Julie's Journal
Good girls have diaries... Bad girls have blogs!
This isn’t my proudest mommy moment, but I thought I would write about it in hopes to help other parents of teenagers who might be facing the juvenile court system.
Over the summer my 17 yr old son got a ticket from the police department for underage drinking. He was at a high school party where a fight broke out (in which he wasn’t involved in) the cops were called, and all the kids got a ticket to appear. I was called by our police department to come pick him up at said party, where I was reprimanded by the police officer just as hard as my son was.
When your minor child gets in trouble with the law, you as a parent get in trouble also. I had to take him down on his court day and stand in front of a probation officer with him just as if I was the one who was underage drinking. The probation officer referred him to the psychological office where he was to be evaluated.
I took him to his psychological evaluation, where I was surprised that I wasn’t allowed to go in with him. After all, up to this point I was included in this whole process. The psychologist came out to take him in, and she told me to sit and wait. He was escorted into a room and sat down in front of a computer where he was instructed to answer the questions truthfully, while the psychologist left the room.
They both came out after about 20 minutes and she handed me a paper with the information we needed for him to attend a drug awareness class, (yes I had to go also) and started walking away. I promptly stopped her and asked her about the evaluation and how she came to the conclusion that he needed to attend this class. To say the least, she was taken aback by my question, as if no parent had ever asked her such a thing.
She fumbled her words for about 3 minutes, then finally was able to give me a semi-straight answer. She went on to tell me that the test that he took was called POSIT (although she didn’t know what that acronym stood for) and told me that the drug class sentence was the results of his answers on the test.
Since I Google everything that I don’t know about, we went right home and I got online to find out more about this test. The search term POSIT will give you 3,580,000 results for absolutely NOTHING that even relates to a teenager psychological evaluation given by a county juvenile court system. Narrowing my search term to POSIT+test I was finally able to find ONE site that gave me information.
POSIT Problem Oriented Screening Instrument for Teenagers
The Problem Oriented Screening Instrument for Teenagers (POSIT) is a brief screening tool designed for adolescents 12 through 19 years of age to identify problems requiring subsequent in-depth assessment. It also can help determine a potential need for treatment. The self-report questionnaire assesses ten functional areas:
- Substance Use/Abuse
- Physical Health
- Mental Health
- Family relationships
- Peer relationships
- Educational Status
- Vocational Status
- Social Skills
- Leisure and Recreation
- Aggressive Behavior/Delinquency
The POSIT test consist of 139 yes/no items. So assuming your teenager told the truth to every question, the results depend on which class they have to attend. Now I’m not a dreamer and I have a pretty level head when it comes to my teenager, so I can bet that he wasn’t as truthful as he should have been while taking this test.
Seriously, what teenager would be completely truthful when answering a question like:
- “Do you drink alcohol at parties?”
- “Do you make bad decisions when you are drinking?”
- “Was this the first time you drank alcohol?”
I don’t think my teenager did, but if your teenager would then high five mom of the year! You rock! You need to write a book for the rest of us horrible mothers.
So today was our 2 hour Chemical Awareness Program where we learned all about substance abuse, self-esteem, setting goals, parent/teenager relationships, and decision making. It actually was a good class, and where else can a mother sit down next to the their teenager for two hours straight? Hey, I take what I can get.
Overall, I can say that the experience wasn’t the end of the world, as I first thought it would be. It certainly wasn’t just a conversation if he could pierce his tongue and get body jewelry, but the earth didn’t fall off it’s spinning axis either.
Yes, having the cops call you to come pick up your drunk teenager sucks ass on many different levels. Having to stand in juvenile court with teenagers that have committed rape and murder is no walk in the park. And being as guilty as your kid is just a hard pill to swallow. But I’ve learned a lot from this experience, about myself as a mother, and about my teenagers struggles with self-esteem and peer pressures.
Do you have a story to share? Are you the mom of the year I wrote about? What do you think of this experience? I’ve love to hear your thoughts, so comment away…good, bad and downright ugly.
[tags]teenagers, juvenile court, Las Vegas, Nevada, underage drinking[/tags]
Comments
I had no idea that getting busted at a party led to this much bureaucracy. Did you have to pay court costs and for the cost of that “psychological” test? Also, if you don’t mind my asking, did you also punish your son further for the incident like by grounding him, or did you figure that court and the test were punishment enough?
I hope you are still blogging in about five years when my son is 16 and I need guidance for all of this 
Elizabeth – good question that I forgot to address! Yes, he was grounded for the first week, and his curfew is STRICTLY enforced now, where I gave him some slack before this incident. There was no fine involved.
Julie, I appreciate your honesty and openness about all of this. Hopefully this will be the last time you have to deal with this kind of thing. I know I’m concerned about alcohol and drugs and sex as my kids move into their teenage years – you never know what life is going to bring.
And hey – maybe there’s an opportunity to take advantage of getting in the top SERPs for POSIT+test. 
When my son was 16 I found some pot in his drawer. It freaked me out.
My husband and I spoke to him about the ramifications of using, and what he should do for himself to get away from the drug. We did however enforce some strict rules in the house.
He is 18 now and talks openly with us about busted parties, people smoking etc… But seems to be on the right track . I think you made a wise decision Julie and it sounds like it was an interesting experience.
Don’t feel too bad – my mother had to post bail for me so I could attend my 18th birthday party
As for the test they gave – they’re all a crock. I’ve never used an illegal drug and, aside from one night of depressed drunkenness, drank a grand total of about a six-pack of beer all the way through high school. Yet, every time I got arrested (there were a few) they made me take drug and alcohol awareness classes. It’s all just revenue generation.
Been there, done it too. Only she was 18. I felt as if I was being sent to the gallows. We made it through it.
Amy – believe it or not, I’m already in the #8 position
Aahz – bailing you out of jail for your 18th birthday? God bless your mother.
Karen – good to know. Hopefully he learned something from this experience. I sure know I did!
I know here in PA, when a kid turns 14 they can make their own decisions as far as going to a psychologist. I mean, parents can’t go with them unless the kid allows them to.
Well I’m not the mother of the year either I guess. When my son was 16 (he’s 19 now) I got called by the police to go pick him up for underage drinking.
Actually the police were pretty decent about the whole thing as they realize kids will be kids. They didn’t ream me or my kid out. He had to pay a fine (and yes, I made him pay it) and he was grounded for a month.
Thankfully I was never called back to the police station again.
But…kids will be kids.
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Invisalign – thanks, and good luck with your son. I hope he stays on the right path.
Cheryl – is that even if they are court ordered?
Kim – hopefully it just takes ONCE to knock some sense into them
What a cool post, taking us through the process you’ve both gone through together and the ‘neatness’ that sometimes comes out of teenage troubles. I know my mom and I wound up sharing some special times together, as a direct result of my having so much trouble. And I will always cherish those memories. Two in particular stand out to me, maybe I should blog them.
It has sounded so much more peaceful and manageable – and even friendly at your house in the last few months.
Even though I could never tell my mom this at the time, I really super duper loved and appreciated her and her companionship and her support during all those times. I pray it’s the same with your son!
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Lisa – thanks so much! I hope that is how it ends up that way with my son also.
Wow, you’re a great parent! If I had to attend that class with my kid (I don’t actually have any at the moment), I would be asking the instructor if they suffered from low self esteem and substance abuse, and if that’s how they got stuck in this kind of a dead-end job!
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Thanks Jon, I’m not sure I am a good parent, I’m just going with the flow the best I can
Deb D on 14 September, 2008 at 4:57 pm That is really interesting Jules. Underage drinking is pretty common here. I thought it was overlooked unless there was driving involved but Tyler says some of his friends have been fined. I’m fairly certain that there is no test or classes involved. I’m inclined to think that this might be enough of a hassle for both kids and parents that they might abstain.
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Deb, I hope you are right about abstaining!
Good post Julie. It’s crazy isn’t it the way we feel so guilty when our kids get in trouble? And they don’t even realize we are being punished as much as they are.
I’m sure this episode will be a life long bond between the two of you especially if you can talk and laugh about it in time.
I’ve always told Crystal she is certainly going to pay for her teenage misdeeds! When I’m old and I get arrested every Friday afternoon for shoplifting at Wal-Mart she’s going to have to come bail me out They will have her number on speed dial!
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Heather – seriously! HAHAHA!
Jules,
I was in the hospital when this happened, just found this post linked in your newest post.
Anyway, no parent is perfect, we all have kids who do stupid things, underage drinking is one of those dumb things.
Neither of mine have done it yet, but I know they’ve been exposed to drugs and drinking, most of their friends do it.
But you’re a much better mom than me.
My kid would have been dead before the court hearing, I would have kicked his ass for all of the police hassles that I had to go through…LOL
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Kat – I don’t know if that makes me better. I think my “soft” approach is coming back to bite me in the ass.
