Drugs in your cupboard, what your teen could be using under your nose

Whilst most parents are aware of cocaine and marijuana, and ecstasy, very few are as educated about the other drugs that teenagers use to get high; the ones in many family cupboards across the USA. These are the drugs, which have coined the word "huffing" to describe how teens, and often young children, use these everyday chemicals to get a buzz.

Most of these drugs are absorbed through inhalation, and are often dispensed as some sort of spray, making it easy for the child to get the chemicals into their bloodstream. The danger of these household items should not be under estimated; children have died from one "snort" of the wrong chemical.

How do teens take these drugs?

• Huffing - sniffing from an inhalant-soaked rag, placed over their mouths and noses


• Sniffing or "snorting" fumes from containers


• Spraying aerosols directly into the mouth or nose


• Bagging - by inhaling a substance inside a paper or plastic bag


• Inhaling from balloons filled with nitrous oxide

What types of household items are being used?

Solvents

• Paint thinners


• Dry-cleaning fluids


• Gasoline


• Glues


• Correction fluids


• felt-tip-marker fluid

Gases

• Butane lighters and propane tanks


• Whipping cream aerosols or dispensers (whippets)


• Household aerosol propellants


• Spray paints,


• Hairspray


• Deodorant sprays


• Fabric protector sprays


• Medical anesthetic gases, such as ether, chloroform, and nitrous oxide (laughing gas)

Nearly all of these inhalants act to slow down the body's functions and if abused can result in loss of consciousness. For the teen, the high is relatively quick, and for younger teens can be long lasting, but gradually they need to take more and more. The teen that is huffing or snorting, can suffer from depression, they may complain of headaches, irritability, and nausea. These chemicals can cause heart failure and death, organ damage, loss of hearing, brain damage, and central nervous system failure.

How to tell if your teen or child is abusing household chemicals

• Chemical smell in room, or on clothes


• Paint on clothes or hands


• Hidden empty spray paint or solvent containers and chemical-soaked rags or clothing;


• Drunk or disoriented appearance and slurred speech


• Nausea or loss of appetite


• Inattentiveness, lack of coordination, irritability, and depression;


• Missing household items.

Talk to your teen about the dangers of these household items, and keep them locked away!