Parents- 14 year old smoking pot, drinking. What would you do?

In My Humble Opinion
1

So my good friend, OlderBro, has a 14 year old brother, Mike. Mike is in his Freshman year, and has been struggling with his grades. He’s a reasonably smart kid, but he’s been doing a lot of the dumb teen stuff- not turning in homework, failing tests, and generally dicking around and not focusing. He’s also discovered girls, and his social life has starting to transition into a teen’s social life. He was diagnosed with ADD some time back, and his family figured his grades were due to him not taking his medication and stopping with his tutor. He has a new tutor and has started taking his medications again, but his last report card was abysmal, with mostly Ds. He’s also been telling a lot of stories that don’t add up.

For background, Mike’s parents are both immigrants, and spend a lot of time back in the home country on business. When both parents are gone, either OlderBro or their 20 year old brother, MiddleBro, will keep an eye on Mike. Mike has started to run with a crowd from the Old Country, and some of them are quite a bit older and more streetwise that the kids in Mike’s fairly clean cut middle class neighborhood.

Anyway, the other week, MiddleBro caught Mike and his friends drinking in the garage, and called up OlderBro to intervene. It turned out that Mike had invited about five kids over specifically to drink. They were doing shots of vodka (from the parents liquor cabinet) and drinking beer. There was spilled alcohol and broken glass, which they tried to conceal. In attendance were a couple of Seniors from his school, as well as some younger girls. OlderBro quickly broke up the party and alerted the parents. After checking Mike’s cell phone, OlderBro found that Mike was the ringleader and had been moving the whole operation forward.

The Parents were upset that Mike was drinking, but felt that they shouldn’t come down too hard because he was just trying to be popular. Mike first tried to say it was only his second time drinking, and then he made a big show of remorse. But soon after, he was caught with a bottle of vodka in his backpack on the way to a school dance. He claimed it was leftover from the party, and he was just trying to return it to the guy who brought it. The Parents chose to believe him. OlderBro and MiddleBro were agitating for a harsher reaction, but the parents felt that he had made a mistake and should move on.

This week, the Parents looked at Mike’s Facebook account and discovered a reference to him “smoking.” The parents called OlderBro, and OlderBro had to explain that the terminology being used wasn’t referring to cigarettes. Upon further investigation, it became clear the Mike has quite an active relationship with marijuana, and had apparently been buying it and pressuring his girl friends to use it with him. It’s also becoming more and more clear that lying has become a way of life for Mike. He’s lied consistently about things big and small, most worryingly about skipping class to smoke pot with his buddies. He’s also been using his lunch money to buy pot, and threw out a whole rack of lies when his parents tried to make him brown bag it.

Parents, do you have any advice? OlderBro is worried sick. He’s been a teen and knows about exploration, but he feels this is all coming too young, with too little maturity, and with too many lies and negative effects on grads and the like. He’s worried that his parents aren’t familiar with how sordid modern US high schools can be, and how seriously Mike’s grades and lack of focus can affect his ability to get into college. He’s worried that Mike’s developing brain is too young for this, and that Mike doesn’t have the maturity to navigate these obstacles. He’s only 14, and in many ways still a kid. OlderBro is in a position of some authority with Mike, as the mature (much) older brother. He’s hoping he can be a good influence, and provide some of the street smarts that his parents may be in a position to provide. But he’s also worried that it may be already too far gone.

Has anyone been through this? Any advice?

2

We of the castor oil generation will tend to sniff on this story. Even absentee parents have a way of controlling their kids.

3

What I ended up having to do with my unruly 14 year old son is to catch him in the act of doing something illegal and calling the police on him. This got him charged, in court, and on probation. His probation requires him to have a curfew, be searched on demand, keep his grades up at school, and follow the rules of the home, along with other things. Now it’s no longer a big power struggle between him and me about what he will or will not do- now it’s between him and the law. As he is basically a good kid at heart, he doesn’t want to break the law or risk going to juvenile detention, and so he has improved his behavior drastically. He also gets intensive counseling, 3+ times a week, and that has also helped. These measures, especially having him arrested, may seem very drastic, but when it comes down to it, sometimes drastic measures are necessary and worth it. It’s working for us.

4

The behavior in itself isn’t the problem. Smoking pot, drinking, and feeling up Wanda Hickey are normal teenage behaviors.

But I’d worry about the absence of parental oversight and interest. That’s where those behaviors become habitual avoidance of reality and/or seeking fulfillment though, um, destructive methods.

(Well, the first two. Kid’s going to want to bang every girl he sees for the next 10 years under all circumstances. That’s normal.)

5

You think drinking at 14 is normal behavior? Maybe wine and beer once in a while are ok, but shots of vodka? That’s bad and needs to be nipped toot suite. As for smoking, well it’s 2013. There is no reason on earth why he should think that’s a good idea. Getting an attitude and being disobedient once in a while are natural teenage actions. But when the grades start slipping and they start abusing (because there’s no way a 14 year old is going to have the self control or understanding to be responsible in their use) drugs and liquor, then the hammer needs to come down.

6

Somebody needs to step up, whether it’s the parents or the older brother, he needs more supervision. He also needs more repercussions for his actions. Unique punishments might be something to try. When I was 14 and was caught sneaking beers with friends, I had to scrub the entire kitchen floor with a toothbrush. The basement was the next step if I did it again. Experimenting with alcohol or pot suddenly became very uninteresting until I left for college.

7

Thanks guys.

The alcohol itself is not the problem, as much as the way it is being used. A 14 year old sneaking a sip of whiskey from the liquor cabinet or having a beer at a house party is normal experimentation, if a tiny bit premature. But inviting people over for the sole purpose of slamming shots of vodka? That’s out of the norm for a 14 year old. He doesn’t have the maturity to manage that level of drinking, as has been amply demonstrated by his grades, his need to lie, and his getting caught. He’s in way over his head.

Likewise, sharing a joint with your friends is something that most teenagers do. But he is buying directly from dealers, maintaining his own personal stash, skipping class to smoke, and pressuring others into smoking. In his messages, he was found continually pressuring a girl who maintained that she didn’t want to smoke. This is more than experimenting with pot, and still quite young for any of that.

8

We agree that more supervision would be better. Mike isn’t neglected. His mother is a stay-at-home mom, and while both parents travel frequently, they don’t usually travel at the same time and there is always someone in the house watching him. It would be nice if they were home more, but it’s also their livelihood and it will be difficult to change that.

I think the cultural gap is a bigger issue. A lot of Mike’s going-ons are missed due to the language barrier and unfamiliarity with US teen culture. I think that also makes it a little easier for him to lie and hide the loose ends in language confusion.

OlderBro thinks his parents don’t really have a full grasp of how critical this time is to Mike’s future. OlderBro was first generation and always knew he had to fight a little bit harder, so he was able to be very self-directed and get himself through college and into a comfortable position. MiddleBro did his share of slacking, but he managed to skate by through high school to community college to university. The Parents didn’t really have to take too active a hand to get them in an okay position, and while both of them experimented, they were smart enough to do it without getting into trouble. Little Bro is different- he’s more social, less directed, and more Americanized. He’s less likely to guide himself onto a college path, and the Parents probably don’t know the system well enough to make up for that.

Another issue is that in the Old Country, the drinking age is much lower and a kid drinking isn’t that huge of a deal. Indeed, Mike was in the Old Country over the summer and had the time of his life running around with his buddies chasing girls. The Parents were happy to see him taking an interest in his heritage, but looking back he was almost certainly getting up to some trouble there. I’m guessing that Mike doesn’t realize that the challenges he’s going to face in the US are going to be different than what his cousins are facing in the Old Country. Unlike his (often very affluent) friends here or his buddies in the Old Country, Mike doesn’t have the family connections and social status to automatically guarantee him a spot in the middle class. I don’t think he fully realizes that he’s going to have to really work to have the level of comfort his parents have, and he’s not going to get the breaks that his well-connected buddies may get.

9

It may too late. Good kids have good parents, and it seems like his are absent in spirit if not in flesh.

Drinking and smoking pot are normal, if early, behaviors. The lying? That’s a sign of a different problem. And his brothers, while they can support him, aren’t his parents and the kid will never view them that way.

I dunno - a big crack down at this point may just drive him further away, if its from patents who haven’t been there for him before. I hope it’s not too late, but I imagine that the parents should probably be home and tell him they love him and rebuild the trust that THEY’VE broken.

10

Well for the record, I haven’t done any of those things but I digress…

Two questions:

  1. Did “OlderBro” or “MiddleBro” have similar (if milder) problems of that nature when they were “Mike”'s age?

  2. What country is the “Old Country”-knowing whether its Honduras, the Netherlands, Taiwan, or Morocco might help us better understand exactly what sort of cultural background the parents are operating from.

11

Well, if you think Alice’s approach might work, getting the authorities involved, maybe one of the bro’s could search for his stash, and if it’s large enough, call the cops. That needs to be stopped, now, if you think he’s dabbling in dealing/distribution. It really sounds like the parents are a bit wimpy about things, or maybe they’ll change their tune if an older bro is able to show them a large pot stash. He’s at an unfortunate and perfect age to be recruited, and especially vulnerable based on the rest of his behavior. His friends knowing his parents or someone in the family is willing to call police on the drug possession might make the friends take a few steps back from him, and that would be a good thing.

12

If a parent/guardian of the girl whom he’s pressuring to smoke pot finds out about it, he/she may just take care of the “calling the police” part.

13

I would strongly recommend, if the cops are brought in, that it be for underage drinking, and not for the pot. They find the pot, they charge something related to pot, and the kid’s chances for going to college plummet, and getting federal financial aid is now impossible.

Just sayin’. The adults have to consider the long term consequences of their actions, too. The system is set up to strongly discourage parents from farming out discipline on pot related matters.

But it sounds to me like this kid just has way too much unstructured unsupervised free time. Some kids can handle amusing themselves safely, and some can’t. He obviously can’t, and needs adults to be his locus of control a bit longer.

Best way to keep 'em out of trouble is to keep them busy. Housework, yardwork, tutoring (even if his grades suck, he could tutor younger kids, and maybe then form some empathy for teachers trying to teach him), volunteering…keep that kid so busy using his mind and his body that he’s just too exhausted to go out drinking and whoring. even sven, surely you know a small town in Africa that could use a good strong American boy to carry water this summer, no? :smiley: Get that kid some perspective on his woes!

14

Also, somebody needs to give this kid the “no means no” talk. If he’s pressuring a girl to use pot who specifically says she doesn’t want to, he needs to understand that he must stop doing that, and he must not pressure her (or anyone else) to do anything else they don’t want to do.

15

I think a real harsh talk coming from the brothers collectively is in order.

1 - You can booze and drink all you want but getting D’s in HS with a tutor is inexcusable. This is beyond learning disability. You are no longer functional. You need artificial benefit just to float by at the minimum. Someone’s spotting you 10 yards in the 40 yard dash and beating you. Furthermore, you clearly aren’t smart enough to be able to smoke and booze AND go to HS and HS is a lot less demanding than a job - any job - even a minimum wage job. Get it together.

2 - You are not as cool as you think you are. Drinking in a garage is sad and pathetic no matter how old you are. Hotboxing a car in the park is sad and pathetic no matter how old you are. If you saw a bunch of men crammed in a van toking up at wal mart, would you think “Wow, what a bunch of smart, successful dudes!” ? Get your shit together, go to college, get a job, and use that money to party in style - not this bush league shit. You are not having fun.

3 - Drinking and getting high are means to escape stress. What stress do you have as a 14 year old? Is it too much to handle to go to school and hang out with all your friends and generally socialize while learning a little something from time to time too much for you to handle? Tough shit, because real life gets a lot rougher than that.

4 - Drinking and smoking doesn’t make you cool. Anyone can drink and smoke. The only reason you get to do it is because you’re exploiting your parents. Would your friends still be friends with you if you aren’t exploiting your parents? Or would you and them just go around trying to find someone else’s home situation to exploit? Think about that. Could you get your friends to hang out with you for a month without alcohol or drugs? The common tie of your friendship is that you want to “look cool” and take shots - in a garage. Don’t be such a boring intellectual midget. Have some interests. Make friends based on those interests. Succeed based on those interests. Then you can celebrate your success with all the booze and pot you can handle, but what you’re doing right now is a shit-poor imitation/mockery of the intoxication process.

16

From the brothers? What about the parents?

I bet they’re not barely scraping by financially - maybe they should curtail their business activities to, you know, parent their kid and not push it off on the brothers? A Ford drives just as good as a Mercedes, and they’ve already missed the boat on this kid. They need to step up.

I’m just amazed that people are calling for involving the police, and not looking at this kid’s parents. I see a situation where they’re tried nothing, and are all out of ideas…

17

A rebellious teen would be less receptive to a talk from his parents

18

Where the guidance comes from isn’t important. Whether it’s from the brothers or the parents or a counselor or the cops, doesn’t matter – somebody has to step up, with the parents as well as the kid.

Do they understand what the future looks like for a high school dropout?

19

Unless he’s desperately trying to get a rise out of them and failing.

One of my brothers was like that. He just had to push and push and push until he finally found a boundary he could break. My laissez-fair stepmom now looks back and wishes she’d at least put on a show of disapproval when it was little and unimportant, so maybe he’d have been satisfied with that.

There really is something to that “just wants attention” thing…I just don’t think it has the same conclusion many people give it. If a kid wants attention, give him some attention!

20

Talks from the brothers might be more effective than talks from the parents. The latter can just be dismissed as stupid old fogies who don’t know what its like. People closer to his own age might have more effect.

The other thing the parents could try to do is have a heart to heart talk with Mike. Asking him to explain why he’s doing what hes doing. Explaining that they love him and are disappointed in him. Asking what he needs from them. If his behavior really is a call for help it might allow both sides to reach a greater understanding of eachother. On the other hand if he is anything like me when I was his age, it will be the most humiliating and painful punishment he has ever known: scrubbing the floor with a toothbrush times ten. The fear of that look of concern, disappointment on my parents face and a condescending lecture was enough to keep me on the straight and narrow.

Finally, get a lock for that liquor cabinet.

ETA: If they can afford it they might also try family counseling.