
Parenting Teenagers (12-18) Support Group
This community is focused on the joys, challenges and concerns faced by parents of teenagers (12 to 18 year olds). The major areas of child development include: physical development, perception and sensory development, communication and language development, cognitive development, emotional development and social development.
a. it seems cool at the time
b. its pretty harmless, unless he is driving or having sex.
c. boredom. Thats the biggest reason to smoke pot. you have nothing to do and sit back and think about stresses in life and wallah, they are gone.
Have you smoked?
Since he doesn't have job, and since most of his friends don't have jobs, I don't know where the money to buy pot comes from. I have all but cut him off, and if he says he needs something, I take him to the store myself. I no longer give him the money to do with what he wants.
He knows a lot of the local dealers, and pretty much only hangs out with other kids that smoke pot.
His marks in school are passable, not great, but he is passing. He does not participate in family things any more, and is seldom home, but follows curfew.
Some say it is a phase and will pass. Is there any guarantee of that?
most likely it is a phase until someone he knows pays the price (gets caught, gets locked up, gets expelled, or ?) I dont know. Does he realize that you know he smokes?
As far as the money part, he could be selling CDs or playing cards or trading lunch for pot, you name it. If one person has cigarettes, the other has pot, they trade a little of each, etc.
He says he only tried it twice, and that was all since school started this year.
I smoked when I was a teenager and up into my 20's. Which of course I DID NOT tell him. IMO... I wish they would make drinking illegal and pot legal. No I don't smoke anymore. I have 2 kids now and it's illegal - would not be worth loosing my kids over for sure.
I was shocked when he told me - why?? Not sure.
Don't know exactly what advice to give you on this one. I know you love your son very much and don't want to see him go down a bad road.
I would not tell him it's okay. Right now I am trying to get mine into as many positive activities as possible. If they are busy doing other things then they don't have time to get into trouble. It's hard though if yours doesn't want to get involved with anything.
Does he like animals? Is there a shelter nearby that he could volunteer at? Just a thought.
Also, I agree with the others, if your son is smoking on a regular basis (and not just socially) he probably is "self-medicating" and you might want to have him evaluated by a therapist. There may be underlying issues that need to be addressed.
Also, if you want him off the pot completely, there are home drug-tests that you can have him do.
Best of luck to you!
I wish you and ur family lots of luck.
Morgaine
As far as the "self medicating" theory... And the other parents here saying it's alright or whatever, it's NOT alright. It's against the law, and if he gets caught the "self medicating" excuse will NOT work. it will NOT keep him out of trouble. Is it a phase? Could be, guarantee? No. I grew up around kids that smoked pot friends with most of them, and what do they do today? Hmmm.. One is 45 lives at home with mom because he won't work and is on harder drugs. Another? hmmm. She's moved around so much living off the state has had too many kids to name, all in states custody because she moved on to harder drugs. Another friend, still smoking pot, doesn't work, lives off the state, has one child, no car nothing to her name. I can't think of ONE single person that i've known to smoke pot on a regular basis that has made something of themselves. It doesn't happen often. Pot is a drug. There are reasons that it's not legal. Mainly for the affects it has on brain cells. In severe cases it's prescribed as a medication but that's in severe cases where the good outweighs the bad. If it were my son, I'd be issuing pop drug tests and if he failed he'd be grounded to stay home. PERIOD.
He said he did it because he thought it would make him feel better. Since that time,
we have discovered that he has been seriously depressed to the point of thoughts of suicide. (Sorry, I don't mean to scare you.) Our situation may be quite different from yours though as he also has recently been diagnosed as bipolar (yes,
I am in the community also). However,
my point is, is your son using because he is
depressed? My son unfortunately keeps his feelings to himself. Perhaps some counseling would help to sort things out for him. Good luck with this!
Look where he's at now.