Smithtown Parents: Go To Drug Meeting, Or No Prom

Unfortunately this is a sign of the times. I can remember going to a mandatory mother daughter meeting in 4th or 5th grade for the "special movie" about developing!! Life is not so simple now. Heroin is everywhere. I meet or hear of someone every day that is somehow involved in this frightening epidemic. There are so many young lives being effected and ruined because of this new drug surge on Long Island. Our kids don't know better, they weren't taught better. We think we have it all under control, but lets face it, things are getting past us. Heroin snuck in right under our noses. Did you hear about heroin first from your child or the media? Our kids know darn well this drug is around, and they know other kids using it. They just don't tell us everything. They keep parts of their lives to themselves. The Smithtown School district gets my stamp of approval for bringing much needed information to the parents as well as the children. If a mandatory meeting is the only way to get parents to attend, then so be it. Open communication is the best tool we have as parents. Now we all have something to talk about, learn about and push the hell out of our neighborhoods.

As a smithtown graduate of 08 and a recovering heroin addict with a year and a half clean of drugs and alcohol, I think this is crucial. I was heavy into drugs since about 9th grade and my parents knew very little of what was going on. Some parents believe that "well, im sure my kid is drinking occasionally, or even smoking pot once in a while" but even that should not be acceptable. I went into a rehab during my last semester at Smithtown West, at this point i was heavily into heroin and thought i was a lost cause. Thankfully with the support of my parents, i was lucky to make out a live clean and serene. This program should be mandatory, but I feel that scientists and medical experts arent going to get to the parents and students. No one wants to hear the fact, we all know heroin and other mind or mood altering substances are bad. What they need to bring in, is people who went through it. People that can get up there and relate to the parents, and the students. Have both sides of it. A parent with an addict child, and a recovering addict who got clean at an early age. I will tell you right now, that the reason i am clean today is not from learning from a counselor who only knows about addiction from a text book, but from people who lived it. I am currently and have been in a 12 step fellowship that has kept me clean and restored me to sanity and gave me not my old life back, but a brand new one. What a lot of parents don't understand is, that they don't know their children as well as they think. A 4.0 student can still be an addict. My parents had no idea what was going on with me. I suggest that parents give out drug tests, if they have nothing to hide they shouldn't be afraid to take one. I did not make it to my prom because i was in rehab, but i know my plans were to party all night and take whatever i could get my hands on. And if you know your child had an addiction problem, don't throw it under the rug or try punishing them, sympathize with them, get them into treatment, do whatever you have to, attend nara-non or ala-non meetings if you dont know what to do. Addiction is a life long process, people do not and cannot "just stop" i am battling a life long disease and am taking the appropriate steps to do what ever i have to to make sure i never pick up again.

Recovering Addict wrote:

As a smithtown graduate of 08 and a recovering heroin addict with a year and a half clean of drugs and alcohol, I think this is crucial. I was heavy into drugs since about 9th grade and my parents knew very little of what was going on. Some parents believe that "well, im sure my kid is drinking occasionally, or even smoking pot once in a while" but even that should not be acceptable. I went into a rehab during my last semester at Smithtown West, at this point i was heavily into heroin and thought i was a lost cause. Thankfully with the support of my parents, i was lucky to make out a live clean and serene. This program should be mandatory, but I feel that scientists and medical experts arent going to get to the parents and students. No one wants to hear the fact, we all know heroin and other mind or mood altering substances are bad. What they need to bring in, is people who went through it. People that can get up there and relate to the parents, and the students. Have both sides of it. A parent with an addict child, and a recovering addict who got clean at an early age. I will tell you right now, that the reason i am clean today is not from learning from a counselor who only knows about addiction from a text book, but from people who lived it. I am currently and have been in a 12 step fellowship that has kept me clean and restored me to sanity and gave me not my old life back, but a brand new one. What a lot of parents don't understand is, that they don't know their children as well as they think. A 4.0 student can still be an addict. My parents had no idea what was going on with me. I suggest that parents give out drug tests, if they have nothing to hide they shouldn't be afraid to take one. I did not make it to my prom because i was in rehab, but i know my plans were to party all night and take whatever i could get my hands on. And if you know your child had an addiction problem, don't throw it under the rug or try punishing them, sympathize with them, get them into treatment, do whatever you have to, attend nara-non or ala-non meetings if you dont know what to do. Addiction is a life long process, people do not and cannot "just stop" i am battling a life long disease and am taking the appropriate steps to do what ever i have to to make sure i never pick up again.

Well said and Good Luck to you. Keep up the good work and stay sober and enjoy your life. You are an inspiration to others in your situation, and I hope your message is heard loud and clear by others. There is help if you want it and education is the key!!

1) The problem is not drugs, the problem is drug abuse.

2) Illegal drugs fund gangs, terrorists, crime and death.

3) The Netherlands takes a more progressive attitude toward drugs and drug use and yet, their drug problems have not significantly increased in decades.

4) Someone who is willing to accept the risks of drug use, will not stop until they change themselves or they die, let them learn the hard way. That is how life teaches us. Remember, "...we forge the chains we wear in life..."?

5) When people drank, smoked, partied and humped, they didn't walk into school and blow away their classmates and teachers. Those who are so inclined will always find something to take, regardless of the consequences. Shall we all be penalized for that?

6) Too much government control of personal lives is ALWAYS a very bad thing. What makes these civil servants more intelligent about these problems then the parents? Who are they to tell anyone how to raise their children?

7) You don't get to trade OUR liberty for YOUR comfort. If you are so concerned about the welfare and safety of your children, you deal with your children; not mine. How I raise my kids is none of your business.

8) Sometimes, people have to die to preserve the liberties and freedoms we all enjoy. That doesn;t mean "just soldiers".

If you think this is an intelligent approach to solving this problem, you need your head examined.

It is much more likely that you are incompetent or unwilling to accept responsibility for your own life. Stop wasting my life because you don;t want responsibility for yours.

if you actually think that your being penalized for having to go to meeting, your the one that needs to get their head straight. All they are trying to do is raise awareness of the problem. We all know every kid that drinks or smokes weed isn't an addict. But there is a drug problem, and we cant just sit back and let it continue. We are powerless over what people are going to do, but that doesn't mean we cant raise awareness. Drop the timothy leary retardedness you lazy pot head.