pressure, putting the blame on me. you know, i owuld take a puff, but man, my mom says she will test me and off to military school i go, so no thank you

now i have done drugs, i am pretty mellow and accepting and understanding kids will do what htey do

my kids already say they will never drink. we have alcoholics in family that have gotten in trouble and they see the repercussion. i make clear to them, good dont drink, but probably not going to be reality. alcohol inherently isnt bad, it is hte abuse of it that is bad. and seeing it is in your family, will be what you are conscios and aware of

so, yes to drug test. no to secrecy. they have to earn trust. as we all do

[liberalitch]

22. Where is search his room for his stash...

and smoke it yourself

[DebinTx]

23. Here's what I told my kid

and yes, he was smoking dope. I wanted to test him secretly but what would I tell him if it came back positive? tHAT i WENT BEHIND HIS BACK? I decided to be upfront about it. I admitted that I smoked it in my lifetime but with him being so young, it would really put a major crimp in his life. He wouldn't get to use the car any longer, no friends, no life, no education, no job, etc. He later admitted that he tried coke too (but that was only one time, mom, I SWEAR!).

To be fair, I told him that if he would quit now, that the day of his graduation from college, if he wanted to sit and smoke dope all day long, I'd buy it for him and smoke it with him. And I reminded him that on that graduation day, he'd no longer be my responsibility and it would be his life from there on out.

It's been 2 years and so far, so good.

Funny thing is, I could tell he was smoking it because he was VERY obvious about it.

[Ariana Celeste]

30. That's what I'd do, n/t.

[KamaAina]

24. Other: I enroll him in Andover, fill out early admission to Yale,

get him a copy of "A Charge to Keep", and tell him, "Son, you too can be pResident some day. Here, have a pretzel."

[JohnLocke]

32. LOL!

:D

[maveric]

25. Buy a "Home Test" and demand they submit a sample.

Sorry but they are kids and it may benefit them someday.

[PunkPop]

26. This one has particular relevance for me

I have a good friend I've known since high school. He married sooner than me and consequently his two kids are now early to mid teens. The boy is 15 and is a handful. He is constantly in trouble and does poorly in school. They have suspected he is smoking pot and my friend has written me on a couple of occassions and said, "Well, we had to give -- a drug test because his eyes were red and he was acting funny". To my knowledge they have never come up positive but I think drug testing your kids is IDIOTIC. I also have a major problem with it. I can't imagine this is his idea. It has got to be his wife's. I never come right out and tell him how stupid I think it is. Usually I make some half-joking comment like "Drug test? What do those cost? Can you deduct that from your taxes as a child-care expense"? When what I want to say is:

YOU FREAKING HYPOCRITE! DO YOU REMEMBER ALL THE SHIT WE DID IN HIGH SCHOOL? POT WAS THE LEAST OF YOUR PROBLEMS. WHY DON'T YOU LET HIM MAKE HIS OWN MISTAKES. TALK TO HIM IF YOU THINK HE'S SMOKING POT INSTEAD OF TREATING HIM LIKE SOME KIND OF PAROLEE! HE'S YOUR SON.

I just think people who resort to this are really insecure parents who don't understand the negative effects making your kid pee in a bottle can have on your relationship with them.

[AtTheEndOfTheDay]

28. I agree

as a dedicated and life long smoker of the herb, my relationship with my parents is and always has been good. Had they pulled that crap on me I think I'd never have thought very highly of them. I'd have smoked anyway and just figured my parents sucked like my friends regarded there's.

[Selteri]

27. I do the same thing my dad did.

When I have a kid, hopefully.

My dad sat me down when I was 10 and told me that if someone offered me drugs or alcohol that I wasn't old enough. This was after a minor accident with mixing up my red pop with someone's 'cherry bounce' at a party I honestly can't remember past the headache for the next day.

It wasn't hard for him to convince me that my body was not ready to handle alcohol or drugs and wouldn't be until I was older. Both of my parents were liberal about the alcohol in the house, I was allowed to try it under their supervision and usually was allowed a small shot of champaign on new years. It was always supervised and was not taboo.

When I was 13 (seventh grade) my dad said that it was about the right age for me to be being offered MJ and possibly other drugs. He asked that if I was offered the drugs that I come to him first. He told me he'd tried MJ in college and that was the appropriate time for it, but if I wanted to experiment that he would rather I was at home and tried it in the basement under his supervision in case anything went wrong. I had no reason to disbelieve him because he told me the straight unblemished truth now that I was 'old enough to understand'. Then again, he also told me that if I really wanted to try it that he'd make sure to get me clean, quality marijuana.

I never took him up on the offer, but it being there left any and all taboo out of the subject. His not treating it like anything other than something adults do to releave tension sometimes took any allure from it. I tried it in college and didn't find the high anything spectacular and didn't give it much thought until half a decade later when I discovered the medical uses on chronic pain.

His honest, up front approach left me with no questions, stating that if I wanted to get or try them that he wanted to be there to make sure I'd be safe destroyed any real desire to show it as rebellion. My father may have had many problems, but he taught me about drugs by telling me the truth and educating me.

Treating your child with respect and honesty is the best way to raise them. Lieing to them creates nothing but disrespect to other truths.

[UdoKier]

29. Definitely. Kids know when adults are lying and hypocritical.

They know that a huge percentage of boomer and X'er parents tried drugs in their youths. And they can see that some of their friends use pot or alcohol and are not always losers or burnouts.

Teaching about moderation, and that there is a HUGE difference between marijuana and alcohol, which are relatively safe, and the other much more destructive narcotics.

I know few kids who didn't go through a period of experimenting with drugs and sex. The ones who went to excess and often became addicted were usually the ones whose parents told them "NEVER, Zero tolerance!" They were left very little wiggle room between rigid parents and peer pressure.

But I guess "Do as I say, not as I did" will be around for a long, long time...