Month: October 2008

Blog October 28, 2008

CSI

This weekend I was watching CSI: Miami, as I do most weekends. However this weekend the episode that I was watching showcased a very interesting phenomenon. In this episode there was a substitute teacher who was getting kids to sell drugs for him. A new drug called “cheese”. Cheese is a drug that contains heroin and over the counter cold medication. It is commonly used by watering down heroin and combining it with Tylenol PM. He was getting the kids to sell it by giving them new “cool” shoes. Weird! Not to mention creepy. But anyways, my point is that I have not heard much about this “cheese” drug. I work at a rehab and I have never known anyone who has used this. Now I am not saying that it is not prevalent, I am sure it is, I just have not heard of it here in southern California. So, since it is news to me I am thinking that it is news to you. Therefore, I will educate you. Cheese has mainly been linked to the Dallas, Texas area so far but just as with all drugs, news travels fast. Black tar heroin contains 30% heroin and cheese contains anywhere from 2-8%. It can be bought as a powder and it is used by sniffing it, it is not usually injected such as traditional heroin. Cheese first became known when it was found in due to arrests, and in elementary, middle and high schools in Dallas, Texas between 2005 and 2007. It is basically known as the “gateway drug” to heroin. It is also commonly used by young kids, some still in elementary school. Between April 2006 and February 2007 there were 71 teen drug users arrested (ages 10-16) in the Dallas area. Dalas rehabs and adolescent drug treatment centers started admitting younger and younger kids, where before they were 15-17 years old, they are now admitting 11-13 year olds. Cheese is also considered a cheap drug. It goes for about $2 a hit and $10 a gram. Cheese looks like a tanish-brown powder and is usually folded up in notebook paper. Drug dealers are targeting adolescents and kids by putting this drug in an easy to use powder form, making it more affordable and giving such an innocent name. They are calling it the most addictive and deadly drug since crack-cocaine.

Top Ten List for Better Communication with Teens:

Most of these are common sense, but we forget to address the obvious when we are busy with our own lives

1. Remember that during adolescence, communication generally decreases and a child will confide less in parents. This is a fairly normal process, so parents should not overreact.

2. Listen to what is being said; that is, try to understand the teenager’s feelings and where they are coming from.

3. Stop what you are doing and look at your teenager. Listen when they speak to you. Put the cell phone away for a minute and stop texting.

4. Be sure most of your communication is positive, not negative. Don’t dwell on mistakes, failures, misbehaviors, or something they forgot to do. Give them positive communication and talk about their successes, accomplishments, interests, and appropriate behavior. Modeling appropriate behavior is also a plus.

5. Talk to them about their interests (e.g., music, sports, computers, cars). Have conversations with them without having to make a point, teach them something, or impress them. Talk to them just to talk and to have positive verbal interaction.

6. Avoid talking too much – giving long or too-detailed explanations, repeating lectures, questioning excessively, or using other forms of communication that will result in the teenager turning a deaf ear to you.

7. Try to understand your teen’s feelings. You do not have to agree or disagree with them; just make him aware that you understand how they feel. There are times when you do not have to fix things in order to make them feel better. Again: LISTEN!

8. Do not overreact to what is said. Remember, sometimes teenagers say things that are designed to get a reaction from their parents. In addition, do not say “no” too fast. Sometimes it is better to think about the request and give a response later. In other words, think before you open your mouth.

9. Try to create situations in which communication can occur (driving to the doctor’s appointment, having the teenager help you with household tasks, eat dinner together!). You have to be physically close to the teenager for communication to occur. A television in the adolescent’s room can be an additional barrier to family communication. Whenever possible, the parent should try to do things with the teenager, rather than separately. Although the child may not frequently accept them, provide opportunities for him to do things with you.

10. Try to avoid power struggles, confrontation, and arguing matches. Your goal should be to have the communication move toward a compromise situation, rather than a battle. When appropriate, involve the teenager in decision making and setting realistic and enforceable consequences for his or her behavior. Make sure that they understand that you are the parent.

Adolescent Prescription drug abuse

There are many different ways that adolescents are using to get high these days. Marijuana and alcohol are among the most common. However, more and more adolescents are turning to prescription medication abuse. 48 million or 20% of the United States population have used prescription medications for reasons other than medical in their lifetime. Since 1995 emergency room visits resulting from prescription medication abuse have gone up 163% and so are visits to adolescent drug rehabs Prescription medications are easier to obtain now more than ever. Some teens are simply stealing their parent’s prescriptions out of the medicine cabinet. More often teens are visiting online pharmacies, where they sell very addictive medications to anyone who will pay. Teens also will trade their prescriptions at school, either for other drugs or for money. Prescription medication can be classified in one of three categories that are the most commonly abused: stimulants, opioids and central nervous system depressants.

Opioids include Morphine, Vicodin and Oxycontin, to name a few. Opioids are used to treat pain. When abused these medications can be life threatening. If opioids are mixed with any substance that depressed the central nervous system, such as alcohol, Xanax, or Valium, they can cause respiratory malfunction and death. These drugs are occasionally snorted or injected, in order to amplify the high.

Central nervous system depressants, such as Xanax or Valium, are used to treat anxiety and sleep disorders. Barbiturates are also considered central nervous system depressants. These medications work by slowing down brain activity, which when abused or used with alcohol they can slow the activity down so much that it results in heart or respiratory malfunction and death.

Stimulants speed up the body causing increased attentiveness, alertness and energy. Stimulants were primarily used to treat asthma and obesity. Currently they are used to treat Attention Deficit Disorder, Depression and narcolepsy. Abusing these medications or mixing them with decongestants may result in irregular heart activity and high body temperatures.

Secondhand Effects of College Binge Drinking

We’ve all heard about the epidemic of binge drinking on college campuses across the country and the effects it can have on individual health and academic success. But what about the secondhand effects of this behavior? Much like smoking, collegiate binge drinking causes a host of secondhand problems for those that are surrounded by it.

In my freshman year of college I was on the rowing team and lived in a frat-like “team house” with my fellow rowers. Much like in a fraternity or sorority, many of my housemates and neighbors drank large quantities of alcohol after a win or on the weekends because this was the perceived college cultural norm. As it often does, this behavior caused many problems for my team as a whole including getting written-up for noise violations and being hung-over and late for practices and even races.

Unfortunately, many times it is not just those that engage in this activity that are harmed. Quite often these are the conditions under which fights, verbal and emotional abuse, and humiliating events such as hazing occur. It is also quite common, as I experienced more than a few times, to have one’s sleep disturbed by intoxicated roommates and neighbors or having to “babysit” a friend who could no longer take care of themselves.

The occurrence of ritual binge drinking has dramatic and widespread secondhand effects on both non-binge drinking individuals and college communities in general. Will this trend of binge drinking on college and university campuses continue? Unfortunately, it seems that a combination of stress, peer pressure and a cultural idea of drinking as part of the collegiate experience lead to this unhealthy and destructive phenomenon.

Strawberry Quik

So once again drug dealers prove they are some of the lowest of the low in our society.

There’s a new drug on the market being handed to kids in school yards. It’s a type of crystal Meth that looks, smells and tastes like strawberry pop rocks (it fizzles and pops like the popular candy) Its being called “strawberry quik” or strawberry meth. This new and kid appealing version of this highly addictive drug is also being made in chocolate, peanut butter, cola, cherry, grape, and orange flavors.

Drug Dealers are obviously looking to turn teens and pre-teens into their new adolescent and teen addict customers. Kids are showing up in Adolescent rehabs and teen treatment centers.

If parents don’t still tell their kids to not accept anything from strangers now is a time to start having those conversations! Its sad that “cooks” would be making this destructive drug so easily marketed as a candy for kids only to have serious and even deadly results.

There is a fox news report on this at https://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,271215,00.html .

Meth is a highly addictive and destructive drug. Please make sure you children are informed so that they are not rushed to the hospital or morgue because they took “candy” from someone at school!

amy lawhorn

It is widely known that when attending 12 step meetings, such as alcoholics anonymous or narcotics anonymous, you will see many people drinking coffee or energy drinks and smoking cigarettes. You will see an extreme amount of energy drink consumption especially if you attend a 12 step convention. Many use energy drinks to stay up all weekend during the convention. I have long thought that recovering addicts were probably using these drinks as well as coffee and cigarettes for the effect. That is to get a buzz without having to call it a relapse. Now this is just my personal opinion, but when I was in school to become a chemical dependency counselor they taught us that caffeine and nicotine are two of the most powerful and addictive stimulants available, yet so many recovering addicts lean on these vices during recovery. There are many different arguments regarding this topic. I have heard some people argue that if it wasn’t for cigarettes they wouldn’t have made it through early recovery. I am not one to take an opinion away from another, perhaps which is true for them. But how can we really say that we are sober from all mind-altering chemicals while consuming them at the same time? Are they discounted simply because they are legal? Well, so is alcohol.

Studies have shown that nicotine as well as caffeine consumption actually raises the relapse rate significantly in those trying to recover. These stimulants also act as gateway drugs for many. Heavy alcohol consumption was especially linked to the consumption of energy drinks, as well as those who consume energy drinks are 3 times more likely to use cigarettes and abuse prescription stimulants such as Adderhol and Ritalin (both used to treat ADHD). This is not so surprising considering that these substances give you a similar, and I will admit milder, feeling that other substances such as Adderhol, Ritalin, meth and even coke might give you. If you are a drug addict who has abused such stimulants in the past, consuming caffeine or nicotine is simply asking to get triggered to want to use again. I realize that I am not going to be the one to change all minds but these are the facts. If you want the best possible chance at recovery why would you tempt yourself on a daily basis?

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEtzRnA-Bg0]

Bill Lane from Bill Lane & Associates Adolescent Transport Services
billlaneandassociates.com Talks about Visions Adolescent Treatment Centers

Bill Lane & Associates Adolescent Transport Services
specializes in the safe transportation of troubled teens, adolescents and young adults to boarding schools, therapeutic boarding schools, wilderness programs, drug treatment, residential treatment centers and more.

For more than 30 years, Bill Lane & Associates Adolescent Transport Services have been involved in the “troubled teen” and therapeutic boarding school industry and has worked with over 10,000 families to provide transportation to all kinds of therapeutic and treatment facilities.

Bill Lane
Bill Lane & Associates Adolescent Transport Services
858-488-5319 or visit https://www.billlaneandassociates.com

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gX_wD66mNZg]

Christina earned her Bachelors of Science in Psychology from San Diego State University. As Outreach Coordinator for Visions, she continues to build community relations in the treatment field. She also assists with the continued progress reports on Visions Alumni. Christina is currently a member of the Women’s Association for Addiction Treatment and Membership Chair for the Orange County WAAT Chapter.

“I am honored and grateful to be a part of a team that provides a safe environment for adolescents to regain a voice, respect and the freedom to be seen as an accounted human being. We have all been adolescents and many of us discredited for our thoughts, so let’s open the door of communication and listen to the ignored hurt and feelings of our youth. What we provide for our youth today will foreshadow the actions of our adults tomorrow.” – Christina Howard, B.S., Outreach Coordinator

Neuroplasticity: A new perspective in neuroscience

I recently had the opportunity to attend a special neuroscience lecture at UCLA. The focus of this lecture involved an exciting and developing mind-brain science called Neuroplasticity. This new science offers a look at the potential we as individuals have to influence the functioning of our physical brain through awareness and mindful choices.

According to the old scientific paradigm in neuroscience, the human brain is much like the hardware of a computer. It is viewed as a material system hardwired with biologically predetermined neural circuitry or pathways that produce our behavior. This old thinking in neuroscience also asserts that whatever one might call the immaterial consciousness or “mind”—and all its manifestations, such as awareness and choice—is produced by, and ultimately reduced to the physical brain. The critics of this kind of older neuroscience have labeled such a conception as “monism”, “reductionism” and “materialism.”

Neuroplasticity as a new kind of neuroscience does not suggest that the mind and the brain are completely separate entities, and it is true that certain behaviors and experiences can be explained in large measure by the physical brain. For example, individuals may have genetic, biologically predisposed brain chemistry which can increase the likelihood of mental disorders or addiction. Rather, what this new science suggests is that there is a kind interactional dualism between the mind and the brain. The brain and its functioning can certainly affect the mind and what we experience. However, pioneering research done at UCLA using Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scans has shown that when we focus our attention on positive, constructive ideas and behaviors, a “re-wiring” effect happens in the physical brain. During this re-wiring effect, brain tissue that was previously dedicated to other maladaptive tasks is incorporated in new wholesome endeavors

The UCLA research shows that re-focusing our attention onto constructive tasks and healthy behaviors can have dramatic effects. Neuroplasticity has important implications for those suffering from addiction and substance abuse as it suggests that an individual’s commitment to recovery and the 12-Steps can have a profound impact on the physical brain. In working a 12-step program for adolescents or aadults and attending meetings, recovering individuals are in a very real sense shaping their brains in the direction of recovery.

-Adam Echols

As a chemical dependency counselor at Visions Adolescent Treatment Center one of my duties is to educate the Adolescents on the disease concept of addiction and alcoholism. As an southern Californian, with a mother who has been sober through Alcoholics Anonymous for the last eight years, I am very familiar and comfortable with the disease concept. I am not going to lie, when my mother first got sober I was an ornery 13 year old teen who believed that the disease concept was an excuse that alcoholics used to disregard their horrid behavior. I thought that alcoholics and drug addicts, not knowing that I was one, needed to buck up and take the blame for their behaviors. (I did not know at this point that the twelve steps were solely aimed at taking responsibility for our actions and making them right.) However, through the process of going to adolescent rehab at Visions Adolescent Treatment Center myself and getting sober I became very familiar with the disease concept and readily accepted it. When people ask what I do for a living, I tell them, with pride, that I am a chemical dependency counselor for adolescents. Many are intrigued to learn more about the recovering community and most people praise me for helping others. Not once have I received negative feedback or people giving me weird looks, as I originally expected. So you could imagine my surprise, when I found out through a gentleman who was touring our facility, that around the world many people are skeptical about the disease concept. When I say skeptical, I mean that the impression that I got was that is was widely discarded as hogwash, for lack of a better term. This gentleman explained to me that he taught a course in the U.K. on the disease concept. He described the way that his students reacted to it and the various ways that he had to go about getting the information to these people without the entire class balking at him. I was speechless. Sometimes, I for one, take for granted the recovering community that I have grown up in, in southern California.