AHS Views

Peer pressure has long been known to be a factor in drug and alcohol abuse and a lot of other undesirable behavior.  For many people, especially kids, it’s hard to stick to your guns when friends are urging you to do something you normally wouldn’t do. This kind of situation can lead to a lot of alcohol and drug abuse that wouldn’t have occured otherwise, and the need for addiction help services for someone who may have been the last person you suspected would ever have such a problem.

Parents talking to their kids about the dangers of drugs and alcohol, and really thoroughly educating them on it rather than just telling them they shouldn’t do it, gives them the understanding they need to help resist temptation. And the earlier the better - if you want to be finding a college for your kids instead of addiction help services, you can’t start educating them soon enough.

However, more than education about alcohol and drugs was obviously needed for 18-year-old Adam Beggs who recently died from alcohol poisoning after drinking an entire bottle of vodka. Why do I say that? Adam was given the vodka by a 24-year-old guy who was also drinking and dared Adam to guzzle it down. Did Adam just need to know about the dangers of alcohol? No. In this case, Adam needed education on the type of people who are likely to cause him trouble.

The guy who gave Adam the vodka was 24-year-old Larando Sweeting. He drank in violation of parole - no alcohol was a condition of his release from prison. He was in prison for gross sexual assault and sexual abuse of a minor after having sex with a girl under 14 years of age.

Perhaps when parents talk to their kids about drugs, they should also be educating them about people who have sex with minors, people who are charged with gross sexual assualt, people who violate their parole, and people who dare them to do things that could kill them.

Obviously, this person is not someone you would want your kids to hang out with.

I don’t know which came first for Adam, drinking or hanging out with people who can do serious damage to your life. Perhaps Adam had needed addiction help services for a long time and, because he didn’t get it, he became involved with criminals. 

What I do know is this: if you want to prevent serious injury or, as in Adam’s case, death, you should get them addiction help as soon as you know there is a problem. And if there is no problem, educate your kids well on drugs and alcohol and on the dangers of associating with people who have proven that they really don’t have the best interests of others at heart.