When you were growing up, you probably thought about what sort of person you would be when you became an adult. Some boys dream about being dads, but most little girls dream about being a mom. If you were blessed to have a parent or two who really loved you and worked hard and showed that they cared, then you had an example to follow. Not everyone does.
Probably no child or teenager sits, thinking, “When I grow up I want to leave my children alone in the home while I go out and do errands. I want to sell drugs out of the back door of my house, and hopefully raise my kids in a dirty, rat-infested environment, feeding them canned spaghetti, soda pop and potato chips. I want to do as little as possible to make them feel comfortable and loved. After all, they only need to own 2 shirts and pants, and maybe one toy. I have to think about myself, after all.”
Drugs alter the brain and the ability to think straight. Drugs cause the brain to make decisions that are self-centered and drug-centered, because the brain just says, “more, more!” and the body follows suit. Unfortunately, this means that there are drug endangered children here in Arkansas, and we need to do what we can to help them.
A two-day conference was held on April 4, 2012 at the Wyndham Riverfront Hotel in North Little Rock in honor of Arkansas Drug Endangered Children Awareness Day (ADECAD). With the Division of Children and Family Services gearing up to do about 34,000 investigations of abuse this year, and over 200 drug raids being done, many of which discover children on the premises, it was a timely and wise idea to bring groups of individuals together to learn and formulate plans.
Loma Linda University’s Doctor Kiti Freier Randall said at the conference that,
“Drugs are a big part of every community. We need to reach out to those families, but particularly reach out to those children because we know those risk factors are for a long-term trajectory that may result in them being users themselves."
