Consider if there’s anything you will have to leave out when you are telling your kids about your high school experience. Through this reminiscence of memories, are you going to look back at these happily? Do you think you will spend your future thinking back to that one regretful night? 

As someone who has directly seen addiction affect my loved ones, I understand what some high schoolers neglect: what you do affects everyone around you. There are people who care about you that you don’t even notice.

If your friends pressure you to join them when they are drinking, vaping, or smoking weed, then they do not have your best interest in mind. It’s easy to feel lost when you look at your peers and realize that they all have assumed that you participated in these drugs. I will admit that I have and I wondered if I was doing the wrong thing, because so many people made me feel out of place. Don’t let someone else tell you that your feelings and opinions are invalid. In doing this, they will eventually realize that telling you to join them in harming their health is destructive to both sides.

I don’t see what is attractive about not being able to control yourself when you are under the influence. It’s not a flex or trendy, it’s disgusting. Stop posting about your mistakes like you’re proud of them, because someone looks up to you. If you show that person that’s what you think is important, they will follow you.

How has something evidently illegal become something that is brushed off by peers, parents, and even teachers? I shouldn’t have to sit in class and watch my teachers listen to students talking about drinking and doing drugs and my teachers just acting like they didn’t hear it. Many are taught from a young age about the effects of drugs and alcohol. However, unless you have directly seen what it can do to someone, you probably don’t understand. That’s not something you can most accurately teach.

It is your choice whether or not you take part in the use of substances. If you are taking part in these things because something bad happened in your life, you are just pushing your issues off to your future. When you get around to dealing with them, you’re going to have another problem: you’re going to be addicted. So don’t wait for your problems to go away, because they won’t. Now is your time to choose to figure this out. From here, you can plan to pursue something in the future, and if you choose to have kids, they will have someone to look up to and trust.

Check out this story about a related issue.

Drug Presence Examined