How to Recognize Drug Use in Your Teenager

How to Recognize Drug Use in Your Teenager
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It can be very frightening to wonder why your child has suddenly become a different person, seemingly overnight. Parents can feel a list of emotions regarding these new behaviors, including shame and worry. The most likely cause of a complete metamorphosis in character is that the teenager has begun to use drugs. While this is worrisome, there are drug tests to ensure that this can be accurately assessed. The first step is to recognize the signs of drug use. The following is a list of signs that the teenager has begun ingesting illegal substances:

1. Your teenager's grades have dropped

School is a great measure of where a child is at. When there is a marked drop is academic performance, a likely cause is that the child has lost interest in school. There are other explanations, such as the onset of a learning disorder or a mental illness, so do not jump the gun. However, this is still one of the tell tale signs that a teenager has something seriously interfering with their motivation and mental acuity. Unfortunately, use of drugs can lead to tiredness at school and a fixed focus on obtaining more of the drug of choice. School becomes the place where the teenagers drug connects are found, not the learning environment that it previously presented as.

2. Your teenager sleeps at odd hours

Doesn't every teenager rise and wake on a different time schedule than the rest of society? While this is true, when teenagers are engaging in drug use, their circadian rhythms become severely disrupted. They rise and fall to the beat of the new chemical balances and imbalances being created in their brains. Often home time becomes sleep time because a teenager is looking to catch up from staying up all night and partying. This will become especially apparent if you don't enforce a curfew, because likely while the child is sleeping over at friends, they are actually not sleeping at all. This is when their drug binges are occurring. They may return home the next day and sleep the entire day.

3. Your teenager is getting sick a lot

This is usually what addicts call being "dope sick." The body is reacting to all the stress that has been put on it from a day of drug taking and not sleeping. The body wants more of the drug to continue on in a state of euphoria. When it doesn't get what it wants, it reacts, sometimes violently. Your teenager may often be in their bed with a "fever" and full body aches. They at this point will do anything to get out and find more of the drugs they have become dependent on. So alarm bells should be ringing in your head when your child appears violently ill but still needs to go out and hang out with their friends or work on a homework assignment at the library. Are teenagers really that resilient? The more likely answer is that they are going to meet up with a supplier.

4. Your teenager has frequent visitors to the house

Continuing on from the last point, teenagers who do drugs have lots of willing friends who don't mind doing home visits. These adolescents may seem to be on their death bed, but Johnny, Bill, Suzy, and Tom all drop by in one day to drop off homework. Seems like these teens have some great friends. But if the friends give you a funny feeling, trust your gut instincts. These might just be entrepreneurs of the drug trade coming to get their cut and drop off product.

While parents want to trust their teenagers, they also don't want to see them wreck their lives. When teenagers display the above behaviors and you have a bad feeling, you don't need to look the other way. You can insist that your teenager does a drug test if they want to continue to live in your house. You will regret the damage they begin doing later if this is not nipped in the bud. Teenagers on drugs often can't hold a part-time job and steal from their families and neighbors. Don't let your teenagers become delinquents; help them flourish into who they were meant to be my forcing them to overcome drug addictions.

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