help w khk

[confuzdmom]

Mk, Im at my wits end&need help. 17yr old daughter-expelled from school,have tried "joke"drug treatment centers here locally.She using pot,coke,meth&possibly heroin.Her doc wants to send her to khk in milford.Found this site..hmm.I dont believe in coincidences.Im freakin, as my child is drowning&she wont take the lifejackets we've been throwing to her.We have to go to khk(hubby&me)2morro.Im scared.Ive printed out the isac stuff& want khk to adress these issues.Hubby says everyone is just disgruntled. What should I do?

[The Liger]

Listen to your gut feelings.  

People aren't spending time on this message board, traumatized years later for nuthin'.

Don't put her somewhere that doesn't have an open-door policy for parents.  Don't put her somewhere that won't allow her 24-hour unmonitored phone access.

Don't make any rash decisions!  Good luck!

(I'd also get into my personal feelings about how parents make too big of a deal about teenage drug use, and how most people grow out of it, but that would take too long.)

[The Liger]

Also, getting expelled from school isn't the end of the world.  Nothing is the end of the world.  I got expelled from two schools before I was sent away.  My parents thought it would solve all my problems to send me away and get me a diploma.  I did more drugs after I got out then I ever did before and dropped out of college.  But after a few years, I got over the drug use just out of maturity.  I went to community college and am now in law school.  In a year, I'll be a lawyer.  So you see, a life time of misery is not an inevitable effect of drug use or expulsion from school.

So I guess I went into this topic after all.

[confuzdmom]

thanks. i know what you mean about making a big deal. Shes our third. her sisters have smoked pot.But they also graduated hs, are in college,have jobs & dont get arrested on a regular basis bc of their recreation.Its NOT an addiction for them. But it is for this one.Its a part of growing up. You have to experiment.Who the hell didnt.BUT...coke & heroin-different beasts. I am going in there tomorrow armed with the info I have&if there are no open door/phone policies, I wont do it.The court will have to find an alternative if thats what they rule.(therapist said we should put her in b4 court next week..judge will order her to go,insurance wont pay then,blah.)BUT WHERE DO PARENTS GO?? Thanks again.

[Antigen]

If she actually is addicted to opiates, I would suggest you find a medical doctor who is certified to rx suboxone or subutex (check spelling). Early on, when the medical researchers started reporting on methadone, it all looked good. Now that there are a good many actual patients reporting, it doesn't look so good. And damned near every suboxone pt has failed on methadone and almost every one I've ever read about or talked to say suboxone is, far and away, a better method of withdrawal.

But nothing will "work" unless your daughter is ready for a change. There's a fine line (sometimes not so fine) between firm support and harmful coercion. First and foremost, do no harm, don't allow anyone to tell her what to think or to force her to confess to anything, especially anything personal. Keep her as close to home and under the least restrictive conditions.

If your kid is still highschool age, it's extremely unlikely that she's developed a hard addiction of any kind. It just takes a long time to do that. So don't let anyone tell you that the drug use is the root of all evil.

Most important, check credentials, claims and promises from a variety of information sources. Don't take program provided references as being representative of the whole body of former clients. Look up other sources of info.

Finally, if you can't find a safe way to attempt to help your daughter (and attempting is all anyone can honestly promise) then refer back to the first point; do no harm. It would be better for her to fall down w/ you on her side than to lose your affection and support and the trust that almost all kids have in their parents, even when they insist they don't. Don't lie to her, trick her or take her by surprise. That's definitely over the line of coercion.

Every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution, can be valid. To deny this, would be to affirm, that the deputy is greater than his principal; that the servant is above his master; that the representatives of the people are superior to the people themselves; that men acting by virtue of powers, may do not only what their powers do not authorize, but what they forbid."
--Alexander Hamilton    

[confuzdmom]

Thank you for your time & insight. My gut instinct is to cancel.And I know that usually,my gut is right.

[Invertix]

Another thing to take into consideration is that if you have uneasy thoughts about a program, it's usually much eaiser to not put your child in a program to begin with then trying to take her out later via a legal battle. (Not sure the status of your marriage)

[Anonymous]

Thank you for posting confuzedmom.

If I could say anything to someone considering putting their kid in KHK or any other Straight, Inc. spin-off for that matter, it would be this:

I would never trust a place that denies me access to my kid. They will tell you at KHK that the reason they do that is because kids "like YOUR kid" are "manipulators", part of their "disease" and are not to be trusted. They will say that the kid has to "earn" the "right" to see you. Both parents and kids are God-given blessings to each other and nobody has the right to EVER deny them access to one another. You should be allowed to 24/7 to be able to talk to your kid with NO ONE around "supervising" the situation.

Hell, anybody out there can manipulate, even the KHK salesperson with the "sweet" angel-face that tells you, "honey, I've been there", but 'now we're a happy family'. However, you'll never hear how that kid they are talking about had to "confess" a sexual history, make up things that may or may not have happened, solely so it can be used against them later if they get out of line with staff. It takes a while, but while that kid's all guilt ridden, they start to lose their spirit never to recover it again. That's called brainwashing. They will spend the rest of their lives trying to trust people again, including their own parents. It's just not worth it.

They will throw out terms like you need to use "tuff-love" on your kids, they are "cons", "manipulators", "liars", anything they can to land your money.

They will never have you sign up unless you have money in the bank, access to a major loan/credit line, great insurance. The vast majority of parents in there will have one or more of these sources of incomes for KHK to milk. KHK I assume will have one or few token POOR families on some kind of "scholarship" for the lack of better term.

Oh, many have gone bankrupt sending their kids to places like that too, and with the new bankruptcy laws the way they are, God help the parents that are suckered in there.