teenagers problems with alcohol and drugs

Teresa Elimar Aráuz Medal
Alcohol, Cigarettes and Drugs, a Problem for Teenagers Can you imagine how hard it is dealing with a drunk and smoker teen as a parent? One of the worst nightmares as a parent is finding out that our teenager has started smoking or drinking, inclusively both at the same time. Many teenagers are tempted to try alcohol and cigarettes or drugs at some stage in their life. This addiction causes: Risk to their health, break relations between parents and son/daughter, and future problems in their life.

Every time a teenager drinks or smokes, the risk in his/her health increases every day. Studies show that the 70% of teenagers drink alcohol regularly, and the 56% are regular smokers, this includes cigarettes and drugs. In addition, the consumption of alcohol and drugs causes cirrhosis of the liver. Also, heavy drinking can cause the number of oxygen-carrying red blood cells to be abnormally low, this condition is known as anemia and can trigger a host of symptoms, including fatigue, shortness of breath, and lightheadedness. Moreover, when teenagers consume a lot of alcohol and drugs, they lose total control and contact with the reality because they lose the perception and their mind plays with them causing the development of psychosis and high levels of schizophrenia. Alcohol and drugs consumption can cause major health problems, these addictions do all kind of things on the body, and we are not fully aware of all the effects.

When teenagers start to smoke or drink without the permission of their parents, they lose their confidence and break their relationship. Because of the lack of communication with their parents, many teenagers destroy the trust or the connection with their entire family. They just submit their lives into the alcohol and drug's world. In addition, when we get into the world of addictions, at the same time, we are destroying the trust on ourselves because we do not try hard to solve our problems in a good and healthy way, we look for the easier and bad way to do it. In brief, while the use of cigarettes, drugs and alcohol is seems as something right for some teenagers, the truth is that these addictions are something totally bad and negative in the life of teenagers.

The third cause of the consumption of alcohol and drugs is that this practice brings negative effects in the future of every teenager that try this. When a teen start to practice this every day, she/he becomes addicted and the quality of her/his life change in a bad way because every aspect of your life suffers. Your health, your relationships, your career, your emotional well-being, etc. The more you spiral into the self-destructive cycle of alcoholism and drugs, the more damage you do to every facet of your life. Most of the time people depend on alcohol and drugs to control themselves because is the only way to do it and to calm down when you feel irritated. Also, we have to be clear that there is not cure for alcohol consuming and smoke; although there are support groups, this does not ensure that you will be cured completely, you just get over that stage. In short, drinking, smoking and using drugs is considerate a disease for teenagers. Sometimes teenagers are getting into this because they need an escape, perhaps they are unhappy at school or there have been recent changes at home that may have unsettled them. This can be acceptable because at some point of our life we all need an escape, another form to forget about everything. This is why teenagers get into drugs and alcohol. However, it is completely wrong to justify this actions just because we need an escape, we all have problems and with drugs and alcohol we do not resolve them.

In conclusion, smoking and alcohol consumption affects the life of those who use it, and the lives around them too. Although the common practice of drinking and smoking is accepted by many people, this does not mean that this practice does not have negative effects on health and life. So, every person that smokes and consumes alcohol and drugs should be more aware of the dangers that this practice really have.