We have just found out my 18 year old is doing drugs. We suspected he was smoking pot and occasionally drinking. But now we have found text messages from him looking for Mushrooms and / or acid. We also found a small baggie in the toilet that looks like cocaine. I am scared to death over this and don't know what to do. Does anyone have a suggestion on how to handle this? I know we need to speak with him, but I am not sure what that conversation should be as I don' tknow how far into this he is. Any advice would be great.
Thanks!

Do you still have what was found in the toilet?! To the untrained eye, coke in powder form can look a lot like crystal meth that is in powder form and could even pass for heroin.

My advice would be to not over react to the situation. For most people who know anything about drugs, there are a pecking order to the severity of the drugs being used. Think of it as a tier system. Alcohol, tobacco and pot are on the bottom tier. Cocaine, Shrooms, MDMA, LSD, Ketamine, etc would be a tier two drug. And Meth, Crack, and Heroin would be a tier three drug. And most medical personnel will tell you there are a lot of myths out there about what drugs do or their effects on the body. Many will even go as far as to tell you that much of the information out there is put there by the government to try to curb drug use in the war on drugs.

Before you talk to your son, I suggest that you forget all the misconceptions you have learned about drugs and educate yourself to the facts. I suggest looking at the site Erowid.org. Look up information on the real risks of each drug and not what has been force fed to you by a government that has a "just say no" policy when it comes to drug problems. Once you know what you are dealing with, then you can talk to your son like an 18 year-old. You can make sure he knows what he is using and what the risks are. After that, then you set some rules. Is he living in your home?! If so, then maybe he has to be able to pass a drug test at anytime you want him to or be forced to move out. Are you paying for college?! Maybe he has to pass a drug test in order for you to pay for school! He is an adult and will experiment with things as he learns his way, you just need to make sure that he knows where the line is and what will happen if he crosses it, then you must stick with it. What happens if he gets caught with it, will you bail him out?! If you say no, then you must stick with that decision, because the first time you bend, you just enabled him to use from then on.

I would go a different route, or another route in addition to what has been posted.

Have you thourouly checked for drug paraphernalia in his room? Have you had reason to suspect he was using drugs i.e. his behaviour has changed? Where is he getting the money to buy the drugs, does he work? What made you suspicious in the first place.

Are there younger children in the house?

How you approach this is by being informed. If there is a service in your area that offers information and/or counselling on drugs, go and see them. They will be aware and experienced with dealing with kids on drugs, and can offer advice and guidance in how to deal with your son. This is unchartered territory for you. They see it from the street, all the way up; an invaluable source for no nonsense information.

Don't doubt yourself, or your instinct as a mother.

My daughter used what you've mentioned, plus heroin. When you know the whole story from your son, or from experts in the field, don't be lulled into a false sense of security, or that you've solved the problem. Experts can be a dime a dozen, and have no vested interest in your son. Keep knocking on doors until you are satisfied with getting the answers you need.

Start with the facts, and go from there. Please post again and let us know how you are doing.

Thanks all. My son is 18 and is in college. He lives on campus but is only 45 minutes away so comes home frequently. He does have a job that he works on breaks and over the summer with his dad, but even that is a challenge. Where does he get his money? From what we can tell he steals it. He has stolen money from me, my husband and his sister. He has even taken change from a coin collection. We have found pot and a pipe at one time in his room as well. His behavior is OK, haven't really seen any major changes. He has insisted in the past that he doesn't do drugs, he drinks on occasion, but doesn't really like it. This I believe, he has never really like alcohol.

We found the baggy in the toilet, and he had borrowed his dad's phone and there were text messages on the phone where he was looking for shrooms and acid, that he wanted to get totally wasted that night. From what we could tell, he didn't find any. I am not convinced that he is heavily into this, but we all know how quickly that can change and it scares us. I am going to look for resources in the community and see what I can do, thanks for that advice. I have also looked into the website provided and it does have some good information, thanks again.

You have given a clearer picture of his drug use. Finding what you have, and knowing he has stolen from you makes it pretty clear he has problems that need to be addressed.

It is a really good idea that you are checking out resources to help deal with this.

Just curious, have you checked to see how he's doing in school?

He is a freshman, his first semester was a disaster, (this may have been more about freedom and not being responsible than anything else) but he seems to have stepped it up the second semester, I haven't seen any real grades yet, but I do know that he is at least passing. He is transferring to another school next year, and he is talking more "maturely" than he has in the past, so it is very confusing. He is a very smart kid, he was always honor roll until his last year in HS when he was just enjoying himself, not taking things seriously. I just hope he is smart enough not to get to deep into this, which is why I need to do something now. Thanks for listening!

First I would arm myself with sll the knowledge in the world. GO to your local Alchlol and drug recovery center or what ever it may be called and talk to someone. You don't give names just tell them you need help and let them help you. Because we as parnets are fighting this war against drugs and we have to get all the help and knowledge we can get to provide us with the right tools when dealing with our children. Yelling and Screaming, kicking there none of that is the answer it talking to them finding out what really is wrong. Best of luck to you.

If he is looking for mushrooms or acid - that's not a good sign. Acid can be extremely tricky. You can have a "good trip" and you can have a really awful trip where you end up in the psych ward of the hospital. It is not like pot where you can figure out you've had enough and stop smoking the joint. You take a pill or a hit of acid and the high can kick in right away or take 30 minutes to really develop during which time a lot of new users will take another pill thinking the first one didn't work. That's the problem with acid. There is not real way to gauge it properly.

He obviously didn't dream up all this stuff himself. More than likely it is due to his new peers at college turning him on to these new forms of getting "wasted". He hasn't figured out that reality is where it's at and thinks it's fun to mess with his head and get drunk so bad he passes out and stupid things like that.

I would definitely tell him that you're on to him and that if he wishes to live at your home and use your money to go to college he'd better knock it off as you will be drug testing him at random times and if he does come up dirty you and your husband will cease any form of financial support regardless if he has one semester left.

He will just keep sampling drugs until he finds one that really makes him wasted. If he does try acid I hope he only does one pill or one hit because if he tries to do more than one pill he will end up literally a vegetable. This scenerio happened to a friend of mine's son. He did 2 hits of acid and has spent the last 20 some years in an institution not knowing who he is or what planet he is on literally. You could say he sure got "wasted". He's still partying on 20 some years later. Do you want your son to end up like that kid did?

And stealing money from family members shows me just how much he really wants to get high regardless of who he steals from. If something is not done to cure this kid he's going to end up in jail due to his theft habit to feed his drug habit.

I'm 19 and I just quit the use of about everything you have just told me. I've heard about everything there was to hear about drugs and why I should have quit. But for me it was finding that one thing that made me want to quit. It took me about 3 years to figure out how much drugs have changed me.
The best advice I can give you is don't get mad, but to find a place where you 2 can be alone and just talk about it. Don't tell him what he's doing wrong just listen to what he says. Just ask questions and eventually he'll open up to you and that's when he'll start listing to you. Tell him you'll always be there for him when he wants help and give it time and if that doesn't seem to work and he's getting worse then go to more dromatice solutions.
That's what I whated was for some one to listen to my problems. There's always a reason why someone would start and there's got to be a reason for someone to quit. I wish the best for you and your son, because I've been in his position before. The best of luck to the both of you.
Sincerely,
Wukaking19

Alcohol is more dangerous than most people think, It's more physically harmful than weed, acid, or mushrooms. I do believe that weed is the gateway drug, and that it is important to let them know that there is a very big difference between weed or mushrooms and coke or meth. I have never done acid but I have done mushrooms and weed. People think that mushrooms are a hard drug, its not even close. Its not addicting whatsoever. The big thing I realized is that it is better to teach them about responsible drug use. It sounds oxymoronic but getting high or tripping every once in a great while is not a big deal. Just because alcohol is legal doesn't mean its any better than weed or mushrooms. How many lives has alcohol ruined or destroyed? Definitely find out what that powder was, and approach them. Don't go crazy and rip them a new one or they might resist even further. Ask them why they do it and put them into a mindset that they can tell you anything. Encourage honesty and don't give them ultimatums, they usually don't work. Share with them some real life example of what may happen if they don't clear things up. All of this may seem like stupid advice but without knowing the person its hard to say there is just one right way to approach it. Good Luck

I found out the powder was a drug used to treat ADD, it is an amphetamine and he used it during exams. Since there was a little bit of powder left in the bag and it was being thrown away, I do believe him when he says he just needed to stay awake, not that that justifies the use, but at least it wasn't coke or worse. We talked about the mushrooms and acid and what he was loooking for that night never materialized (thank God) but he swears he never used either before. We had a long talk about things and the dangers of illegal drug use. I know he smokes pot occasionally, and I want to believe that he hasn't done anything else, but I am doing so cautiously. He will be home from school in two weeks and I will be able to get a better grip on what he is up to since I will be seeing him more often, and I am trying to keep the communication as open and honest as possible. I am keeping my fingers crossed that we get through this as painlessly as possible and letting him know that I am here for him, no matter what. We will see what happens next. Thanks all, any other advise is greatly appreciated!