Me and Sandy (1983) White tux kills!

What is it about a prom and graduation season that makes rational parents go bonkers?

As we move into the prom and graduation season, many parents and school officials worry about the safety of their children. An Internet search under the term “Safe Prom” turns up hundreds of websites that focus on encouraging students to make safe and healthy choices and schools conducting pre-prom events showing the dangers of drinking and driving. However, there were few websites encouraging or guiding parents to take a leadership role in creating a safe prom night.

For over a decade, I’ve worked as a drug education specialist in independent and public secondary schools educating principals, headmasters, parents, and students about the dangers of underage drinking and other drug use. When conversation turns to a horror story about prom night or graduation party disasters, in many cases, it is a parent who has either rented a hotel room with little or no supervision or purchased the alcohol the teens’ consumed.

A 2002 study revealed that 40% of teen traffic fatalities during the prom and graduation weekends were alcohol-related. Fatal car accidents, injuries, and assaults are not an adolescent rite of passage for any teen. Underage drinking is a major factor in the two leading causes of teenage deaths: car crashes and fatal injuries. Underage high-risk drinking is also linked to two-thirds of sexual assaults and date rapes of teens, and increases the likelihood of unsafe and unplanned sexual activity. According to the American College of Preventive Medicine, approximately 75% of adolescent morbidity and mortality is associated with behavioral health risks, of which a large portion can be attributed to alcohol and other drug use.

I’m assuming by your question that you mean am I giving teens the impression that drugs aren’t that bad because I’ve recovered and I’m leading a productive life?

I think the point of being sick, as the state of addiction is often described, is to get well. I’m not apologetic about getting well or leading a productive life with strong relationships and financial independence. My recovering is work, ongoing work, ongoing hard work, which is something I point out to teens. The work of recovery and subsequent consequences–which is more peace of mind for me personally, friends and family–should be the goal of recovery.

I think you have a right to be concerned about a recovering person teaching a drug prevention program. I understand the concern; perhaps it is like going to a dentist with bad teeth. There is also research that suggests that recovering people perpetuate the myth that everyone is doing it (drugs). However, recovering people teaching alcohol and other drug prevention can be a very powerful strategy, especially when the instructor understands his or her personal narrative around their addictive experience and can translate it into meaningful drug education.

New Addictive Painkiller Drug: MyFoxBOSTON.com

Teens and Alcohol

Most kids will tell you they get alcohol from a friend’s home.  Others will say they have an older sibling or family member buy it for them.  In a study by the Center for Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) 95% of 12^th graders, 28% of 10^th graders, and 18% of 8^th graders said alcohol was easy to get.  The top four areas where adolescents get there alcohol is through some form of adult interaction.  One source is a compliant adult who will go out and purchase alcohol for their minor child and friends usually under the mindset that it is better that they are drinking under their roof where they can be supervised.  Even if this were true, and I do not believe in this strategy, there are plenty of stories where teens who have been drinking in this “supervised” environment who leave the home undetected and get injured or worse, die.

Non-compliant adults are those whose alcohol supply has been raided and these are ideal targets for those teens looking to drink.  Adults with teens should begin to think more seriously about the amounts of alcohol in their home and how the alcohol supply is monitored.  When thinking about adults, we often think of people in the 30’s, 40’s or 50’s. However, in every town, there are those people in their early 20’s who for whatever reason have not moved on with their lives and surround themselves with the high school crowd.  These young adults pose a serious danger due to their legal status to purchase alcohol.  Last, but not least, is the returning college student, perhaps an older sibling, who has secured a fake ID at college.  The market for the fake ID is alive and well on college campuses.  All parents must have a serious conversation with their older children about purchasing alcohol for minor siblings.

Dangerous College Drinking

There’s good news and bad news.  The bad is that those students drinking on college campuses are drinking more.  However, the good news is there is an increase in students who abstain completely from alcohol or drink moderately.  Additional good news is more and more colleges are taking the issue of underage drinking and alcohol abuse seriously.  Higher education is developing comprehensive prevention strategies that are making a difference like Social Norms, Brief Interventions, and Motivational Interviewing.

Any parent who reads the newspaper or watches the news has seen and heard tragic stories about dangerous drinking on college campuses. Parents are frightened by these stories and have every right to be.  Because of this fear, I have seen a growing myth gain dangerous traction as a parent strategy.  What is this myth?

More parents believe that allowing their high school senior a little rope regarding their drinking will give them the experience to practice safe and responsible drinking in college.  Let me be unequivocal here, this parent strategy is not a good idea and can have dire consequences.  My professional experience as well as the research on college drinking does not support this hypothesis to be true.

Teens and Drugs

This is a difficult question because many of the characteristics of being an adolescent resemble drug use.  If I were to say, “Look for abrupt changes in mood, appetite or social affiliations,” most of you would run screaming home assuming your kids were on drugs.  Adolescents, unlike most adults, often are able to disguise the physical damage and attributes associated with substance abuse because they are young and resilient.  Adolescents tend to bounce back faster from a night of drinking than adults.  The mere fact you asked the question is a healthy sign that you are making room for the idea that your child could be using drugs, including alcohol.  As long as your feeling does not grow into paranoid intrusiveness, then I think it is a healthy dose of realism on your part.  I have met too many parents who say, “I know my daughter and she would never do drugs.”

My work with independent school adolescents has made me believe that they may be more at risk than their public school counterparts.  I met a young lady name Loren (not her real name) at a school in Connecticut.  She approached me after class and said, “I smoke pot (long pause) and I don’t think it’s working out.”  Curious I asked, “What do you mean by not working out?” “Well, my grades are fine, athletics are going well, my teachers like me, and my parents and I get along well too, but…” “But what?” I asked.  “Smoking weed is the only think that makes me happy.”  Loren, like many independent school students I meet is an intelligent and gifted student.  In many ways, her gifts disguise her developing emotional and psychological reliance on marijuana.  Marijuana is called a dissociative drug.  Meaning, it “disorganizes” a teen’s emotional life.  Loren is good example where her sense of joy is coming from a chemical and not her inner self.  I am sure many of the adults in Loren’s life would be surprised to learn about her relationship with marijuana, especially her parents.  Loren is a good example of how parents can be surprised by the discovery of substance in their kids.  However, I feel there are always clues if the parent wants to look.

Deborah Drake

I‘m pleased to introduce you to a new friend and colleague Deborah Drake.  I met Deb years ago when she was the enrollment specialist for a Recovery Coaching program. Deb’s approach to handling my questions, her enthusiastic engagement in the mission of the program, and her gentle way of guiding me to registration made a strong impression on me.  I remember saying at the time, I wish I had someone like that working with me.  Well, now I do.

After many years of walking this consultant’s path alone, Deb is a welcome ally.  Deb’s role is being created as we go, but for now she is helping with marketing, media creation, and writing. I’m excited to say that in a short time we’ve worked together, Deb and I have finalized my first book “Message in a Bottle” due out in April.  We have two more books coming out this year “Drug Education for the Soul” (tentative title) and a personal memoir.

Deb and I have also co-created WolfPack Education.  WolfPack will be our train-the-trainer program that we will be bringing to cities next year.  Our hope and intention is to create a transformative educational experience for anyone teaching drug education programs or those working with kids who want to effectively handle dealing with alcohol and other drug misuse or better still, to proactively encourage students to make better choices for themselves.  For many years, health teachers, counselors, and youth workers have asked me how to teach my particular brand of drug education.  I will now be taking two days and training people with our WolfPack model.  We will be offering a sustained training model where graduates of the program will receive ongoing coaching and assistance.

Here is a little about Deborah’s professional experience.

Pre-Order Now | Release Date April 15

I’m excited about the coming release of my first book “Message in a Bottle”.  It’s a book for parents, but not about parenting.  After 15 years of speaking and at the encouragement of parents and school administrators, I have compiled and addressed the most frequent questions asked of me at parent presentations.

These questions are essentially asked by parents everywhere. This book represents my best effort to offer my insights and the understanding gained from working and dialoguing with kids, their parents and their educators and mentors.

Each question is essentially a chapter with my response.  I use the word “response” rather than “answer” because I do not have definitive answers for all.  I also think that each family has to determine what works for them and the word “answers” sounds so predetermined to me.  My responses represent a compiled experiential knowledge of 15 years. I hope most people will find great value in these responses and better still that a dialogue is sparked between parents and their kids, parents and schools and the kids with each other.

A friend asked me the other day, “Is this going to help me be a better parent?”  I think I shocked her when I said no.  The book is not a “become a better parent” book.  My responses can better equip a parent.  However, they can better equip both a loving parent and an abusive one. This summer I’ll be writing my first draft of a book more designed to engage parents in a thoughtful reflection on what loving and nurturing parenting looks like.

Me and Mom 1980

There are men to gentle to live among wolves

Who prey upon them with IBM eyes

And sell their hearts and guts for martinis at noon

There are men too gentle for a savage world

Who dream instead of snow and children and Halloween

And wonder if the leaves will change their color soon.

There are men too gentle to live among wolves

Who anoint them for burial with greedy claws

And murder them for a merchant’s profit and gain

There are men too gentle for a corporate world

Who dream instead of candied apples and ferris wheels

And pause to hear the distant whistle of a train

So, Mom, did you ever smoke pot in high school? Dad, did you drink?

Mom and Dad, what might your answer be? Ask yourself another important question; how comfortable are you with sharing your own history?

A Reality Check: The parents of today actually did more drinking and drugs than their children may be doing today; creating more of a conflict about what to share and what not to share.

There is a 50/50 chance that you did drink or do drugs as a school age person yourself. So whether you say you did engage or not, you have a 50% chance to relate to your kid.

What if you didn’t drink and do drugs in high school? What do you say when asked by a student or your child about what you did do in high school? One teacher at a Catholic School I was teaching at for the week approached me on the fourth day with this to share:

“With all the kids talking about you, “Mr. Wolfsberg,” in my classes, I am feeling like I need or want to make up stories about drinking in high school. “

So I asked him, had he? That teacher shared he had not. To be perceived of as more relatable, he considered making up stories. He wanted my feedback on what to do, I gave it to him. Absolutely not.  Again, remember the likelihood that in a group of 100, half the teens are drinking and half are not. So telling the truth of your choices in high school means you will be relating to AT LEAST half the students.