Is it harmful or helpful?

Question

Do you think it is helpful or damaging to let your kids know about your drug past? Say you did drugs, whether it be smoking weed to doing heroin, coke or crack when you were younger. Do you think your kids would be less likely or more likely to do them themselves?

I know some ppl who's kids knew and they did drugs. And I know just about the same amount of ppl who told their kids and they didn't do drugs.

So what's YOUR opinion?

I asked this before and almost everyone said to always be honest and never lie to your kids.

But...I'm not sure that you should NEVER lie to your kids. There's got to be some stuff that would be better if you lied about it.

To be totally honest, I did do drugs when I was younger. And sadly, I "enjoyed" them. I'm not gonna lie, although I did make some royal screwed up choices and I suffered alot b/c of my choice. But all in all, I liked the "high" from it. I can't very well tell my child "Oh I loved the way I felt from *whatever drug* but you should never do drugs."

I think there's alot of ppl who have gotten straight and been sober for YEARS who secretly enjoyed the high, but won't admit it.

I've heard Sinbad say "before you do any drug, watch someone else who's doing that drug and watch how they act, and I guarentee you that you will never do that drug." . And I thought it was great advise.

For the longest time, my dad has always said, "Do as I say, not as I do" I don't agree with that. I think that's the "lazy way" (for lack of words) of going about it.

Answer 1

I would maintain your reputation. Kids know plenty of people who do drugs without one of them being you. I think your credibility would suffer and they may even get drugs because you did. You can use alcohol as maybe an example of usage to tell them that you use to do it too much and it was bad if you must have some form of an example. I think you being clean and them knowing that that wasn't around in their home or done by their folks is becoming a rare thing today as almost everyone has experimented and as you know those experiments end up with the same results: failure and tragedy. Good luck.

Answer 2

I applaude your concern to both teach and tell the truth. What I would do is this: Follow the comedian SINBAD's example - "before you do any drug, watch someone else who's doing that drug and watch how they act, and I guarentee you that you will never do that drug."

Yeah, tell them you did it, and how it felt, and how you didn't care about anything else (maybe lie a little), how you almost flunked...etc. I myself told my brother and my cousin when they went to college, that it's not like it was in the sixties - people put poison in just for laughs, and use chemicals to treat the drugs making them more potent but now deadly.

Show them that you don't want them to make a mistake you made or almost made. That actor guy is right, "Get between your kids and drugs any way you can" - if you can lie to keep your kids away from drugs, you damn well do it.

Answer 3

you may have confused the pleasure or "high" from taking the drugs with hapiness, and this may be true, but hapiness is not always good there is such an existence of bad hapiness where pleasure is attained and the effects are temporary, afterwards there are consequences to pay for. Good or true pleasure is only attained if a person truly worked and attained for it, meaning the hapiness is deserved and not found through drugs or other "highs"

I think it is better to tell your kids the truth, but also tell them that drugs are not a solution to any problem. With every action, or word of mouth is a responsibility to themselves, and not to authority figures because you have already expressed its dangers, therefore they are now aware of their own doing. Also, tell them that they are above drugs and no materialistic object or addiction has the right to take control of them.

Answer 4

Truthfully you kids are gonna do drugs or not do drugs based on their own personal choice. Telling them could work in a good way because then if they ever feel pressured by friends or need to talk about if for whatever reason they will know that you have experience in that department, rather than if you were a Lame parent who thought you did weed by injecting it into your arm. Telling them could als backfire because then if and when you catch them doing it they will automatically play the "you did it when you were young and your just a hypocrit" card. My dad did drugs when i was younger and so when i got in trouble with the law for smoking pot i was ashamed and everything but i knew that he wouldn't dis own me or anything for "experimenting". I don't think knowing that he did drugs influenced me in any way when it came time for me to pass or puff, It just helped me feel more comfortable talking about my (and his) past mistakes.