Are taking drugs and being a good parent mutually exclusive then?

[wanderlust]

I don't want to get told off lots or start a fight, its just that I (along with most of my friends - parents or not) will take drugs every now and then, but I am aware that the people I know are not necessarily representative of what's really normal or acceptable - so what does everyone really think?

Ok ok I get the message

I will go and cut my dreads off forthwith.

My bro did some filming for a documentary at Newbury, and ended up getting quite involved. Mind you, he doesn't take much persuading if something involves drugs and a bit of a scrap with the police.

most people i know indulge in recreational drugs too, be they parents or not. ecstasy, alcohol, caffeine etc. (some of those are ok to do in moderation in front of your kids i reckon!)
some of my friends have indeed had mental health problems, and they take drugs, and the two could be correlated. i think cannabis is probably more harmful than most of us would like to believe, if smoked daily or on too regular a basis, it does seem related to some people's paranoia and mental wellbeing. i think the same about coffee though.
i think its totally brilliant that some people really believe that taking one pill or having one smoke will lead to a lifetime of drug addiction and squalor! its great that, whatever scientific research says, people are prepared to take a firm moral stance against all illegal drugs. maybe its the smug intellectual in me, but i do enjoy tabloid style shock horror that is so wide of the mark.
when people are so horrified about parents taking drugs they are probably basing that on films showing completely unrealistic things happening, rather than a dinner party where everyone enjoys a couple of lines of coke afterwards.
i used to indulge in all sorts to excess, and now im a parent i have to be far more responsible than i used to be. about everything. but i guess im not too up my own arse about it. my father; now a respectable and deadly dull retired businessman; was a speed dealer back in his day. he saw his best friend die from heroin, and gave me a good talking to about "the hard stuff" when i first came home stoned at 13. my mum said she'd never tried anything, not even cannabis (bless her!) after she passed out at a Pink Floyd concert just from the fumes!
i still indulge in some pastimes but everythings got to be done with the responsibility and knowledge of your child. so, if, theoretically, me and my dp went out and took pills, we would make sure our ds was at his grandparents overnight and for a good whack of the next day.i wouldn't personally take my kids to all night parties, cos i don't trust myself to stay straight enough to deal with any emergencies.
btw i know some of the 9 ladies crew too!

I am relly rather depressed by this thread. I had to retreat

eewww at you newbury crew - which of you threw used tampons at the workers?

Not me - I was not there.

And I have a mooooooncup anyway.

not in those days you didn't!

Tis true I didn't back then. But I was too young for Newbury (according to my mum).

I never throw things at anybody, apart from the odd insult every now and then.

I think it's more of a matter of where the line has to be drawn on obviously problem parenting (DC going to school unwashed and unfed, too many accidental injuries because parents incapable of grabbing them before they fall downstairs, etc) as opposed to things that parents do which don't have any direct impact on their children. ANd it's not just drugs and alcohol that can cause problems for parenting. What about gambling? Gambling addicts can can spend the rent/food money on their habit, rendering their DC hungry and maybe even homeless, yet this doesn';t make anyone who buys a Lottery ticket a bad parent. And (setting personal opinions aside here many parents have religious beliefs which they try to instill in their children, which may have the side effect of their DC being bored rigid once a week by having to sit through some religious ceremony - but some people's religious beliefs demand much more of their DC, such as genital mutilation, other physical abuse, forbidding of friendships outside the family/religious group...

Oh, and the keeping-drugs-in-the-house danger argument oh FFS. Do you keep your houses free of matches and sharp knives, just in case? Does having an open fireplace make you a bad parent?

Ladysnowsalot - no-one laughed at your joke! I liked it

ok I think I missed the whole discussion, but anyway
I smoke, I drink, but i dont smoke near ds (I smoke outside) and I don't get ratted when theres no other responsible adult sober in the house. I can't risk taking drugs because of my job, but I personally don't see a problem with smoking spliffs (but not getting caned) when your lo is in bed, or if you are clubbing doing a pill, speed or coke (ie when you arent being responsible for your lo).
I dont think its good to get wasted when you are in charge of you dc, even if they are in bed.

does anyone of my generation (mid 30s) wonder how we all survived the 70s when everyone smoked, everywhere, all the time and it was socially acceptable to drink and drive and you could clamber around the car without seatbelts or any sort of restraints and take dogs into shops and stuff?

Dogs in shops! You still can Oop North.

can you really?

In some of them, yeah. Much friendlier than London

lol vacua - and being allowed to play outdoors unsupervised, going out to play in the rain and snow at school, sitting in the passenger side footwell of the car!

Or going in the car boot as I used to do sometimes.

Our perceptions of risk have really changed.

and not being allowed to watch ITV because it was 'vulgar' but working through a stash of video nasties found in parental wardrobe instead . . . good times!

Wonk I've seen a fantastic bit of footage on Undercurrents involving a old old tree, a chainsaw and a meeting between a police horse and a wild pony in the forest who'd come to see, in a state of distress, what the commotion was about. Very moving. That wasn't your bro' was it? I have that film somewhere.

finally some recognition for my joke

thanks TSC

isn't addiction an illness and therefore sort of separate from the occasional social use arena?

and I wonder how many people are addicted to alcohol, as compared to those addicted to drugs?