True Stories

Taylor Hooton was a star pitcher on his high school team, a handsome teenager who had everything going for him. Until steroids caught up with him, and he took his own life.

Irma was a 14-year-old girl from Belmont, California who took an Ecstasy pill. She became sick immediately—vomiting and writhing in pain—yet her friends did not seek medical help for her. 

Dave spent most of his teen years looking for answers in a mixture of marijuana, cigarettes and alcohol.

When our son, David, was 13 and 14, we discovered he had tried drinking alcohol and smoking pot. We reiterated our rules that alcohol and drug use was unacceptable, and imposed what we felt were appropriate consequences. 

In his senior year of high school, his car was firebombed in the driveway of our home. In retrospect, we realized it was drug related, but at the time, the explanation he gave us made sense. It was all a lie. Drug activity is typically associated with violence and deception.

I worked for a community-based substance abuse prevention agency and so did my son, Jason. Jason knew the dangers. We believed that he was not using drugs—we talked about it often. I was so convinced that he was not using that it became a sort of joke between us—as he would leave home at the end of a weekend, I would frequently say, “Jason, don’t do drugs.” “I know, Mom,” he would say, “I won’t.” But he did.

We found our oldest son, Efrain, in our bedroom dead from a self–inflicted gunshot wound to the head. At age 19, Efrain had grown to be a fine, respectable and loving young man. Sure, he had his share of youthful stumbles along the way, but he responded well to our guidance. He had the highest respect for his parents and was very kind at heart. He adored his baby brother, Ethyn and younger sister, Erika. He was raised in a solidly Christian home, and had embraced his faith.