HEARTBROKEN BARRIERE MOM SPEAKS OUT

"This Is an Isolated Community, There Is No Better Place For Dealers To
Find Customers."

"I don't want to bury my daughter," were the first words a very emotionally
distraught Barriere mom said to this reporter when she walked into the
Star/Journal office last Tuesday.

"Hopefully I can help save someone else's kid," said mom.

The story is heartrending - a true story that started about an attractive
young 16 year old, a member of this community, with a loving family, good
friends, acceptable grades at school, and an exceptional talent in
athletics. This young lady was active in school projects, community
volunteer organizations, and athletic groups. All the ingredients required
to assist her in obtaining a bright and prosperous future.

Last week she ran away from home at 2 a.m. leaving her mom to search the
streets and bang on doors looking for her daughter. When mom knocked on the
door of a home she knew to be a crystal meth house, a place she suspected
her daughter may be, the inhabitants lied to her and said she wasn't there.
After an agonizing night of fruitless searching mom finally managed to
establish that her daughter was indeed in that house. Barriere RCMP removed
the girl and she is now in a safe house where she awaits acceptance into a
drug and rehabilitation center.

What went wrong?

The first step that led this young lady and her family into a living
nightmare was for her to start hanging out with the wrong kids at school.
Mom laid down the rules, named the kids she didn't want her daughter to
associate with and was ignored. What do moms know about who a kid should
hang around with? Right? Wrong - big time.

Pressure at school is hard for young people just coming into their teen
years. Parents, teachers, peers - all put pressure on young people to do
well in school, to learn and excel, to be part of the group and to fit in.
Pressure for this young lady came with struggling to maintain a decent
grade with reading and math and her natural wish to be part of the group,
be cool, fit in.

Being cool and fitting in often leads to the wrong friends.

The wrong friends led to the wrong choice, and smoking marijuana became the
thing to do.

How does a kid go from marijuana to crystal meth? Mom says it starts with a
pot dealer hanging around the high school and handing out or selling a
special marijuana for the kids to try. Just something new. See if you like it.

What makes it special? It's laced with crystal meth! Hell has started for
the kid that made the disastrous choice of smoking that first joint.

"For $20 your kid can be stoned for three days on crystal meth," said mom.
"It is an amphetamine, they don't sleep for two days, and they literally
burn up before your eyes. When they come down they sleep for at least two
days and then wake up depressed and ravenous."

When did mom know her daughter was using drugs? She said for a very long
time she was in denial. Her husband told her the girl was using but she
didn't believe him, wouldn't believe him, not her wonderful little girl.
She had ugly fights with her husband over this and then finally couldn't
avoid the evidence any longer and had to admit he was right.

What were the signs? Mom says at first it was just the wrong friends, all
known drug users. She established a list that grew to at least nine people
her daughter was not to associate with. Then it was trouble at school,
suspensions and finally being expelled.

After that things got a little better, the daughter was active in
athletics, joined a local service organization, got a job, started to take
pride in herself.

Mom says after struggling for four years it all fell apart a few months ago
when her daughter started to lose massive amounts of weight. "Her clothes
just hung on her, and her hip bones stuck out," she said.

The daughters personality started to change, the usual fun loving, ready to
go anywhere kid no longer wanted to do anything or go anywhere. That's when
mom found out her daughter was sneaking out at night to be with the wrong
crowd and feed her now escalating drug habit.

"Her personality changed to a "Jekle and Hyde"," said mom. "I tried to keep
her with me all the time, she was virtually under house arrest, we had a
police state, but even I have to sleep sometime."

Mom said checking on the girl every two hours through the night just hadn't
been enough. That's when her daughter snuck out and ran away.

"I want parents to know that it may not be their kid but their kid's best
friend could be a user," said mom, "That's how its starts for so many of
the kids."

Mom says that she knows of at least two crystal meth houses and dealers in
Barriere. She has given this information to the RCMP. She also says that
another parent has told her there are five crystal meth houses in the
community.

"Wake up and smell it," said mom, "The coffee is burning. This is an
isolated community, there is no better place for dealers to find customers."

Mom says she hopes she is a good parent. Last year she attended 60 ball
games with her two kids, has wholeheartedly supported them in their
endeavors, and the family has lived, played and worked together for many years.

Mom said she hopes the time has come for the community to fight back, time
to keep an eye on who hangs around the schools and who doesn't belong.

She says she hopes that by coming forward and sharing her story others may
take a longer look at what is happening in their households, in the house
down the street, or who is influencing our children.

"Two years ago I thought I had hit the bottom of my ability to handle this
stress, I was at my wits end," said mom, "Amazingly I keep finding the
bottom goes deeper and I keep fighting to save my daughter. I don't want to
bury my daughter. I love my little girl."

For tips on protecting your child from substance abuse see Angela
Lawrence's column on page 14. This column will be a regular in upcoming
issues of the Star/Journal as our nespapers first step in this communities
war on illegal drugs.