Teen Drinking

Drinking to Get Drunk What’s Really Going On at High School Parties

By Jennifer Thompson

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little bit outside of town, one of the most popular football players of the local high school lives in a big house, and his well-to-do parents have left for a week in Paris. Word passes via text (because social networking sites are too likely to call attention from the police), and soon students ask older siblings and friends to procure alcohol or they’re pulling out IDs (that either have a false age on them or used to belong to someone else entirely) to go into the liquor stores themselves with little fear of being caught. And on Friday night the big, empty house — and perhaps the barn outside or the field nearby — fills with over 100 teenagers whose goal is not just to listen to music, play beer pong, and hang out with friends, but also to consume as much alcohol as possible until they pass out.

This could be a scene lifted out of any number of cliché teen movies or television shows, but, for Kelly*, 19, it is the story of a typical weekend with her high school friends.

Involvement in underage drinking regardless of moral or ethical opinions, of which there are several is a status offense for children under 18, a misdemeanor for those over 18, and unlawful transaction with a minor in the third degree for those over 21. So if there’s such a rap sheet already stacked against it, why are parties like this so common throughout Louisville and Southern Indiana, and why is no one talking about them?

WHO is drinking?

Just as with adults, drinking for teens can serve many purposes — whether to fit in with those around them, enhance a social gathering, or help them cope with emotional stress.

The party described above is, in fact, indicative of Kelly’s high school experience. Kelly, now in her sophomore year at IU, says that at her high school she was part of “the popular crowd — the rich kids and pretty girls and football players.” Although Kelly herself did not drink, she felt that if she didn’t go, she wouldn’t ever see her friends and would spend her weekends sitting at home alone.

But drinking is not just for the popular and rich teens. Steve*, 23, a graduate of Louisville Male Traditional High School, says that he and his friends were “middle of the road” in both high school popularity and socio*Note: For the privacy of those involved, some names have been changed or omitted from this article.

As seen in Today’s Woman magazine, October 2011, www.iamtodayswoman.com

economic class, but alcohol was also a favorite weekend pastime because it made their regular hangout time “funnier” and “looser.”

The “unpopular” crowd also finds reason to experiment with alcohol. Anna Gryce is an Oldham County mom of a 17-year-old who is now a recovering drug and alcohol addict. “He’s really kind of a shy kid,” Gryce says of her son. “He didn’t participate in sports or academic clubs, but when he started smoking and doing marijuana, people paid attention to him and he was popular.”

Gryce says that teens today are usually more aware of alcohol’s effect on their performance ability. However, involvement in sports is not necessarily enough of an incentive to stop drinking. Steve was on Male’s soccer team for his entire high school career and says he was careful not to drink before games, and Kelly cites examples of football players who knew if they got caught, they would be facing suspension from 25 percent of their athletic season. Steve sums up many teens’ attitudes when he likens underage drinking to violating minor traffic laws. “I understand there has to be a cut-off [on the legal drinking age], but I think the law is somewhat unrealistic,” he says. “No one feels bad when they speed; you understand why there has to be a limit in place, but you’re only upset if you get a ticket.”

They’re getting wasted. It’s complete binge drinking, and it’s kind of scary because it’s completely the norm.

WHAT is actually going on?

Kelly and Steve both say that the bigger parties were not common in high school. “If you have 100 people at your house, it’s not ‘if’ the party is getting broken up; it’s ‘when,’” Steve says.

Major Mark Fox, LMPD, confirms this, as he says that most of the phone calls the police receive about underage drinking come because of large parties that produce parking problems and loud noise that disturbs neighbors. “It’ll start out as a small group, but then it morphs into something huge and gets beyond the control of the host,” Fox says.

For this reason, Steve and Kelly both say that their typical gatherings were between five and 10 people.

“There weren’t really any parties involved,” Steve says. “We were usually in a basement, and we would just drink and do stupid stuff — which we did anyway, but the drinking made it funnier and stupider. I would always just chill and talk to people I knew, but in college there were usually people smoking cigarettes and weed too.”

Kelly, too, says that the purpose of these social gatherings was to get drunk. “Every get-together, it’s just a given that people are going to be drinking — and not just drinking. They’re getting wasted. It’s complete binge drinking, and it’s kind of scary because it’s completely the norm,” she says. “I would never show up by myself because by the time I got there, everyone was always smashed, so you either had to catch up or pretend you were drunk too.”

Kelly says that the gatherings often included music, dancing, and drinking games, and social drama also often escalated as inhibitions lowered. “Most of the time it would be arguments, but I’ve seen people fight. Guys would wrestle, but because they were so drunk, they wouldn’t realize how much pain they were causing.”

Major Fox says this sort of behavior is a natural consequence of not knowing how to drink responsibly.

“Inexperienced consumers of alcohol — no matter what their age — are dangerous,” he says. “You don’t know how you’re going to act. And when you’re a teenager, those emotions are already heightened.”

WHEN are they drinking?

Operation Parent is a local nonprofit organization that provides resources and classes to parents of teenagers. Jean Schumm, director, calls underage drinking an “epidemic” that is occurring as a direct result of absent parents.

“With parents working and struggling with their own marriages, kids are looking for that bonding time. When it’s not there, they get bored and start looking for ways to fill the time,” she says.

Jill Howard, an Oldham County mom of a 21-year-old recovering addict, agrees. “A lot of children are just bored after school, and (drinking) is an outlet for that boredom,” she says. “Parents are letting their children experiment while they’re not at home, after school before the parents get home — it’s a free-for-all. And it’s happening younger and younger every year.”

Jackie Wisman, director of JCPS’s Safe and Drug-free Schools program, says that JCPS has had to develop policies for possession of or being under the influence of alcohol in students even at the elementary school level.

“If we feel like there’s a serious problem, they’ll come to the assessment center and meet with a counselor — not a school counselor, but a professional drug and alcohol counselor. We’re more about trying to help them than throw them out of school because we know that won’t solve the problem,” he says.

Howard believes that solving the problem starts with curing the boredom. “Get them involved,” Howard says, “for older children especially. They need social responsibilities. Have them get a summer job or volunteer even if it’s not necessary.”

Although Kelly’s friends started drinking as early as middle school, Howard’s theory at least holds true for why Kelly refused to participate.

“You can’t sleep well and you always feel gross the next day,” she says. “No one goes home until 4 in the morning, so you’d have to sleep until 2 the next day. I had to work and stuff.”

WHERE are the parents?

Before the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984, the legal drinking age varied from state to state, meaning that many of today’s parents grew up with the legal drinking age being 18 or 19 in different parts of the country. This, among a vast array of personal beliefs, has created a major disparity in parents’ attitudes toward underage drinking today.

Christina*, 20, graduate of Christian Academy of Louisville, says that her father introduced her to wine coolers when she was in high school so she would know the taste and effect of alcohol and be able to handle situations involving alcohol when she got to college. His rule was that she could only have one a night and he had to know about it.

Although Christina also often drank to the point of drunkenness at a friend’s house without her parents’ knowledge, she says she values her father’s effort to teach her responsible drinking. “I’m the kind of person who has to experience it for myself to understand,” she says.

…(his) mom came downstairs and said, ‘I don’t really care that you’re drinking, but don’t let anyone drive.’

On the other end of the spectrum, Gryce, who is the PTSA president at Oldham County High School, says that “my first duty as a parent is to uphold the law.”

Before Gryce’s son began to abuse alcohol and drugs, she says that they had conversations about underage drinking being unacceptable.

Gyrce says. “They’re not going to like every rule that you make, but you’re not doing it out of spite. I love my children, and I want my children to be safe.”

Some parents believe that keeping their kids safe means allowing them to drink in their homes so that they can monitor their behavior and not allow them to drive. Parents collect keys at the door and allow teens to stay at their house to keep them off the road.

Steve reports that after their senior prom, he and his friends drank in a friend’s basement while his parents were upstairs. “At one point, (his) mom came downstairs and said, ‘I don’t really care that you’re drinking, but don’t let anyone drive. Whoever’s here right now is staying the night.’”

Schumm says that when parents do this, they are doing exactly what Gryce advises them not to — that is, being permissive and trying to be their child’s friend.

At Operation Parent, parents are taught that there are four different parenting styles: authoritarian, authoritative, permissive, and uninvolved. Schumm says that authoritative is the best method of approaching teens because authoritative parents don’t just put the rules in place (like an authoritarian parent) but also explain why the rules are there.

“That’s the critical piece — building that relationship and explaining why,” Schumm says.

“Teens need to know that we love them and want to protect them. Their peers aren’t going to do that for them. Parents are the only thing that stands between their child and the toxic culture.”

Parents are the only thing that stands between their child and the toxic culture.”

WHY is no one talking about it?

If parental involvement is key to keeping kids safe, then why are so many parents unaware of what is going on with underage drinking today? And if they are aware, why aren’t they speaking up about it?

Schumm says that it’s fear that cripples parents. “It hits too close to home,” she says. “They want to avoid difficult questions that kids might ask — did you drink when you were my age, why do you drink and I can’t, etc.”

Gryce echoes this idea. “It’s embarrassing. For me, as a parent, having to manage all the drug and alcohol issues at school, it was very embarrassing. I’m the PTA president, for crying out loud, and here I have an addict for a son.”

Lisa* is adamant about keeping open lines of communication with her kids, even if it is difficult for her.

“I don’t like the fact that I had to tell them what I did when I was younger because as a parent, you want to be perfect in their eyes,” she says. “But being honest and frank with them helped them be honest with me.”

Although Lisa doesn’t permit drinking in her house, she always

lets her kids know that if they do drink, they (and their friends) can call her without fear of repercussion.

“The first thing I say is ‘I hope you don’t drink,’ but I try to be realistic about it. I tell them always to have a designated driver, and if they don’t, to call me. Just telling my kids ‘no, don’t do it’ isn’t going to work; they’re going to do it if they really want to.”

Lisa recalls one time her kids brought home a friend who was drunk and afraid to go home. She allowed the friend to stay overnight and get sobered up, but the next morning she sat down and talked to him about his choices and encouraged him to talk to his parents about what was going on, because he could not use her house as a place to stay out of trouble.

Lisa has, however, called other parents to tell them what their kids are up to, but she has been met with anger as parents insist that their kids would never drink.

“They’d rather shoot the messenger than deal with the issue,” she says. “I’m not going to stick my head in the sand and I’m not going to not be on my kids’ case about this.”

Lisa’s definition of “being on their case” includes searching her kids’ rooms and making them aware that she will have them undergo drug tests and breathalyzers. But at the end of the day, she tells her children that she knows they might drink and that she is a safe resource for them.

“I’d rather have my child alive than be afraid to call me.”

I’d rather have my child alive than be afraid to call me.

HOW does this affect a teen’s life?

Now a junior at Bellarmine, Christina says that because she got alcohol poisoning once in high school, she knew, once she got to college and had more freedom, just how much she could drink without getting to that point again.

It also made me grow up a little bit faster,” she says. “(Drinking) introduces you to the ways of the world sooner than what a high schooler should have to deal with because there are so many dangerous things that go along with it — drugs and sex and stuff.”

Gryce says that through her experiences with her son and her involvement with Operation Parent, she has learned about the adverse effects that alcohol has on the adolescent brain.

In addition to the physical ramifications, Gryce says that underage drinking and drug use causes emotional and familial turmoil as well.

“I can speak from experience of living with a teen who is living with an addiction, and it’s awful. It changes their lives, and it puts so much stress and pressure on the family,” she says. “At 16, my son had a great job and had saved up enough money for a car and his cell phone, but now he’s lost everything.”

Although Schumm says that it’s important to start talking to children as early as fifth grade about alcohol, Gryce encourages parents that it’s never too late to hope for the best for their kids.

“Parents should not give up on their children,” she says. “There have been so many times I’ve wanted to give up on my son, but in those moments when I wanted to walk away, I had to remember that if I were in his shoes, I would be calling out for help.

“My son still has his whole life ahead of him. He may not know that, but I know how much fun life can be, and he still has that opportunity to live life to the fullest.”