How do I stop my daughter from one day doing drugs?

No matter how much research a teenager does, there's no way they can understand the true risks they're taking.

How do you protect your children from experimenting with drugs? Picture: Sasiistock

My wife and daughter were in their bedroom down the hall. Our toddler was battling sleep like a warrior child, as I stood alone in our kitchen.

There were dishes to be done and rubbish to be taken out. Oh and a rising guttural scream in the distance.

What we'd learn in coming hours was these were the primal roars of a 15-year-old boy sent completely wild after apparently taking "acid". Some kind of psychotic break also seemed likely.

His friends had no idea how to act. They panicked. They threatened a boy clearly out of control. That made him act out even more, which shouldn't have been a surprise.

I could hear the screeching and screaming from inside my closed-up house. I could hear him galloping up and down the street. His friends were furious. Undue attention is not what you want when a bunch of you have a gutful of drugs.

My neighbours reacted quicker than I did.

They were already down on the street trying to calm the yelling boy and get answers from his friends.
 

I arrived when the madness was at its peak. Here was a tall, athletic teen, entirely naked and running around like a wild animal. He would run towards us, then away, then towards again.

By the time the police appeared, he was utterly out of control. The officers could not bring him to the ground. He was too wired. Also, his naked, sweaty body made him slippery as an eel.

We watched this teen be shot with a Tazer three times. Each time it paralysed his muscles and brought him heavily to the ground. His arms did not come out to protect his face or body.

After each pulse tensed all of his muscles into submission, he somehow stood up and ran moments later. On the third try, reinforcements brought him to the ground and kept him there.

Paramedics then swung into action, bringing him tumbling from those great heights.

It was a long way to fall by the time he landed in the ambulance.

When our street calmed, I was left asking my wife: How do we stop our daughter from being the one in the back of that ambulance?

You can't forbid them to experiment.

They will find a way. It will be at a stranger's house instead of their own, and if things go wayward - like it did here - they will be too scared to call the police or the ambulance for help.

No matter how much research a teenager does, there's no way they can understand the true risks they're taking.

Do you give them all the information and hope they make rational decisions, or do you play dumb and hope that the spectre of drugs just never enters their circle?

Where do you stand?

Originally published as How do I stop my daughter from one day doing drugs?