The involvement of America's teenagers and young adults in illicit drug abuse is greater than in any other nation in the industrialized world. Six out of ten teenagers will use illicit drugs at least once before finishing high school. Many were first exposed to drugs at an early age. One in three eighth graders has abused inhalants. The National Institute on Drug Abuse reports that when all is said and done, over 70 percent of all American adults have used an illicit drug by the time they reach their late 20s.
Drugs are back with a vengeance.
And while your children and teens may not be personally involved, the opportunity and possibility is always there. Not long ago I visited a young friend at a rehabilitation hospital. Recovering from a severe spinal cord injury that had left him a paraplegic, he shared a room with several other teenage spinal cord injury victims who had been left partially or fully paralyzed as the result of automobile accidents involving alcohol. As I looked around the room, I was struck by the collection of photographs on their bulletin boards. Many of the pictures were of these young men before their horrible accidents.