http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaru-herald...s-wreck-family
Legal drugs wreck family
'I just hope one of them does not end up in a box'
Last updated 05:00 13/04/2013
Sue Eade, of Timaru, knows only too well how legal highs can wreck a family. Her two sons have used the legal substance K2 with disastrous consequences.
MYTCHALL BRANSGROVE
SHE UNDERSTANDS: Sue Eade, of Timaru, knows only too well how legal highs can wreck a family. Her two sons have used the legal substance K2 with disastrous consequences.
Timaru woman Sue Eade fears she will bury one of her sons.
That fear comes from seeing what legal highs have done to them and to her family. And now she wants to set up a support group to help other families affected by the drugs.
Her sons, aged 15 and 20, began using the legal high K2 last year. Since then she has seen the elder lose his dairy farm job as he was no longer reliable. This week she got the call to collect the 15-year-old from school as he was high on the legal drug.
She does not blame the employer or the school for the steps they took. She does blame the storeowners selling the synthetic cannabis.
"I bet they are not using it themselves or letting their children use it," she says of the store owners.
"They are hypocrites. They have no idea what it is doing. It does not matter whether it is legal or not.
"It is wrecking families," she said, explaining how her sons had taken items from the house to get cash to buy the highs.
"You go to get something and it is gone. I've had to put a lock on my (bedroom) door."
Last month the police called. The 15-year-old had been found comatose in Marchwiel Park.
The "mate" he had been smoking K2 with had left him there. Someone else found him and called the police. He was taken to hospital.
Medical staff at the hospital made it clear they were seeing similar cases "on a daily basis".
"He couldn't even walk. It took a nurse, my friend, and me, to get him into my vehicle."
Miss Eade spent the night checking him every hour, making sure he was in the recovery position in case he vomited and choked to death.
At least she knew where he was that night.
And this was a boy who was a top student in his first two years at high school. Earlier this year his science teacher told Miss Eade her son was in the top 1 per cent of students in that subject.
As of last Monday he is no longer welcome at school. He will not be allowed back until he tests clean. But he is not interested.
Attempts to reason with her sons have failed.
She has a very personal reason for fearing for her boys. Miss Eade understands the legal highs can cause kidney damage. She has hereditary kidney disease.
"I go through agony every day," she says of her condition, but even seeing their mother in such a state has not been enough to dissuade her boys from using.
"I just hope one of them does not end up in a box."
The legal highs have even affected her 11-year-old daughter. She used to love her big brothers. Now she hates them because of what they have done and the way they act. "It just tears you apart."
What the future holds for her sons, for her family, she does not know. But she does hope she can support other families who find themselves in similar situations. She has posted a link on the Facebook page Stop Legal Highs, inviting others to make contact.
Only those living through the hell the legal highs can cause can really understand, she says.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaru-herald...t-dope-dairies
Mayor: Boycott last dope dairies
RHONDA MARKBY
Last updated 05:00 13/04/2013
An angry mayor is calling on the Timaru community to boycott three dairies which are still selling legal highs.
Mayor Janie Annear was ropeable to learn On the Spot at the corner of Trafalgar and Evans streets, Corner Convenience on Arthur St and the Wai-iti Rd Food Market were still selling the synthetic highs.
"All three have lied to me on more than one occasion. I am extremely disappointed and incredibly sad that they continue to sell poison in our community, to our young people. They know these are extremely dangerous and highly addictive."
The shopkeepers knew sales would become illegal when the Psychoactive Substances Bill got through parliament, and were "totally driven by profit", she said.
"Obviously these dairies don't feel good about it as they are lying. If you care about our young people you should not reward these people who know what they are doing is wrong and dangerous. . . . I am saying don't shop at those dairies. I will not be shopping at those dairies."
Mrs Annear had been sent catalogue that showed items, including hookah pipes for smoking synthetic highs, and she feared they would be next on sale.
Mrs Annear said it was up to the community to make a stand.
"I have heard of kids [in Timaru aged under 18] who are now addicted, and they reckon you only have to smoke it on three occasions. They are now supporting $20 to $40 a day habits.
"Once they have finished stealing from their parents, where are they going to get the money to continue this habit?"
Mrs Annear said people rang her all the time about the legal highs issue.
"I have probably had 10 people approach me and they are saying it is just the most insidious situation and our young kids are in a situation of extreme risk."
She was concerned that the long-term effects of the legal highs were not known yet. Health professionals felt that because young people's brains were still developing, they risked long-term psychosis.
Dairies in Geraldine and Pleasant Point have never stocked the legal highs. A Temuka dairy that had, was no longer doing so.
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Originally Posted by blackdog
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