Nearly one in five kids admitted to adolescent Drug Treatment has abused inhalants by the time they reach seventh grade. There are more than 1,000 products that are dangerous when inhaled, such as paint thinner, spray paint, nitrous from whipped cream (think Redi-Whip), or correctional fluid, to name a few. The user can become high, dizzy, nauseous, less inhibited, unconscious…or they can die. Sudden Sniffing Death Syndrome can kill a user even the first time they abuse inhalants. According to the National Inhalants Prevention Coalition, signs of inhalant abuse include: -Paint or stains on mouth, fingers and/or clothing -Spots or sores around mouth -Red or runny eyes and nose -Chemical breath -Drunk, dizzy, or disoriented behavior -Nausea or vomiting -Loss of appetite -Anxiety, excitability, or irritability
Talk to your child about the extreme dangers of inhalant abuse, and keep potentially abused products away from all children and teens. Inhalant abuse is as serious and deadly as any other drug and deserves the same amount of attention.
If you think your teen is abusing inhalants, don’t hesitate to contact us today by clicking here adolescent drug treatment.
Some signs of teen drug use may look exactly like a teen being a teen- mood swings, changes in sleep patterns, irritability- but multiple factors may indicate a drug problem. Here are some of the signs that eventually gave me away when I was using drugs and alcohol as an adolescent: Secrecy. Most of my behaviors stemmed from a stronger and stronger need for secrecy. While most teens want privacy, teens who are using drugs seem to often take this to the extreme. My friends and I thought we were very clever, talking in code on the phone or online, and creating elaborate systems to hide drugs. Part of the fun of drug use for me was the ritual of secrecy: hiding the drugs/paraphernalia, doing the drugs without getting caught, and covering up the smells and effects. I became more secretive about who I was hanging out with too. I stopped hanging out with my long time friends and started hanging out with kids that used. I didn’t want my parents to meet them or have any part of my new life. I was fiercely protective of my new world. The funny thing about teens with drug problems is that we often do things that give ourselves away, despite our claims of wanting privacy. It didn’t make sense that I thought I wanted to keep my drug use a secret, yet drew pot leaves on my shoes and backpack. The thing I’ve noticed with drug addicts is that if we think we are being clever about something, we often want someone to know about it. I am surprised at how long it took before anyone noticed I was using. My clothes began to reflect my lifestyle. I took less pride in my appearance. I wanted my peers to know I used. I left a lighter out. To cover up the smell of pot smoke, I kept dryer sheets stuffed in a toilet paper roll. I burned incense. I frequently burned my thumb or had black marks on my hands from a pipe. I kept Visine in my pocket. I blamed my behavior and appearance on being tired, having allergies, or having food poisoning. The more I used and the more I tried to keep my using a secret, the more apparent my drug use became. I couldn’t remember the series of lies I told each day. My parents caught me in a lie every day. I could rarely account for my whereabouts and when challenged, would get really angry and defensive. Finally, my parents convinced me to submit to a drug test. It was a very long and painful night for all of us. I was furious because I felt that my world had fallen apart, and they were so scared for me. After adolescent Drug Treatment, my appearance calmed down quite a bit. I stopped being so secretive about my friends and my plans because I didn’t have anything to hide. My relationship with my family improved greatly because I wasn’t lying and sneaking around. It took a long time to regain my parents trust after treatment. I learned that I couldn’t tell them to trust me, I had to show them I could be trusted. I had to be patient. Again, just as when I was using, actions speak louder than words.
For more information about treatment just outside Irvine, Newport Beach, Huntington Beach or The greater Orange County area. please click here teen drug treatment.
At Visions Adolescent Treatment Center in Malibu we talk about trust between parents and teens being extremely important , and the question of whether or not to snoop in your teen’s room is a delicate one. In my experience as a teen addict, I feel that after a certain point, my parents had every right to snoop in my room- I had broken their trust and was engaging in behaviors that were dangerous to me and others. I feel that as soon as I demonstrated suspicious behaviors, like my dramatic mood change, not coming home at night, and a severe drop in my academic performance, their decision to snoop in my room may have saved my life. At the time, I was furious, and why wouldn’t I be? I threw tantrums about my right to privacy and became increasingly sneaky. I was trying to protect my private using world. The idea that it would be taken away terrified me. I did not believe that I could live or be happy without drugs. The problem was that I wasn’t happy with drugs either. My parents found paraphernalia in my room one day while I was out with my friends and later confronted me about it. At the time I was furious and told them I could never trust them again. Big deal. They had no reason to trust me anymore. I know it must have been hard for my parents to act in a way that made me react so violently, and to take the abuse I was aiming at them. I know now that they made the decision to search my room because they were very afraid for me. Even after they sent me to treatment, I felt very angry at my parents. I felt like I’d been tricked into treatment and I let them know how angry I was at every possible opportunity. I was not nice about it. I tried every manipulative trick I had left to get them to let me leave treatment and come home. The truth is that I was terrified of the new life that lay ahead of me- a life without using, a life full of feelings and reality. My parents, thank goodness, let me throw my tantrums and left me in treatment. I know now that it was incredibly hard for them too. Over time, I began to calm down and be honest with myself. My life using drugs was miserable, and I was afraid of being even more miserable without drugs. As time passed in treatment, I started to recognize the feelings and fears that led me to use, and learned new ways of dealing with my feelings. My parents got support too. Together, we began to mend our relationship. Once I was finally able to be honest with myself about my behavior and my using and drinking, I could see that my parents were helping me, not hurting me. I wasn’t a victim- I had gotten myself there and I was lucky to have parents that cared enough about me that they would endure my anger and find help for me. I wish that I hadn’t put my parents through all of that, but what I can do today is stay clean and never make them have to go through that mess again. It is my living amends to them. I feel like unwarranted snooping in a teen’s room can break down trust, but in my case, where I had already been showing warning signs of drug and alcohol abuse, my parents’ choice to search my room may have eventually saved my life.
Michael Jackson passed away this afternoon in LA after suffering a cardiac arrest. You have to wonder what led to this tragic end for the King of Pop. I know that his weight has dropped dramatically over the last few years and because of his enormous sense of privacy, one can only speculate what could have happened. Poor Michael Jackson. I know that many things can lead to cardiac arrest. It is one of the biggest risk factors of the two things that plagued my own young life: drug abuse and eating disorders.
Perhaps it’s unfair or too cynical to conclude that Jackson’s end may have been the final result of a lifestyle of damaging weight loss and/or drug abuse, but celebrity deaths can sometimes help to bring attention to the huge risks that lie in dangerous lifestyles. His repeated cosmetic surgeries make me wonder how unhappy he might have been with himself. I hope that Jackson’s death wasn’t the end result of an eating disorder or drug abuse. That would mean he had been miserable for years, and I pity anyone- celebrity or not- who has to endure that kind of pain. I hope that his kids will be okay, and that his family can have some peace. Rest in peace Michael.
A 20-year study has concluded that abstinence from alcohol rather than controlled drinking has proven to be the most beneficial method of recovery for alcoholics. It makes sense to me. When I first entered adolescent drug rehab, it made sense to me that I should probably stop using drugs, but alcohol? I wasn’t even old enough to drink legally. I wondered what I would do when I went to college, or turned 21, or got married. What would I drink on New Year’s Eve? How would I ever have a normal life? Some of my friends and family shared similar concerns. Not even a glass of wine at dinner? None of Nana’s famous eggnog? The decision to remain completely abstinent from alcohol and drugs was made after I realized in adolescent drug treatment that it didn’t matter what the substance was. If everything was taken away from me, I got creative and abused over-the-counter medications and inhalants that I could find around the house. If left to my own devices, I found myself taking heroin and nearly dying.
Understanding the root of my addiction helps me to make the decision to remain abstinent one day at a time. I know that if I were to drink, all of the work I’ve done will go out the window, and let me tell you- that work was painful and difficult, so I’m not going to just toss my progress away! It is rare that I encounter a situation where I feel like I wish I was drinking. In my age group now, my peers in Manhattan Beach still like to binge drink, and that never looks good to me. I don’t want to puke on my shoes anymore, you know? In day to day life, I feel proud of my teen recovery. I don’t tell everyone I know about it. Many people think that maybe what I went through was just a phase and that I’m being dramatic. It doesn’t matter what they think. I learned in teen drug treatment to put my recovery first, no matter what. I have watched peers relapse and end up worse than when they started, and I don’t want to trade the life I have now for a life of shame, guilt, and puking on my shoes.
I don’t worry anymore about what my life will be like without alcohol. I worry about what it would be like with alcohol. I continue to take the steps to protect my sobriety that I learned in adolescent rehab. I stay connected with my support group. I attend 12-step meetings. I don’t spend an unnecessary amount of time around alcohol and I don’t hang out with people who are using drugs. Sometimes these decisions make me feel awkward, but I can deal with awkward. I will take awkward any day over the despair and hopelessness I felt when I was drinking and using. Teen drug and alcohol treatment gave me an opportunity to honestly look at the destructive force drugs and alcohol were in my life, and showed me a new way to live, one day at a time.
Teens with drug problems come from all walks of life; they aren’t just the teenage runaways depicted in Lifetime movies as I’d originally thought. Teens develop drug problems for a number of reasons- my daughter’s competitive nature seemed to be what initially led her down the path of drug and alcohol abuse. I was the last person to suspect that my daughter was a drug user. On the outside, she was a perfect student. She excelled in school, taking all honors classes, and was the star of the track and volleyball teams. I often wondered how she could get it all done. She never got into trouble and seemed pretty happy at school. I knew my daughter was extremely hard on herself. Her weight began to drop and she seemed increasingly edgy and irritated. I chalked it all up to the stresses of high school and teen angst and tried to talk to her more. Her withdrawing from the family seemed like something teens do- I didn’t want to smother her. I tried to be more lenient with her. She was such a good student I never suspected she was up to anything dangerous.
One night I heard a crash in her room. I found her sitting on the floor sobbing. I asked her what was wrong and she just cried and cried. It was a heartbreaking thing, to not be able to fix what was hurting her. I don’t know what possessed her to tell me, but finally she just blurted out that she had a problem with pills and couldn’t stop. I was floored. It was hard not to get angry with her, because I felt so scared, but at the same time, I didn’t want to discourage her from talking to me. I guess she’d put so much pressure on herself to be the best at everything she eventually became a candidate for teen drug treatment turned to stimulants like Adderral to help her preform and downers like Xanax to take the stress away. As she opened up to me that night, I was horrified to learn what she was putting herself through. I promised we would get help, but I had no idea what to do for her. Sitting there on the floor, holding my sobbing daughter, I felt as terrified as she did.
I had heard of Visions through a coworker, but had never thought much of it, since I didn’t think I’d ever need that information. They were amazingly helpful and understanding. It was hard leaving her there, but the weekly family sessions helped me work on myself so that I could help my daughter. She just blossomed there. Instead of being the rigid girl I knew who was so incredibly tough on herself, I began to see a girl who took care of herself and could respect her own limitations. As my daughter worked on herself, I learned ways to help support my daughter’s new sobriety. She isn’t a bad kid because she did drugs. She’s a fantastic kid. She always has been. Visions Adolescent Drug Treatment Center just helped her realize that.
According to a recent survey of 48,000 teens, Robo-Tripping, or abusing cough medicine to get high, is one of the top ten abused drugs by teenagers. It is Also a major admitting factor to adolescent drug treatment in Newport Beach. Robo-tripping is often viewed as harmless because it is not a hard street drug, but it’s effects can result in slow breathing, cerebral hemorrhaging, brain damage, seizures, stroke, or death. Dextromethorphan, also know as “dex” or DXM, can be obtained through cough relief medicines in either pill or syrup form. Cough syrup is one of the first drugs I ever abused. It was right there in my friend’s house in Newport Beach. The effects made me feel like I couldn’t move and I felt displaced from my body. According to my research now, that is actually a very dangerous side effect of overdose. Good to know. At the time, I thought, “This is weird.” I had no idea that cough syrup abuse could actually kill me. It wasn’t a particularly good high- in fact it was kind of gross- but since I was only seeking to change the way I felt, and it was easy to get, I went for it. I stashed the family’s cough syrup in my room, stole it from my friend’s houses, or stole it from the grocery store (where I also stole whipped cream cans…more on that another day). Parents should keep an eye out for medicine bottles or pill packages, or a mediciney smell to your teen’s breath. Teens under the influence of DXM can appear drunkish, dizzy, paranoid, or slow to respond. I remember the time my mom picked me up from my friend’s house after the first time we’d tried it and she asked me what was wrong. “I’m tired,” became a usual utterance for me after that. Yes, teens have a lot on their plates and get tired, but I was unreasonably tired for a long time. There is a difference between being sleepy, and being unable to keep your eyes open because you’re loaded on drugs. Ultimately, DXM abuse generally leads to abuse of other drugs. Stopping drug use early can save a teen from years of problems or death. Keep all medicines away from children and teenagers. Talk to your teen. If you think your child is struggling with DXM abuse, don’t hesitate to contact us today.
New research indicated that young people who drink before the age of 16 are much more likely to suffer from alcohol related problems as adults. Teens who drink are more than twice as likely to develop a dependence on alcohol than teens who wait until age 21 to drink. Teens who drink are more likely to drive drunk as well. Again, all of these findings make me grateful for the help I got as a teen through adolescent Drug Treatment in San Diego. I don’t know what my life would have been like if I’d continued on my destructive path. I don’t know if I’d even be alive today.
Addiction tends to be a progressive disease, but it is possible to arrest its progress and find a new way to live. At least where I went to high school, lots of kids were drinking. I don’t know why my drinking became such a problem and other kids managed to make it out of high school without being sent to rehab. I have seen several of them turn to harder drugs, get DUI’s, drop out of college, or die. Some of them seem pretty fine, but their whole existence focuses around what bar they went to last night, and where they’re going tonight. That’s fine for them, but I am so glad that my life is bigger than that. Because I am in recovery, I have gotten a chance to help other people that are in the situation I used to be in, and that is extremely gratifying. When I was drinking, I was constantly “not feeling good” due to hangovers and physical dependence. Liquor slowly disappeared from my parent’s supply. I think for awhile they thought they were hallucinating its disappearance. I was a straight-A honors student, so who would suspect me? (When my grades dropped significantly…that was a sign.) I rarely spent the night at my house. I chose to sleep over with friends whose parents weren’t as alert as mine. I got a fake ID. I always chewed gum (to mask the smell- or so I thought) and was very protective of my backpack and closet (where I hid things). I think my parents didn’t want to see what was right in front of them. Who would? No one wants to think their kid is an out of control alcoholic. When I went to treatment it was a relief to everyone. While I was there, I was safe from doing further harm to myself and my family, and began the long and slow process of getting better. My life today seems a million miles away from the life I had when I walked into treatment. I am so glad I got the chance to do something different.
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A medication aimed at fighting cocaine addiction failed in clinical trials recently. Things like this make me really think about my addiction and recovery. If I was offered a medical “cure” for my addiction, would I take it? Would I stop my involvement in recovery and being of service to other addicts and alcoholics and just take a pill? I don’t think so. When I think of the life I have in recovery, I know that most of the fulfillment in my life comes from the community I have built around myself. Treatment introduced me to a whole new way of life.
When I first went to adolescent Drug Treatment, all I could focus on was figuring out how to not use drugs. I couldn’t think of much else. As time went by, I began to learn that in order to stay clean, I had to change a lot of things about myself; recovery was going to take a lot more than not using drugs. I began to want to be a better person. When I was using, I damaged the relationship I had with my family. I wasn’t trustworthy. I never did what I said I was going to do. I messed up in school and brought a lot of chaos into my home. In rehab, we learned how to become better sons and daughters, siblings, and friends. When I, I got more involved in 12-step fellowships and began to give back what was given to me. I speak on panels at rehabs, sharing my experience, strength, and hope. I work with young people in treatment and in meetings. I try to set an example. One of the coolest things to me about recovery is that we are all trying to be better people. A pill treating the physical side of my addiction wouldn’t give me a reason to try and be better person, or to build the fantastic relationships I have in my life today. Rehab gave me more than a life free of drugs and their consequences; it gave me a new way to live.
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Boredom is often cited as a reason people relapse. Being thrill-seeking people, addicts and alcoholics often demand a lot from life, seeking stimulation and excitement. Sometimes this gets us into trouble. I’m from Santa Monica and when I got clean, I thought that I was facing a life of total boredom. In rehab, I learned that a life in recovery does not at all have to be boring. Yesterday I went to Six Flags Magic Mountain for the young people’s AA day. There’s nothing more exciting than roller coasters, and being surrounded by tons and tons of young people in recovery made it even better. When I was in treatment, Visions Adolescent Drug Treatment Center took us there and I remember being amazed at the huge numbers of sober teens just having a blast at Magic Mountain. I returned for the event yesterday and even ran into new residents and old residents, and it was great to be one of the recovering teens that I had looked up to not so long ago.
Part of what I learned in treatment was that I had to learn to take responsibility for my own life, including when I feel bored. As a teenager in recovery, it is easy to sit back and feel like I can still depend on my parents or peers to entertain me, but part of growing up is learning to take care of myself emotionally. Recovery has taught me to take personal responsibility and to learn how to be honest with myself. If I am feeling bored, I have to ask myself if I am looking to act out negatively, or if I am genuinely in a rut and need to change something about my life. Treatment taught me how to have constructive conversations with myself, and how to be honest about my feelings- a key tool in staying sober. I have had more fun being sober than I ever had using drugs. Being sober, I’m free. I’m free to craft the life I want for myself. It isn’t always easy, but rehab taught me how to take care of myself, one day at a time.
Please click here if you would like to contact us for more information regarding adolescent drug treatment
