‘Powerful and Dangerous Drugs’

How did you feel about Heath Ledger's death?
It reminded me of what could have happened to me last year. Those kinds of things are really sad for me. Being where I am at now, I know there's a solution. It sucks to see other people not find this way out, the recovery aspect of it, because it really is the best thing I've ever found in my life.

What happened to the high school girls who told you about grinding up prescription drugs?
One went to jail and the other one died. She overdosed on heroin. It was her first time doing it.

What do you think of the White House campaign?
The prescription thing is huge. People know coke is bad; people know heroin is bad. You don't need too many commercials out there saying that. The whole idea that this thing that the doctor's prescribing you could very easily become an addictive habit, or cause an overdose, or get into your kid's hands and suddenly he and his friends have a new weekend activity—that's something people need to know.

NEWSWEEK also spoke to Evan's father, George Wattles. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: How did you find out about Evan's problem?
George Wattles: We knew marijuana was a part of his lifestyle to some degree, and we thought the Ambien was being taken properly. We didn't put it together. We were the typical parents. He went off to college in fall of 2006. And things escalated out of our control. He had more access to drugs. He had two prescriptions for Ambien being written. Ultimately he told my wife on Dec. 3 that he felt he was addicted to it and was seeking counseling and not to tell me. Three days later he called us to say goodbye. He had slit his wrists. We called his college, and they swung into action, found him very quickly. He was in the basement of his dorm.

What kind of treatment program did he attend?
He went to the Caron Foundation in Wernersville, Pa. He spent four months there, from Dec. 14, 2006, to April 15, 2007. If he had come home in 30 days, he probably would have picked up and used again very quickly.

What about your other kids?
They're OK. We've had to heal the whole house because of this. The guilt we felt as parents, the failure we felt as parents—how could this happen? It happened under our nose. We let it escalate without knowing. Then the focus as he's rehabilitating turns much to him, and [our daughters] are somewhat neglected and feel that the drug addict is getting all the attention. There's this huge ripple effect.

Evan told his story to sixth- through twelfth-graders at your school last month. What happened?
[He told them,] "I'm two years older than you. I went to school with some of your brothers and sisters, and it can happen to anyone." They saw that as so real. Here's a kid from a good suburb, went to a good school, got into a great college, respectable parents—but it happened to him. The standing ovation was instantaneous. When you and I were growing up, the drug addict was some skid-row bum who just wasn't making it in life. That's not true anymore at all.

Were there signs that in hindsight you'd like to share with other parents?
Weight loss. [He became] less approachable, more secretive, angry, anxious, confrontational. We exchanged blows, I called the cops on him, trying to scare him straight. His good grades threw us off a bit. He was maintaining the work, so [we thought] things couldn't be too bad.

Why do you think teens are abusing prescription drugs?
The kids feel [wrongly] that if it's a prescription, it's safer.

© 2008