Pubdate: Wed, 27 Sep 2000
Source: Naperville Sun (IL)
Copyright: 2000 Sun Publications
Address: 1500 Ogden Ave., Naperville IL 60540
Website: http://www.copleynewspapers.com/sunpub/naper/
Forum: http://www.copleynewspapers.com/survey/
Author: Linda Bicksler

TAKING PREVENTIVE MEASURES

Workshop Focuses On Informing Parents Of Today's Drug Scene

Robin Amberger, student assistance coordinator at Naperville Central High 
School, pulled no punches.

Her low voice was sober, at times feeling, always purposeful. She didn't 
mince words.

At a workshop Thursday, Amberger and school resource officer Tim Erdman 
gave 90 parents and a handful of students an update on today's drug scene.

It's a parent's job to find out enough to become a "credible resource" for 
their children, Amberger said. Adults should educate their children about 
drugs — not the reverse.

There's a lot to know.

While some new drugs may be unknown, one of the key messages of the 
workshop was that many familiar drugs have changed from when adults were in 
high school.

New substances that have not yet been researched, such as the drug ecstasy, 
are "making guinea pigs of our children," Amberger said. Older drugs, such 
as marijuana, heroin and LSD, have been altered in ways that make them more 
insidious than ever.

Teens' increased use of pipe-like paraphernalia called bowls, bongs and 
blunts means they experience a much heavier dosage than the joints, or 
rolled marijuana cigarettes, of the 1970s.

"Kids become zombified pot smokers," Amberger said. "If you have two joints 
a week over six months, your system becomes saturated - even if you are not 
smoking."

As a result, she said, students can become apathetic, drop out of 
extracurricular activities or give up lifelong dreams.

"Kids feel, 'I'm fine.' But it's sneaky," Amberger said. "You don't feel it 
happening."

Some parents may be unaware their child has a problem.

Certain drugs clear the system within hours, Amberger said. A teen may take 
drugs at a party or the start of a school day and return home appearing 
normal. Other drugs, such as LSD, can cause terrifying hallucinations. Even 
though LSD is less potent than it was in the past, its "profound impact on 
the brain" can still cause flashbacks for years.

As for heroin, "It's back. There's been a generational forgetting," 
Amberger said.

The competitive price, sometimes only $10 a hit, and new method of use, 
snorting, not injecting, may cause teens to think heroin isn't so bad. And 
yet the "purity," or potency, has increased.

Amberger said she battles the teen perception that adults are 
overstretching reality.

"They look at what adults are saying and what their friends are doing and 
saying, 'My friends are OK.' They're not telling the truth. But bad things 
can happen."

Amberger told the story of a District 203 student who was half-carried, 
half-dragged by friends to a football game. Fearful the girl might get 
caught being drunk, they took her to the cemetery near Naperville Central 
High School with the intent of picking her up later.

The girl was found - with a blood alcohol content of .43.

"Her breathing was so erratic, she was hardly breathing at all," Amberger 
said. "I told the students that if she hadn't been found, they might as 
well have left her there permanently."

Beyond the legal definition of intoxication, a blood-alcohol content 
greater than .08, and the point at which a person is obviously drunk, a 
blood-alcohol level of .2, come signs the body is overloaded with alcohol.

"At .3 percent, you vomit, and that's a wake-up call," Amberger said. "At 
.4 percent, the body passes out so you won't consume any more. At .5 
percent, you die of an overdose."

Parents shouldn't be naive, Amberger said.

"Kids don't drink socially. They drink to get drunk. Let's be honest here. 
They're not just sitting around with a nice little cocktail and umbrella."

"I kind of feel ignorant about drugs in Naperville. I wanted to know what 
was out there," said parent Joanne Louis about why she attended the seminar.

While Louis said she doesn't think her son, a sophomore at Central, uses 
drugs, "I don't want to be so ignorant I would say this couldn't ever be my 
child," she said. "We think it's always in somebody else's neighborhood."

Students Evan Bassett, a junior, and Gretchen Auten, a sophomore, heard the 
presentation while working that night in Central's theater.

"I think it's important, but to some extent, it might exaggerate what the 
risk is," Bassett said.

Auten said she knows teens who abuse alcohol and marijuana. She also said 
she was surprised Amberger mentioned drugs like steroids and wild mushrooms 
because she had never heard of them being used in Naperville.

"No one is really pressing me to try," Auten said. "Even if they did, I 
won't. I think they're bad. They're wrong."
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