At the time, only one in eight teens seen at Missoula's Turning Point Addiction Services, which Shea directs, had a meth addiction. And only two in eight teens had even tried meth.
But now the numbers are in for last year, and the news is not good.
In a way, Shea and others involved in dealing with the meth problem were hoping against hope. The drug is widely available and relatively cheap. And it's often part of the fare at drinking parties, particularly ones where college-age people are present.
"The fact that teens are present at these college parties just increases the likelihood that they are going to encounter the chance to use meth," Shea said. "There's just so much access to the drug, if someone wants to try it, they're going to get that chance."
Because teens drink at such parties, their judgment is impaired, Shea said. That makes it much more likely they might try meth, even if they've heard it's dangerous.
"Sometimes, I think it can be just that simple," she said.
Teens still use alcohol and marijuana much more extensively than they use meth, Shea said, but meth addiction is much more difficult for treatment specialists to deal with.
Part of that difficulty is the drug itself - meth is powerfully addictive - but part of the problem is the fact that most treatment is provided in outpatient settings.
"With a lot of these kids, as soon as they're gone, they're right back to their sources of the drugs," said Cheri Peterson, program director for Turning Point's Teen Recovery Center, an eight-bed inpatient treatment center that should open in mid-August.
The facility will offer constant supervision and a teacher, so teens don't fall behind in school during treatment.
"Basically, what we've needed is a place to contain them," Shea said. "We need to get them clean and sober for a while and then see what we've got to work with. A 24-hour facility is the best way to approach this."
The new recovery center is grant-funded, and Shea and Peterson hope that if it proves successful, a larger center might be set up eventually.
"Ideally, a 24-bed facility would be great," Shea said.
The children who show up at Turning Point for substance abuse treatment arrive from a handful of sources - referrals from Youth and Drug courts, schools, state Child and Family Services and parents. Those who enter the recovery center will likely be "involuntary volunteers."
"I don't imagine they'll be wanting to go into a treatment program for four to eight weeks, but that's what will happen," she said.
With eight kids constantly working through the center, Shea said the program should be able to reach more than 40 children per year. Clients who finish the center's program would then go into an outpatient program.
"It's very important that they continue in the program," Shea said. "That consistency is really important."
Meth isn't the only new area of concern for treatment professionals who deal with juveniles. Just as with adults, where abuse of prescription drugs is a burgeoning problem, more and more teens are starting to experiment with prescription drugs.
Unfortunately, most of the younger users are stealing the drugs from their parents, even their grandparents. It's frightening enough that children might steal and use powerful painkillers like Oxycontin, but they're also taking and using drugs they know nothing about.
"They're taking thyroid pills, blood pressure medicine, you name it," she said. "If there's a chance they might get a high, they'll try it."
Said Peterson: "Kids are absolutely fearless. They have no interest in what the drug is for."
Although it's possible for teens to find prescription drugs other places than at home, parents' medicine cabinets are the most likely source.
"It's really easy for parents to lock these drugs up," Shea said. "Just get a little lock box. It's cheap and it can be very important."
Short of that, parents should count their pills if they think their children might be taking them.
Both Shea and Peterson stressed that modern America is a culture inundated with the message that there's a drug for every problem. Kids internalize that message and think, "Hey, why not me?"
"The constant message is that you need drugs to live," Shea said. "That's not a good message."
Reporter Michael Moore can be reached at 523-5252 or mmoore@missoulian.com
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