Your daughter seems to be *otherwise* doing fine.
Almost every parent has their older teenager or young grown offspring do some things they disapprove of. Sometimes part of the reason for the disapproval is that those things are against the law.
You *should* talk candidly with your daughter about the potential penalties if she is caught, including making sure she knows what amount constitutes "possession with intent to distribute"---which means they treat you as a drug dealer anyway even if you're not.
You also should discuss with her whether you ever used drugs, what your experience was, and why you do not use them now.
You should discuss RICO with her and your concerns that if she stores marijuana or other illegal drugs in your house, the feds might take your house. They're not as bad about this as they used to be, but it's still a risk.
Discuss the real level of risk and how you feel about it frankly. Don't inflate it, but don't dismiss it out of hand.
Tell her you don't approve, you want her to stop, and that if you catch her smoking it there will be consequences (like grounding, etc.) Tell her the exception is if she's messed up and stranded somewhere---that you would *much* rather her call you than drive herself or get in a car with some other impaired driver. Tell her that calling home for a *safe* ride home if she's drunk or high is so much more responsible than the alternatives that she won't get in trouble, although you *will* want to discuss the situation when she is sober.
This is important for two reasons---it insulates you from "corrupting the morals of a minor" charges *and* it probably matters to her a lot more than you might think whether you approve or disapprove of it.
And with the concern about how she gets home, you don't come across as some sanctimonious anti-drug crusader---you come across as her parent who loves her, and that means she is more likely to realize your concerns about the drugs are genuine concerns for *her welfare*.
Treat the drugs as a terrible example of her not giving herself enough credit and not valuing herself as much as she's worth.
She sounds like too good a kid to have to take some substance to feel good, instead of just going out and having a good time with all the wonderful things that are out there to do and enjoy *sober*.
Taking a drug for recreation instead of going swimming, or biking, or skating, or hiking, or to a movie, or bowling, or to a concert, or to a party---taking a drug for recreation means you aren't doing enough genuinely fun stuff in your life. Or that you're real self-conscious about your social skills in groups--and the solution to that is learning better skills or working on your self-confidence.
Anyway, this is a moment for garden-variety parental lectures, expressions of disapproval of the bad behavior, threats to punish if you catch her at it (but not disproportionately harshly) so she knows you really *do* disapprove----just the same normal bag of parental tricks you use when your kid fibs or won't pick up after herself or misses curfew or all the other normal little headaches of parents.
It's bad behavior. Treat it that way. But it's less likely to be a sign of reefer-madness sliding down into heroine addiction and overdose than it is to be your garden-variety teenage pushing the envelope to see if Mom cares enough to set limits.
Reassure her by applying normal, consistent parental discipline and she'll probably stop on her own after a month or two to see if you really *do* disapprove.
*OR*--since she's so close to 18---you could pull the "I'm so terribly disappointed, I thought you had better sense, I wish I'd done a better job of communicating common sense while you were young, but if you're going to do this, I hope you get by with it without disaster long enough to decide it's really stupid and stop before you really hurt yourself or someone else."-----you could treat her like an adult child who has disappointed you and not really lived up to your expectations, but whom you still love very much.
Your daughter doesn't need a behavior mod facility.
Your daughter just needs a good old-fashioned dose of Mom-Fu. The kind you've been applying since she was a toddler. :smile:
Best of luck with it.
Timoclea
