Several months ago, I was talking to my older son who is nineteen, about some of his friends, as well as about some of his past experiences with drugs. I already knew alcohol was being used by kids starting in their teens and continuing through their twentys. I grew up in the seventies, and knew several people who had done Heroin in High School, and are now dead due to the HIV virus. Now, I found out through my son that you can buy Heroin cheaper than a pack of cigarettes, and easier. No ID required! LSD and mushrooms that make these kids "trip" and have hallucinations, are common place. There are no teen twelve step programs in our area. I sent e mails to the Superintendent of the High School and Middle School, and Counselors, and heard nothing in return. I then took a letter I had written, to the school, explaining that I thought it would be good to have in-house anonymous twelve step meetings in the school, and that I would volunteer my time to set such meetings up, since I had experience with twelve step programs. I talked to the Vice Principal, who assured me he would read it and pass it on to the Superintendent. I have yet to hear a word. It has been almost a year.
While I was configuring my letter, an alumni class mate of these kids, overdosed from Heroin, one year after graduating. They still had no time or desire to implement a program that could help these kids. So many of these young people have pent up emotions from parents who drink and do drugs, who are going through divorces, and custody battles. Their homes are in jeopardy. Their grades go down. They have nowhere to turn to unleash their anger and confusion. These meetings would be a place for them to do so, with experienced twelve step members who would volunteer their time to help.
I guess they feel these meetings would cause shame and embarrassment to their school. And as they think so, more kids are turning to drugs and alcohol, with the occasional overdose that is quickly swept under the rug. Before these kids can vote, or legally drink, they are destroying themselves, isolated in their pain and confusion. I know from talking to other parents in other towns, that the situation is the same nationwide, and probably worldwide. I myself was an alcoholic for some twenty years, and I know what drives one to drink! Pain. Emotional pain. The desire to have someone to speak with who has been where they are, and the knowledge of how to stop, and get more out of life, is kept from them as my letter probably sits in a file somewhere. At least they’re not being embarrassed!
These kids are hurting. They are in pain, and they are turning to drugs and alcohol in an attempt to rid themselves of the thoughts that cause that pain. A twelve step program began a change in my life that has a) kept me away from a drink for over thirteen years, and b) taught me tools to use to think and act in a more focused and clear headed way. These tools have kept me from that drink, even though I have gone through many hard times in the past thirteen years that I have been sober. My father passed away, my kids were being brainwashed to think and act like their father, who was a negative force in their lives, and now, I am going through the courts to end that relationship. Without a drink or drug.
And yet, our kids are dangling out in this world, and they have nowhere to go to find the help they need. One classroom, one hour a day, could help these kids immensely. But, instead, we have ceramics and Spanish, and gym. Yup, those ought to save our kids. They can bring home a deformed clay animation, but can’t learn how to stop their anger, and desire to destroy themselves, and possibly others. Some have their licenses, and are driving our streets under the influence of one drug or another, or alcohol. Many drunk drivers survive their crashes, while innocent people are killed, because the drunk is relaxed, and because they are, they can survive a head on collision. But what about the occupants of the other car? Or the child they just ran over on their bike? Or the drunks who don't survive and are killed or mamed? If they do survive, the money incurred by a DWI between the courts and insurance, is phenomenal, and many cannot afford it. They must take time away from spending it with their family, for a second job just to get their license and insurance back. It's not worth it. But if you don't know that, and a twelve step program does, why not teach our kids from a young age, how to deal with their emotions and pain in a constructive, not destructive way?
This is a serious problem facing our nation. These kids will soon be our voters, our doctors, our teachers, our law enforcement, the people we will need to go to for help. Where are we when they need our help? We are worrying about what parents will think, what other schools will think about us, what it will do to our prestige. It’s sickening, to say the least. Especially since the majority of the time, it is the adults who allow their children to become consumed with their problems. We are not protecting our kids. Who is thinking about them?
The halls of the school, and the classrooms are filled with kids high on one drug or another, and the teachers are aware. These kids aren’t bad, as they are labeled because of their bloodshot eyes and slurred, unintelligible speech. They didn’t ask for their mother to be a drug addict, or their father to beat their mother in fits of alcoholic rage. However, being so young, and ill equipped to deal with their emotions, they turn to anything they can get their hands on to lessen their pain, even if it causes their death, or that of others. And yet, nothing is being done to help them. "It’s almost graduation, we’ll get rid of most of them then!" Yeah, because no juniors, sophomores, or freshman are doing drugs or abusing alcohol.
It’s as if these kids are hamsters in a cage, riding the wheel over and over, knowing there is nowhere to go to escape their pain. And the adults that are responsible, want no part in curing the problems they have caused. Nor are they able, they have problems of their own they can’t get help with, or refuse to. It’s a viscious cycle, and it’s getting worse, not better. How can it get better when it’s not being addressed?
There are twelve step programs in different towns that deal with just addictions to drugs, but these kids can’t get to them. The closest one to our town is a half an hour away. Their parents can’t take them when they are taking care of their own business, and addictions, so they don’t attend. If every Middle and High School had a program set up, these kids could get the help they need to be straight and sober. An hour a day, can keep the drugs and alcohol away. I was one of these kids growing up. There were no places to go for help, or to even find out if one needed help. Therefore, I went on a twenty year spree that caused me great heartache and pain, as well as to my family and friends. When I was thirty eight, I got help, and have lived by the tools I learned in that twelve step program.
Who will help these kids who desperately need it? Most of them are not who people think, they just don’t take the time to talk to them and understand why they do what they do. I have listened to these kids, and heard one talk about the hurt involved with parents divorcing, and one moving to the next state, and having to be shuffled back and forth between the two. This child is sweet, smart, handsome, and caring, and yet, he’s been to Rehab 3 or 4 times. Too short a time at each, which landed him right back in. This is not the fault of these kids. They didn’t create these problems, and yet, we think they can deal with them at 15, 16, 17, 18, and even older? I know fighting with my kid's father in front of them hurt them, and made them feel afraid and insecure, even though it was without malice or intent on my part. It simply happened, but it did affect them enough to experiment with drugs and alcohol, in an attempt to scare their thoughts and bad feelings away. I'd say that was our fault. Now, i have changed my attitude and behavior, greatly in part to a twelve step program, and instead, talk to my kids a lot, as well as their friends.
Not everyone can grasp the concepts and adhere to them. These programs are not an absolute, but they are a start. No one anywhere is going to get information, and process it the same, even in the work field, and this includes adults. There were many people who couldn’t stick to the teachings of the twelve step program I was in, but there were many more that did. A beautiful, caring, loving woman could not stick to the program, and two years after she stopped coming to meetings, she was dead. She died of liver problems.
Our youth is so important. They are the future, even after we parents and adults are dead and buried. We brought them all into the world, and we need to realize that we are responsible to fix the addictions we ultimately placed on our children. And for those who say they’re tired of kids blaming their parents, one out of two marriages ends in divorce, including my own. Kids lose one parent to an occasional visit, there is animosity and unrest in the home, there is sadness and want and depression guilt and fear. Why would it not be the parents fault, if their children, who they chose to raise, and had a responsibility to do so, turned to drugs and alcohol to lessen their pain? Just because they are young, doesn’t mean they are not people, with feelings, and thoughts, and desires. I am so passionate about this that I also emailed my Mayor and my Governor, and my Senator. There still are no twelve step meetings in the schools. It would be so good for our kids if everybody wrote to their Senator. This would be a volunteer twelve step program in each school, costing no one a dime.
Because what we still do have, is kids high on pot and Heroin and LSD and Mushrooms and all kinds of other drugs. And their hearts are still heavy, and their confusion and fears, are still unattended to. Such a simple thing so strongly opposed, and yet so severely needed.
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