Do you look at your teen's friends and wonder what rock they crawled out from under? Do you peruse your teen's report card and wonder "How can anyone flunk P.E.???" Does your teen suddenly seem overly lethargic and close mouthed or overly exuberant and talkative? Has your teen suddenly lost motivation? Has your teen suddenly become irrationally impulsive? These can all be signs that your teen has begun experimentation and abuse of drugs or alcohol.

Here's a scenario that played out one evening in our house: We were called by the police to come pick up our 17 year old son for causing a drunken disturbance at a grocery store the very night after he had been released from two months in juvenile detention. After picking our stomachs off the floor, my husband and I drove out to meet with the officers. When we arrived, my son was still yelling his head off at the policemen. When we attempted to rationally voice our none too few problems and frustrations with his current behavior choice he began to scream and curse at us, making an even better impression on the police officers. He continued to loudly proclaim his innocence and everyone's total lack of understanding all the while smelling like a cheap beer hall bathroom floor until he passed out at home.

Did this show an extreme lack of judgement on his part? Decidedly. Did this show an increased lack of cognitive skill? Obviously. Had he been impulsive in his decision to go out and tie one on? Certainly. Was he able to resist the imagined pleasure of drunkeness? Obviously not. These were the effects of alcohol/drug abuse on my son's brain.

We lived in fear of evenings like this for 4 years. We felt that we could not leave our home unattended. The constant interplay with the troubled teen was taking valuable quality time from our younger teen. We never knew when the next violent erruption would start or what would be the cause. In short, for 4 years we felt as if we were tight rope walking across the Grand Canyon without a net, safety lines or know-how.

In an article on Parenting Today's Teen, http://www.parentingteens.com/askwilkie1... Wilkie Wilson,PhD explains that the development of the brain's frontal lobes is not completed until around the age of 21. This is the part of the brain which controls impulse behaviors, planning and execution, socialization factors, etc. These are precisely the areas of the brain which are targeted by drugs and alcohol. What do you think is going to happen if you take a substance which reduces function to these already reduced function areas of the brain? Very likely you will see any number of the symptoms I stated at the beginning of this article. Undoubtably you will see these effects grow worse with time unless you take tough measures to stop the abuse.

The abuse of drugs and alcohol have long term effects on the brain. If your teen begins siting any of the current street drug mythology, just have them take a gander at a mere few of the multitudes of research articles done on the subject by people who are not trying to make a living by keeping teens using drugs. Here are just a few of the hundreds I browsed through today:

http://www.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/aa... An article which shows how heavy drinking and alcoholism cause permanent shrinkage in the frontal lobe area of the brain. The brain can heal from the damage to a certain degree over time and with abstinence, but not fully

http://www.nida.nih.gov/NIDA_Notes/NNVol... An article which shows how Cocaine use blocks the normal flow of dopamine, a neurotransmitter which is associated with body movement, awareness, judgment, motivation, and pleasure. Researchers believe that this blocking of dopamine reuptake is what may be at the root of addiction.

http://165.112.78.61/MarijBroch/Marijpar... An article which shows how Marijuana affects the parts of the brain associated with short term memory as well as the same areas affected by cocaine and alcohol abuse.

And if these aren't enough and you want to REALLY get technical take a look at CRISP- Computer Retrieval of Information on Scientific Projects, https://www-commons.cit.nih.gov/crisp/index.html, an enormous database of current biomedical research. Use their Current Awards Query form to search for current projects regarding the key words "drug abuse".

Despite the popular street myths, drugs and alcohol devastate our families both physically and emotionally. As parents we cannot be naive and infinitely trusting that even our normal teens will make the right choices. Their brains are not developed enough yet to handle all the variables. Drug and alcohol experimentation and abuse can happen to even the best teens. With troubled teens the temptation variables are even greater.

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