Push the point “If I don’t find out about it, I can’t punish you. If I do find out, you will have to face the consequences.” somewhere in your talk. This is one of the most important things a person can learn about society, and it would do her good to learn it early.
IANA parent, so take this with a grain of salt.
First,make sure you know the facts about what penalties there are locally for getting busted for pot possession.
I would approach it in 2 levels.
- Don’t be stupid enough to be caught so easily. If you must do illegal things, be extremely careful about how and when, and where you leave potential evidence.
- The old “not in my house” deal. You’re 18, you can do what you want in your own space, and you ain’t in it.
Of course, I’m a 50 year old pot smoker. I just couldn’t come out and say it is wrong. I’ve been smoking pot regularly for 30 years, going to school, performing my job, and all that other routine life stuff that pot use supposedly fucks up. Well, it doesn’t, and this is no big deal.
BTW, the stuff you confiscated… er, do you have any plans for it? 
I can tell you what we did with our kids. We sort of made it up as we went along, but we did manage to present a united front (you know you’re going to have to present a united front, of course.)
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There will be no drugs in our house. Period. Non-negotiable.
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There will be no driving under the influence. If we ever suspect you have been driving under the influence, you will take a drug test. You may call and ask for a penalty-free ride home.
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Since you know pot is illegal, if you get busted, it’s your problem, not ours.
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Express concern about self-medication and unpredictable side effects.
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Require them to do research on the effects, side effects and aftereffects of pot. That’s an adult way to skip the lecture.
Do they still use pot? Maybe, but they’re now at the age where, if we don’t know it, it isn’t happening.
I would be most concerned with the depression issue and make sure she isn’t using it to self-medicate. That can lead down a bad road. Find out which came first (depression or pot) and go from there.
IANALawyer but I do believe that legally, being 18 years old is a very important threshold. I believe she is now considered an adult and will not be treated as a juvenile by the authorities if she is arrested. That is defnitiely something I would tell her.
Isn’t there a restriction on student financial aid if you’ve been convicted of drug crimes?
18 was the age where all I thought about was college and wouldn’t have done anything to jeopardize it.
Don’t say this unless you want her to roll her eyes and ignore everything else you say.
I think you lose your Pell Grants, if you received any, and may even have to repay. That was the big motivation for me when I was in college.
I don’t smoke dope, and am not a parent, but I guess if in the future my child did want to smoke, my concerns would be around the age/developmental issues as mentioned earlier. If the kid was older, I would expect them to make a reasoned decision about use - understanding the pros and cons - with the fact that it’s still illegal a major consideration.
In this case, the fact that your daughter has some issues with depression would also mean that I would expect her to understand the medical effects as well - freedom to make her own decisions does come with additional responsibility. This site shows some pros and cons on whether marijuana affects depression, but does have some particular quotes which may be something for you and her to discuss with any medical practitioner.
No one can make a mother’s decision for her of course. And you probably know your daughter better than any of us here.
How likely is it that your daughter will still smoke pot if you ask or tell her not to do it?
If it is very likely, then tell her to stop. Inhaling smoke is unhealthy, no matter what you smoke. She can be happy without it and she should at least try the legal, safe alternatives available to her (counseling and so forth).
If you don’t think you have the power to compell her to stop, there is no point in antagonizing her. While you might resent her for making you worry about her, you’re probably better off being understanding enough that she feels comfortable confiding in you and maybe even taking your advice more to heart.
How would she react if you agreed to let her smoke if she minimized the risk of getting caught (only smoke inside the house, etc.)? Would you be ok with it? The reason I ask is because a friend of mine’s mother ended up doing that and she seems fairly satisfied with the compromise.
She can keep tab of his usage and she even smokes with him sometimes. Granted, they’re french so the laws and the risks are different. (France is one of the least lenient countries on pot in western europe but I believe it still falls short of the U.S .
Disclaimer: I think pot should be fully legal and that the war in drugs is as bad an idea as the prohibition was. Drugs are still huge and a lot of non-violent pot smokers and pot dealers are in jail, which I find very hard to justify. I know many pot smokers and dealers and they’re just as good citizens as everybody else and do no harm.
But I still think she’d be better off not smoking.
Really, (and this is coming from an occaisonal, though light, indulger, and a college student), I would align with the posters who are more concerned with
A) over-use or abuse, rather than reasonable consumption (same as alcohol)
B) Differentiation between pot and “harder” drugs (yes there is a line you can draw, with good medical back-up as DtC pointed out)
C) Impressing of the point that it is illegal and there ARE legal consequences, and that being this careless is NOT a good thing
and, I suppose D, “I don’t want to hear about it or see it”
frankly, I personally don’t support D, and when I become a parent I would MUCH rather be (loosely) informed of my children’s activities rather than willfully ignorant to make sure they aren’t doing things such as driving under the influence, or becoming dependent or abusive of substances, etc. I would also say 18, or possibly senior year of high-schoolish is about when I would be easing up on that subject (any earlier and the talk would be much different), since that’s around the time I started drinking and I turned out, well, pretty much okay so far, but YMMV as to that, of course.
“Okay, now you slightly crush the side of the can, like this. Punch a hole here, and here. Bud goes right here, and inhale here. Got it? … Good. Okay, now, the potato.”
…come on Cervaise… last time I saw somebody tried that all we got was a sliced up can and a lot of rolling eyes.
Now really, so you have this water bottle, right?.. 
One lantern battery, one thimble, some nichrome wire, a potentiometer, and a bottle = vaporizer. It’s the best way to enjoy tobacco.
I never before wondered how MacGyver toked up…
HA! Yeah, the above is what happens when you have electrical engineering students for friends.
I have gotten some good advice here and I thank you all for it. My talk with her is going to be more focused on her wellbeing. The link from Girl from Mars was great, and I think I can use that to get through to her. If she is stupid enough to have the stuff here at home where I can so easily stumble over it, what’s to say she just as easily get caught by the po-po as she calls them.
She has just been accepted to a nice college in the fall and she is waffling on whether she wants to go there with all the student loans involved or go to our local community college and pay as she goes.She wants to go into Law enforcement so I would hazard to guess that getting busted with pot could ruin any career aspirations she has.She had one of the sixth highest ACT scores in her High School, so how could she be dumb enough to let me find her stash. I had enough respect for her that I would have never snooped, so maybe on some unconscious level she wanted to be caught. We have always been able to have a good dialog so maybe this is a cry for help. Which I will answer.
Everyone knows the best homemade pipe is just a toilet paper tube and tin foil
If she wants to be a cop, remind her that she’ll proably have to pass a drug test before being hired, and may be subject to periodic random testing.
I didn’t see if this was posted yet or not but you might want to tell her that in many if not all cases your ability to get student loans from the government will be compromised if you have a drug conviction on her record. Just something to think about.
Could I make a suggestion? Take her out for a meal, just you & her. Make it a favorite place for her, upbeat. Mention toward the end what you found, & how you feel about it. Be honest.
I know this sounds simplistic. I’ve gone through the same thing. This isn’t an end to the problem, but it may start a dialogue.
I’m praying for you.