How far gone do you need to be before you start leaving syringes and caps lying around?
I have (thankfully!) no experience with hard addictions - closest I know is smoking* and even hard-core light-next-using-still-burning-last-cig smokers would empty the ashtrays occasionally.
Why is a pregnant 17-year-old not living with her parents?
His family sounds like a trainwreck in progress.
The story is BS. People do not inject ANYTHING under their tongues unless the only veins left are in the genitalia (and maybe they’ve used THOSE up too).
NWH, R.Ph.
Untrue. I’ve had a half dozen or so addicts go to sublingual injections because it’s less obvious. They even had decent hand/arm veins as they were doing this.
Addicts will put up with a LOT in order to keep using, including sticking needles in their tongues rather than their arms.
However, I’d bet there’s no sublingual injections going on in the OP’s story.
When I worked at the drug treatment clinic we had a couple instances of toddlers getting ahold of the drugs used by another member of the household, including a couple of fatalities. Also, kids who may have picked up very nasty diseases from playing with used syringes. Like I said, tragic outcomes.
Serious thought should be given to getting any infant or toddler out of such a situation. Not all junkies are such careless slobs (I realize that sounds contradictory, but some manage to pick up after themselves) but if there are needles and paraphernalia around the house it’s not a safe place for a baby/toddler/anyone else.
The clinic I worked out had a unit specifically for pregnant addicts and their newborns. Constant battles between those waiting to detox the pregnant ladies immediately because OMG DRUGS WHILE PREGNANT!!! and the clinic and the MD’s with experience in addictive medicine. Sometimes, if the woman gains enough weight during pregnancy her daily dose needs to go up slightly to maintain a safe situation which, needless to say, gets some folks very upset. I’m no expert in the field, nor am I doctor, but I did help collect data on these gals and it was pretty clear after a couple years that maintaining a stable situation led to better outcomes than trying to yank a woman to sobriety. Hell, just getting them off contaminated street drugs and eating regular meals made for a lot of improvement.
However, the “gentle withdrawal” for the baby does not always happen. In the 1990’s in Illinois I’m not sure if it was a change in the law or some notion that got started in the hospitals, but they stopped doing gradually withdrawals in babies. They just didn’t give them anything unless the kid started having seizures for some reason.* I guess the theory was that it was somehow better to subject a newborn to cold turkey than a gradual step down. Man, you think a normal newborn cries and screams a lot? So whether or not a newborn gets a cold turkey or gradual withdrawal is going to vary from place to place.
Depends.
Addicts, like everyone else, vary. Just like some alcoholics manage to be functional and some are a complete mess, some junkies are neater than others. The person involved may have been a careless slob before they became an addict.
I’ve known addicts that were meticulous in their appearance and habits. Others were just a mess before, during, and after their addiction. Drug addiction certainly doesn’t help one keep neat and tidy, and addicts are more likely to leave a mess than sober people, but slobbiness is one of those traits that aren’t so much born of addiction as intensified by it.
Yes, methadone is used for pain management. My husband was on it for years. He didn’t have to go to a methadone clinic, it was prescribed by his regular doctor and filled through the regular pharmacy, up to a 3 months supply at a time. It was pills, not liquid. (He’s not on it anymore, they’re trying other drug cocktails out on him.)
Oh wow, my next conversation with my friend is not going to be easy. I think she already knows the truth but wants to believe the best.
I thank all of your for your insight and comments. I feel like I am walking a fine line here between gathering information and betraying my friend.
NWH I wish I could answer your question as to why a 17 year old isn’t living with her parents, I totally disagree with their decision to let her move in with him. For whatever reason my friend feel like her hands are tied and she has no control anymore.
I already get accused of being negative and I’ve kept a lot of thoughts to myself as I’ve supported her through this ordeal.
For instance, this guy told her daughter that he loves her and she doesn’t have to go back to school (she doesn’t want to) because he’ll get a job and support her. [SIZE=“1”]Sorry, I snorted. Like who wouldn’t? :rolleyes: Where everybody else sees love, see how much he cares about her, he wants to take care of her, blah blah blah; I’m the one who said it sounds like he wants to keep her barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen. They see love, I see control.
Maybe I am negative and cynical.[/SIZE]
QtM why do you say no sublingual here?
I am not feeling good about asking this but I am going to ask anyway.
This is the reason I’ve asking about drug testing during pregnancy. My friend says MD law requires drug testing at each visit. I’ve tried getting information online but it is conflicting The latest seems to be it’s an invasion of the woman’s privacy to do it without her consent.
I haven’t seen my friend’s daughter since before she got pregnant. My friend has told me her daughter has lost a lot of weight and is often sick and she can’t keep food down. This has been throughout the entire pregnancy.
The problem with that is I have been on the phone with my friend when she has ordered food for her daughter, and it is a lot of food. Fast food, donuts, coffeeaetc.
accidentally hit send - sorry
So I said her daughter must be eating if she is ordering all that food. She says yes but then her daughter gets sick afterwards. I think no wonder.
She says after the first trimester her daughter should be able to keep food down and start gaining some weight. It doesn’t happen, but yet when I ask her what the doctor is saying she says he doesn’t say anything. Her daughter is still losing weight, is pale, no energy and looks gaunt. A month or so ago she says the doctor finally taking it seriously (why would any doctor let it go for months?), ran some tests and found out her daughter is anemic. She gets some iron pills, her color looks better, her energy improves, she’s eating better and gaining weight.
Now this morning she tells me her daughter has been sick, losing weight again, can’t eat anything, can’t keep anything down, and now it’s because the iron pills are making her sick.
My friend stays in the waiting room, she doesn’t go into the examining room with her daughter. I worry the daughter may be doing drugs as well, but my friend says no way because by law she is required to be tested at each visit. Her daughter has lied throughout this pregnancy. The due date has changed several times. At one point her daughter told her she didn’t know the due date. What woman doesn’t know her due date, it’s one of the first things you want to know.
I feel like I am saying to much but I think my friend needs to know this, or maybe she does and doesn’t want to tell me. Or maybe she wants to believe her daughter so badly she can’t see the lies. There are so many contradictions here.
Sounds like a trainwreck.
Look, you can only do so much. Do what you can, but don’t beat yourself up. You are one person, and there are a bunch of people involved here, most of them either in denial, enabling, or perhaps involved in drugs themselves.
It is very hard to watch these situations unfold. I know you want to fix it all. You may not be able to. That’s a hard truth, but it is the truth. Do what you can, but realize that you can not make everything right.
I know I can’t.
Not that it says anything about the case you’re discussing but my wife was vomiting throughout her entire pregnancy, she used to eat “sacrificial” meals we called it before the real food she wanted to eat so she would get the vomiting out of the way. because she never dipped below healthy weight the doctor dismissed it, and advised tums. She lost weight during the pregnancy, and I’m fairly sure no drug abuse was going on.
There is a child in grave danger here and you know it. Soon there will be another, one who has literally no say in any of this. Now is not the time to worry about your friendship or betraying anyone. You need to call and report the situation to child protective services immediately.
This super-sucks. Your friend is being a total puss when she should be a bitch. But you can’t make her. Unfortunately for the baby, she’s trying to make everyone happy rather than do the best thing for the infant. Unfortunately, the best thing for the baby sounds like she should either be actively seeking custody months ago, or call family services on her daughter immediately after birth.
All you can do is give her the information she needs and it’s unfortunately up to her after that. It sure sounds to me like this girl has no business trying to have a baby. I hope she’s not actually trying to lose it.
Since the capsules were empty and laying all over, I suppose your friend didn’t pick one up and pocket it, eh? Online pill identifiers are darned good. If you have the colors and the letter/number combo you can find out what they are in a few seconds.
You sure are a good friend. I think I would have washed my hands some time ago.
It is POSSIBLE that the pregnant girl is suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum, which is a severe form of morning sickness that lasts much longer than normal and makes it hard to keep any food down: http://www.helpher.org
However, the circumstantial evidence here makes it sound FAR more likely that the girl is using drugs with her boyfriend and her parents are in denial over it.
If I were you, I’d call child protective services to let them know your concerns. If you know who her ob/gyn is, I would also call her doctor’s office and leave them a message to make sure they are aware that her child will be born in a household where there is active drug use (they can’t release info TO you, but that doesn’t stop you from telling them what you want). They may be able to convince her to accept help if they know what’s happening.
I think I don’t need to call CPS, give them a chance to get her out of there and back home where she belongs. Then if she does have a drug problem they can deal with her directly. If she doesn’t then I feel bad for even thinking it.
I’m really afraid though that they are going to come up with some bs story and my friend may believe it.
I have a cousin with hyperemesis gravidarum, but it seems to me that doctors take that seriously. All I have been hearing is that this doctor was saying don’t worry about it - or that is what the daughter says he says. The doctor may know what is going on, the daughter is not telling, and the doctor can’t go behind her back and talk to the parents.
Call CPS NOW!
If there are medical privacy laws that need to be overturned, they will know how to proceed (and which Judge to use), but it will take time - and baby is not going to wait.
She may need to deliver in the presence of a Court-ordered medical team to seize the infant and care for it.
If the child has an addiction, letting the ‘parents’ decide if/when to seek medical intervention is not a viable option.
Interdiction is possible, but time is critical. By the time an ambulance is called by junkies, the kid is likely to be too far gone.
I agree. The adults, they are their own situation, but the children are in danger and didn’t ask to be in this horrible situation with these messed up people. Contact Child Protective Services immediately. You might even be able to report this anonymously and provide all the details.
The mom-to-be is 17 years old, correct? Her mom certainly CAN speak directly to the doctor about her concerns about her child’s health.
An update
and I already feel that I have exposed too much of my friend’s life here.
They had big blow out meeting with the kids and his family.
His family is shit and I told her so, I said they are lying their asses off.
His grandfather says the boyfriend has a prescription for the methadone. He takes one pill a day which his grandfather brings to him. He crushes the pill, mixes it with water in a spoon, heats it, then draws it into a syringe and squirts it under his tongue. This is what the boyfriend and the boyfriend family say and they say the doctor who prescribes this knows what they are doing. Right! He also uses one of his grandmothers insulin needles to do this but says he does not inject himself, he just squirts it under his tongue. I said why does he need his grandmother’s needles for this. Why is his grandmother giving him needles for this? You can buy syringes and why need a fresh one each time? You can rinse it out and reuse it. Why not just pour it under the tongue?
This to me is so fucking crazy.
It’s beyond crazy and that his family tell these lies and expect to be believed???
There are some serious problems in that family.
Supposedly the capsules (clear with no markings) are from the health food store and contain a weight gaining herb. The boyfriend says he opens them and pours the contents into an energy drink. I said why? If it’s a powder meant to go into a drink if would come in a can. Why not just swallow the capsule.
My friend is making her daughter get a drug test today. I hope for everybody’s sake it is negative.
She didn’t drag her daughter home last night but it’s coming. I know she will do the right thing.
My friend is having such a hard time with this. I feel for her. I told her over and over I don’t want to be mean, I don’t want to hurt her feelings but she has got to get her daughter out of there and stop worrying about getting along with his family.
That they would stand there and lie to her to her face like that? I think I need to be at the next family meeting because I would be calling bullshit the entire time. That they would be so disrespectful to stand there and lie to her face infuriates me.
I feel so bad for her. She wants this to be one big happy family, she wants her granddaughter to feel loved, she wants what is best for everybody - she just doesn’t get it yet that she is dealing with some majorly fucked up people and you can’t fix the crazy.
Complete and total bullshit if you ask me.
Why go to all that trouble if you aren’t injecting the drug? BF is using, plain and simple. Even if it’s a “legit” prescription, the doctor writing it doesn’t know what he’s doing. It might be a forged prescription. Regardless, this isn’t methadone treatment.
There is just a modicum of truth in their statements, but the whole is bullshit. Yes, you can get clear, empty capsules at health food stores. You can get herbal mixture in them. By WTF you purchase already made capsules, open them, and pour out the powder? Why not just buy the powder? This just smacks of ritualized drug use.
That’s sort of a defining trait of addicts, con artists, and criminals. You might be dealing with all three here.
Sometimes, to do the right thing you have to be “mean” and make some people unhappy.
If you call Protective Services - which is an option you should at least consider - 17 year old daughter might well lose custody of the kid. If that happens, assuming your friend’s home life is stable and sane, there’s a good chance grandma can get custody. Of course, that leaves your friend raising another child, but at least your friend will be sure the baby is being properly cared for. Daughter will be able to interact with the child.
There aren’t many happy options left here. It’s time your friend realize that this will NOT be one big happy family. What is best is not always what makes people happy. The adults can make their own choices here, but there is a baby involved who doesn’t have that ability. Best for baby needs to be front and center.