Ep 152: Alcohol, Drugs, and Prevention

Jessica Lahey, author of The Addiction Inoculation and The Gift
of Failure, joins us for a second time to talk about her latest
book and the power of inoculation theory to help teens say no to
alcohol, drugs, and other risky behaviors.


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Full show notes


Stories of addiction and overdoses are incredibly scary. We hear
about teens who lose their way after getting in with the wrong
crowd, or watch friends and family struggle to keep their lives
together while battling substance abuse. As a parent, the last
thing you want is for kids to fall into a destructive pattern of
addiction that slowly chips away at their mental and physical
health….but teens are impressionable and drug and alcohol use
among adolescents is on the rise. What can we do to make sure our
teens don’t develop a substance use disorder?


Today, we’re talking about prevention. So often, we view
substance abuse from the end, looking at the rock bottom as the
starting place for recovery. And while it’s important to
acknowledge those life-changing moments of realization, it’s time
to focus on how we can stop our teens from using drugs at all. In
this episode, we’re getting into the steps you can take right now
to ensure your teen is safe from substance abuse.


Our guest is Jessica Lahey, author of Addiction Inoculation:
Raising Healthy Kids in a Culture of Dependence. With over 20
years of teaching and parenting experience under her belt,
Jessica began to write about her experiences, becoming a blogger,
journalist, and eventually a best-selling author. Her work with
adolescents in rehab clinics pushed her to research and write on
the subject of substance abuse–primarily how we can prevent it
instead of waiting until our teens hit rock bottom.


In our interview, we’re debating the existence of gateway drugs,
explaining how kids get into substance use, and deconstructing
the popular myth that it’s better to give kids wine at the dinner
table before they reach drinking age. Plus, we’re covering things
like academic failure, monitoring teens online activities and
more!


The Truth About Adolescent Addiction


We all want to know the truth behind why teens develop
addictions–but there are so many myths, stereotypes, and
misconceptions to shift through! In our interview, Jessica and I
start out by tackling the popular notion of gateway substances.
Does the use of marijuana really lead to more serious drug use?
Do vapes make kids more inclined to try cigarettes? The answer is
more complicated than you might think, and, surprisingly, has a
lot to do with racial profiling.


Jessica and I also touch on an often debated topic: the role of
genetics in the development of substance abuse. According to
Jessica, genetics are about 50 to 60 percent of the risk factor
for addiction, but early childhood experiences are also pivotal.
Kids can be affected by a whole range of things–whether it’s
seriously traumatic experiences or something as common as moving
to a new place. The more adverse events kids battle with, the
more susceptible they are to substance use disorder...meaning
prevention is even more important, says Jessica.


Let’s say you want to keep your kid from experimenting with
substances, so you get rid of all the alcohol in the house...but
your friends say it’s smarter to just let them have a little bit
of wine when the family sits down for dinner. Or, if they’re
going to go out with their friends and get drunk anyway, maybe
it’s wiser to just give them beers, lock them in the basement and
take away their car keys….right? In the episode, Jessica explains
how introducing your kids to substances early on can actually
backfire.


Now that we’ve separated fact from fiction, let’s talk about
action. How can we take steps to prevent alcoholism and drug
dependence among our teens? Is it smart to monitor their
behaviors or let them make their own way in the world? We cover
that in the episode too!


Should You Be Tracking Your Teen?


As a worried parent, it makes sense that you want to know what
your kids are up to. Nowadays, you can use technology to follow
your kids phone, see their card transactions, read their texts,
see what websites they’re visiting….the list goes on! And
although it’s tempting to surveil your teen just to make sure
they aren’t getting into trouble, Jessica doesn’t recommend it.
In the episode, she explains why she suggests that parents take a
step back from all the monitoring, even though it’s so
accessible.


As Jessica shares in our interview, research shows that the more
teens feel that they’re being controlled, the more likely they
are to lie to their parents. Plus, they’ve been shown to have
less motivation than teens who are more independent! While all
that control might make you feel more secure as a parent, you
have to let kids face the music on their own, says Jessica. In
our interview, she describes the process of “individuation” in
which teens learn to do their own thing–away from grown ups. In
the episode, she explains how significant this process is for
teens to grow into healthy adults.


Instead of focusing on putting up walls for your teen, Jessica
emphasizes the value of building bridges. If you can cultivate a
strong relationship with your kid based on mutual trust and
vulnerability, you might find that you won’t read their texts or
track their location to stay in touch with what’s going on in
their lives, says Jessica. We talk further in the episode about
how to walk the line between being a friend to your kid and being
an authority figure.


When it comes to teaching kids to be independent, confident
individuals, there’s another area of expertise for Jessica:
helping kids handle failure. In our interview, we touch on some
fascinating ideas from her first book, The Gift Of Failure: How
to Step Back and Let Your Child Succeed.


Flipping Failure on its Head


Teens can be pretty dramatic, taking one small failure and making
it into the end of the world. They get upset beyond consolation
over one bad grade, or act as though their break up means they’ll
never be able to return to school again. As a parent, it can be
pretty frustrating to get teens to listen to reason and remember
that next week, they’ll forget about the whole thing. If your
teen is having trouble handling failure, Jessica has some advice
for you!


Her method involves two parts: making failure specific and
success general. By honing in on the exact details of a failure,
Jessica says we can help teens see it as an isolated incident.
For example, say a teenager gets detention for talking to a
friend in class. It may make them feel like a bad student, or
leave the impression that their teacher hates them.


Jessica suggests prompting your teen to ask themselves why they
got into trouble. If they can break down their underlying
motivations, they might realize that they were only talking in
class because they were nervous about doing well on the test.
Jessica stresses the importance of helping them see how they’re
still on the road to success. Instead of being a distraction,
they were trying to be a dedicated student–and it’s not too late
to explain that to their teacher. Using Jessica’s method, you can
help teens put their failure in pers...