DOING DRUGS WITH
PAUL DILLON

Almost five years I wrote about Hannah Lottritz, a 21-year-old college student from the US who had written a piece titled 'Drinking Responsibly' which featured this photograph of her on life-support. When it was first published in 2016, Hannah's article went viral, with the confronting image attracting a great deal of attention. The reason behind her controversial decision to share this disturbing image was clearly explained in her opening paragraph which read as follows: "I am writing this because I didn’t realize the importance of drinking responsibly until I was waking up from a coma, and I don't want anyone to go through what my family and I went through. I ask that you share this with your friends, family or anyone who may benefit from reading this. If I can help just one person by sharing my experience, then I will be absolutely ecstatic." No-one intends to end up in an emergency department when they go out to have a good time with their friends on a Sat...

Few parents would be unaware of the importance of doing their best to 'stay connected' to their child during adolescence. This is particularly true as they transition from early to middle adolescence (around 14-15) - a time when they're trying to find their place in the world, develop their own identity and, in doing so, often pull away from their parents. It is at this time that peers become increasingly important and, as a result, teens can begin to disengage from their families. In addition, their interests may change and friends they've had since they began school may drift away. Years of music lessons or sports training are suddenly forgotten as your teens appears to wake up one morning and decide to abandon something you believed they genuinely loved. Seemingly, overnight, everything you thought you knew about your child can be turned upside down. The real challenge that many parents face at this time is attempting to put rules and boundaries into place to keep th...

An article in a recent edition of the Daily Telegraph highlights the current "nationwide shortage of child psychologists" , which was an issue pre-COVID but one that's become far more significant since the pandemic began. It discusses "massive waiting lists" and, provides results from the Australian Association of Psychologists' (AAPi) latest national survey of 600 private psychologists that found "nearly half of practices were unable to accept new clients - an increase of 10 per cent on 2020." Anxiety and depression were on the rise prior to the pandemic but COVID and all that goes with it, including lockdowns and restrictions, have certainly not made things easier. In 2012, 18.6% of young Australians aged 15-19 years reported 'psychological distress' (a predictor of mental health problems, including anxiety, depression and suicidal behaviour). In 2020, that had risen to over one quarter (26.6%), with young women being at greater risk (34...

This is an updated version of a blog entry that I wrote some time ago and, in response to requests from parents, I've reposted it at the beginning of the school year a number of times. This version has been shortened down and is hopefully more 'user-friendly', ending with five simple things that parents can do to help support their child through the first few months of high school. I'm sure some people have fond memories of their first day of high school - I'm not one of them! The move from a state primary school to a private high school was tough. I knew absolutely no-one and felt completely alone.  Thankfully, it's now extremely rare for children to be thrown into high school and left to fend for themselves, with most schools developing and implementing transition programs to ensure that no-one 'slips through the cracks' during this potentially difficult time. Even so, it's vital that parents realise the school can't do this alone and that they...

This is a slightly updated version of a blog entry that I wrote a couple of years ago. I've put it together due to a number of parents contacting me in the past few weeks requesting a copy of the previous article to give to their teens who had recently got their P-plates.  Even though the Christmas/New Year period has just passed, it's still school holidays and we're going to continue to see police out in force on the roads in an effort to prevent senseless tragedies from occurring. Random breath testing (RBT) units will be stationed on roads across the country and if you have a young driver at home, it's highly likely that they will be pulled over and breathalysed in the weeks ahead. For as much as it called 'random', in reality, very few P-platers mange to drive past an RBT unit and not get ushered into being tested. Victoria was the first state in the country to introduce RBT way back in 1976. It was then introduced across Australia in different jurisdictions...

Over the past few months I've written very few blog articles, mainly due to the extended lockdowns and resulting restrictions that have been in place in parts of the country. Many young people have been unable to socialise as they usually would and it became extremely difficult to write pieces that were applicable to the majority of Australian parents. I have, however, been delivering many online parent sessions in recent weeks with a focus on what happens next, i.e., with restrictions eased, what behaviour are we likely to see when it comes to teens and socialising?  Of course, there are some parts of the country that have been comparatively COVID-free (e.g., WA, NT and Tasmania) and although there have been a number of disruptions and short lockdowns, for the most part, life did not change dramatically for teens living in those jurisdictions. It's important to remember, however, that no matter what their 'COVID experience', they have been watching one of the most chal...

Recently I delivered a webinar for parents for the Mid North Coast Local Health District on the topic of vaping. Like so many other parts of the country, schools and parents in the area were requesting information and assistance around the use of e-cigarettes, particularly in relation to school-based young people. The event was well-attended and I provided some basic information about vaping. Particular attention was given to how parents should talk to their teen about vaping, particularly if they've recently discovered their child has used or is currently using these devices. Since that presentation I have continued to use the same material in other talks I have given. Nothing I said was particularly earth-shattering but I've been surprised by how many emails and DMs I've received from parents who, after hearing what I said, have gone away and used my advice and have had a positive outcome.  Before the advice here's a quick summary of where I believe we are currently a...

In the past few months I've been contacted by a number of parents who have reached out for advice in relation to their teen's drug use. In some cases they discovered what their child had been up to completely by accident (e.g., finding a bag of pills and caps in dirty washing), others had police call to inform them their teen had been arrested and could they come to the local station, while others were summoned to school to be told their teen was being expelled for dealing. To ensure confidentiality all of the stories discussed in this piece have been slightly altered but they'll hopefully give you the general idea. None of the stories are unique and although the available evidence clearly shows that the vast majority of school-based young people do not illicit drugs, some teens will experiment and will suffer the consequences if they get caught. What blew me away about all these cases, however, was that each and every one of these teens purchased their drugs via social med...

One of the worst aspects of living in a COVID-19 world is the uncertainty that accompanies the pandemic. As the past week or two has shown us, things can change very quickly and just as we seemed to be returning to some degree of normalcy, we suddenly get the rug pulled out from beneath us and we find ourselves right back where we were a year ago ... What has saddened me greatly is receiving messages from young people across the country who are absolutely devastated that something they were looking forward to was suddenly ripped away from them due to a lockdown. Here is one such email: "My name is Anya and I've just turned 16. This weekend I was going to be having my 16th birthday party but it's just been announced that we're going to go back into lockdown and we've had to cancel it. Everything that was planned has now gone. It was going to be amazing and the first real party my year group has had since COVID. Everyone was looking forward to it because we haven...

'Sticking to your guns' when it comes to any adolescent issue, whether it be rules around screen time, household chores or alcohol and teenage parties is never going to be easy. You can start off with the best of intentions, attend every parent information session, read all the right books and think that you have it all covered but when it finally comes down to actually putting it all into practice it can be really tough.  Here is part of a message I received from Carol, a mother struggling to maintain her stand in relation to alcohol and her teenage son: "I'm constantly being told by my son that I'm the only one who calls other parents to find out what's going on at parties and even my best friend (who I've known since I was in Year 1 and always said to me that she would stick with me around the whole alcohol and parties thing when it came to our children who are the same age) said that I'm out on my own when it comes to saying 'no' to my 16-ye...

Earlier this year I wrote a blog providing some advice for parents who were struggling with the vaping issue. I had been contacted by an increasing number of parents who had discovered their child was using e-cigarettes and when they tried to challenge them about their use they were met with responses that they feel ill-equipped to deal with appropriately. The purpose of the piece was to assist parents, who knew little about the new phenomenon, when responding to some of the statements that their child was likely to throw at them in any discussion around the vaping issue, e.g.,  "But it's not smoking" .  The article I wrote was not an attack on 'vaping' or those smokers who are looking for an alternate nicotine delivery system. I have made it clear time and time again that I'm not interested in being involved in the current debate about vaping and its role in smoking cessation - my only concern here is for young people, their parents and teachers. I was not pr...

The social pressure to drink in this country is unbelievable and as a non-drinker I have found it increasingly difficult over the years to find things to do with friends and family where alcohol is not firmly positioned at the core. If I find it difficult at my age (and I do, much more difficult than it was in the past), how difficult must it be for our current generation of teens who are constantly bombarded with messages that to socialise you must have a drink firmly placed in your hand? When you add the pressure from family members to 'fit in' and avoid social exclusion, it is surprising that there are any teens who make the decision not to drink. What is so incredible is that if you look at the data around school-based young people and alcohol it is evident that we actually have a growing number of adolescents that are doing just that. We're not taking about just reducing the amount they drink, we actually have more young people who are choosing not to drink at all! The...