Show notes
In this episode of Real Talk, KJK Student Defense Attorneys Susan Stone and Kristina Supler are joined by Philip van Guilder, a Director of Greenhouse Treatment Center's Community Affairs. They discuss mental health and addiction issues in students. The conversation includes the unexpected patterns of addiction and mental health issues prevalent is students today how to identify and address the symptoms of addictive behavior, and what every parent needs to know about the treatment and prevention of mental health and addiction issues. Links Mentioned In the Show: KJK Student Defense Show Notes: (01:37) From personally going through addiction to becoming a mental health evangelist (02:44) The stigma against mental health and addiction issues versus the Greenhouse Treatment Center: how they can help children and adults in 28 days (03:17) What makes the Greenhouse Treatment Center different from most other kinds of hospitals (04:57) Why parents now need to monitor their children for addiction issues as early as the 7th grade (06:30) Marijuana and the serious damage it can do to a child's developing brain, including psychosis (07:40) Why children can get access to drugs from the comfort of their own home (08:58) The warning signs of addictive behavior in children that every parent should be aware of (09:36) One way in which parents and college faculty can curb the onset of addiction issues in students (11:17) The severe and sometimes fatal consequences of overindulgence in alcohol and drugs in college students (12:34) The science behind why compulsive addictive behavior takes place (15:02) The battle of alcohol addiction and sobriety from a first-hand perspective (16:26) Mind vs. Body: Sticking to the path of sobriety (17:57) The ongoing stigma against those with mental health issues (19:44) The best approach to addressing a simultaneous mental health and addiction challenge in college students (22:19) Can someone just have a naturally addictive personality? (24:12) The prevalence of alcohol inhalation and why it's a symptom of addiction (25:38) The relationship between alcohol/drug disorders and eating orders in patients (26:45) The easy steps parents can take to protect their kids and their friends from mental health and/or addiction issues Transcript: Kristina Supler: So here at Real Talk, we're committed to educating our listeners about substance abuse and safety measures that parents and students should know about. On a past episode of Real Talk, we were pleased to have on as a guest, Dr. Beth Weinstock of the Birdie Light organization, whose mission is really to spread information about test strips. And we're so pleased to have our guests today. Susan Stone: We are going to talk to Philip van Guilder, Guilder. I'm sorry. Do you pronounce it? Guilder? Phil Philip. Philip Van Guilder: I do. Yes. Susan Stone: I, I have my tongue twisted today, Kristina. And he is a self-described mental health evangelist at the Greenhouse Treatment Center. And I wanna add a father of five, uh, Philip, without speaking out of turn, you indicated in our pre-chat that you had some addiction issues. And so did your children and for our listeners out there who are mainly parents of high school and college age students, I think your insight is gonna be invaluable. And just add on our last podcast with podcast with Dr. Weinstock so could, before we begin, can you tell us what is a mental health evangelist? I, I saw that and I'm like, are you religious? Where are you coming from? Philip Van Guilder: No, no, it has nothing to do with spirituality. Uh, actually the, the evangelist is a, it pulls me away from the marketing aspects. I, what I'm trying to do and what I do for the greenhouse is make us as transparent to the outside community as possible and make the outside community as transparent to the personnel here as possible. So we can maximize all the resources available and, and we can normalize the stigma of, of mental health issues and, and addiction so that it encourages people to, uh, just to normalize it so that people can get help and, and not feel any sort of a stigma. So I kind of wear my recovery on my sleeve. I mean, if you were to meet me on the street, we were having coffee bumped into each other within about two or three minutes somehow or another, I would word it that you would know. I was a person in long term recovery. Kristina Supler: Philip, you are at Greenhouse Treatment Center, which is a part of the American Addiction Center. Tell us, what's give us some insight into the population that you work with on a daily basis. And what do you do? Susan Stone: Tell us what I, I wanna learn about you. Philip Van Guilder: Okay, thank you. So, so our population is 18 and above, and there are people who primary, uh, diagnosis is substance use. What, what I do, as I said, I reach out to the community. We wanna know what resources are out there. When you come to treatment, whether you're, uh, going to treatment as it, a young adult, or whether you're going to treatment as a, as a child, whatever age you're going to treatment. The 28 days today, which is about what most people can, can, uh, expect to get from their insurance. That's the first step. Uh, we're a hospital. Uh, most hospitals you go to when you go to the hospital, you get medicine, you get a cast, you you're injuries are, are stitched up. And when you leave, you're, you're virtually on your way to, to recovery. This hospital is different. What we do here is we give you information and, and when you leave, what you do with that information determines whether or not you're gonna get well, we don't. And so this is just the first step of your recovery process. So when, so for us, it's important for us to connect with the community because we expect to take the patient, the client from the 28 days and send them to someone else for the next level of care, which is a, um, perhaps partial partial hospitalization, which is the same as all day programming, but not in a hospital setting or intensive outpatient, I O P, which is, number of hours each day, allowing them to work, but continuing their recovery journey or, or even perhaps, uh, as complete step down to continuing care where they show up for a group, uh, once a week or once a month for continuing care. Susan Stone: It's such a long process to recovery. I really, I admire anybody who has the courage to go through it. You talked about working with students 18 and above. Tell us what insights do you have today on young adults battling with addiction, anything different, new, Kristina Supler: or what's the most prevalent form of addiction you're seeing. Susan Stone: Oh, great question, Kristina. Philip Van Guilder: yeah, that, that is a good question. Yeah. What, what we're seeing today is it starts much younger. So by the time we see an 18 year old, they've been involved in, in some of the statistics, I can show, go back to the seventh and eighth grade and it was, and, and, and with alcohol Susan Stone: or drugs, seventh or eighth grade, Philip Van Guilder: Both and with non-prescribed medications and, and, and I, some statistics as recently as 2020, just from this area, we're, we're in, we're just would be the same as any area. 30% of 10th graders, 30% of 10th graders either found it, not dangerous to use marijuana. And yet we know the THC content of marijuana today is so high, that, that it can be very destructive in young developing minds and 30%. So fully, a third of 10th graders believe it's safe to use marijuana. Susan Stone: Well, if it's legal in some states, how would parents dispel that belief? Kristina Supler: Well, I will say in a past episode, we had on Dr. Jill Grimes and who's written a book for college audiences and she is a big believer that it is essential that parents educate their children. That marijuana is harmful no matter what anyone thinks, if it's legalized or not, it does things to developing brains and students need to be aware of the negative impact on brain develop. Philip Van Guilder: Yeah. I mean, there's, there's no doubt about that. So, so let's go back 30, 40 years ago when the THC was three to 4% and, people, perhaps college age experimented with it, maybe they even used it frequently, but it's still three to 4% today. We see pure, uh, marijuana. 18 to 20% and in a developing brain, we're seeing cases of psychosis in 16 year olds, first time use, and we're talking some serious damage. And we know that well, first of all, , and it is not to, it's not to beat up on young people, but. If a little is good, a lot is better. So there is no moderation when we're looking see another thing I've got here. One in five eighth graders believe that it's that's 20, 20% to almost 21% of eight graders. Believe it's okay to use non-prescribed medications because of the way it makes you feel. not just marijuana, but we're talking about people that walk up to the medicine cabinet and grab some, uh, mood altering medication and think it's safe to use a non-prescribed medication. Susan Stone: It's right in the home. Philip Van Guilder: That, that they get out of the medicine cabinet because their parents are taking it on a prescribed basis for the right reasons and they believe it's okay. And it's safe. They believe it's safe, not just okay, but safe to use it because it's after all it's a prescribed medication. Prescribed for someone else. Kristina Supler: Sure. Well, and also, I think we'd be remiss not to mention that with marijuana in this day and age, there's also all the risks. As in that we don't know what marijuana or, or other street drugs could be laced with. Susan Stone: Right. And I, I was thinking one of the questions I wanted you to opine about is. How, if you're in college and you're drinking or occasionally using recreational drugs, how would a student know if what they're doing is within that normal college range versus heading to addiction? What is the line between, okay. You're just having fun in college, a recreational user recreational user, between or. You need to get help. Is it grade slipping, loss of friendships? What are your thoughts? Philip Van Guilder: so I don't wanna be vague about this, but let's, let's go back to what we mean by addictive behavior. When it's compulsive, when I have no choice, but to use. When it's no longer a matter of it was socially fun, but when I have to use in order to feel normal. So what is it like for any, for everybody it's that day when you wake up and you say, you know, I can't face the day without a drink or I can't face the day without first lighting up a blunt or I can't face the day without getting a rig and loading it. That's the day when it's gone too far. In fact, one of the newest organizations that we've seen start off in the last, I would say, I want to, and I'm guessing at this, maybe the last four or five years is young people in recovery on college campuses. We're starting to see a real big push for that because they're not learning how to use in college. They're bringing the addiction to college with them. And so a number of places and, and there's a number of campuses around the country. Arizona was one of the first universities in Tempe was one of the first universities to have a young people on campus. I'm not trying to promote them, but they're just, I just remember meeting some folks that had come out to, to, to bring that template to other campuses around the DFW area. And, and it seemed like people were gravitating towards it because they realized they had a problem. Now that's, I don't know, that's just taken off, but I know that today, when I'm talking to a young person, that's worried about going to school. Like I'm, I'm about a young 18 year old yesterday in a meet last night in a meeting. And he said, he's starting on campus. So small. And I was able to direct him to a young people's group on the local university campus. So it was kind of nice to see him. Know that there's a safe place for him to go. He's been struggling since January of this year. It was kind of nice. Susan Stone: Do you think it's gotta be very lonely to be a college student today in a fraternity or on a sports team and have to say I don't drink. I don't, I'm an addict. Yeah. I, I can't imagine the shame, but you know, Kristina, we've had a lot of friends tell us, they're now sober curious. Mm-hmm , you know, Kristina Supler: A question I had for you, Philip, Susan and I working with students across the country day in and day out. We, every day we're hearing terms like blackout, brown out, gray out and, and. Binge drinking has, has really seems been, been normalized. Susan Stone: We've seen deaths. Kristina Supler: Yeah, actually we've had a couple different cases with a death component and it's an absolute tragedy. What are your thoughts on why. Students are indulging, whether it's alcohol or drugs to such extremes now. Do you think it's the influence of social media? Is it the pandemic in mental health? Or, I mean, working with populations at Greenhouse, do you have any insights? Susan Stone: Yeah, I was gonna say, Kristina, you know, we dealt with that one case where students drink whole bottles of alcohol. And I, I have to tell you, I don't remember that. Did you have that at college? Kristina Supler: I mean, it certainly seems that in the news, there's more reports about fraternity hazing in, in student let's just say excess. And I don't know if it's because it's going on with greater frequency or just the media and other professionals are trying to bring more awareness so that students can be safe. But Philip, what are your thoughts? Philip Van Guilder: I really, I don't think someone says, uh, this is the weekend I wanna binge. You get there with that compulsive addictive behavior. It there's it's if you're truly let's use alcohol, let me separate that from other other drugs. Let's just use alcohol. We know that medically there's a craving component that comes people that are, that, that are alcoholics typically. If we look at the medical, uh, component, it says that we're not able to process or metabolize alcohol at the same rate of non-alcoholic is. Whereas a non-alcoholic can process about one ounce per hour. We can't, we're missing certain components, genetically that keep us, or prevent us from being able to do that. So if we drink more than one ounce per hour, and what happens because we, we retain the alcohol in our system longer because we can't metabolize it. We can't discharge it. It kicks off the craving. So the more we drink, the more we crave that's Kristina Supler: oh, that's interesting. Philip Van Guilder: That's medical thing, whereas you might drink one ounce per hour. By the time you get to the second or third one, you're going, uh, oh, I got a buzz. I'm sitting here thinking man, I need to have some more. I don't have a buzz. Like I want the buzz. You considered something that makes you uncomfortable and I considered something that's necessary. Susan Stone: So that's why all of a sudden they're craving, craving, craving these students. And then all of a sudden blackout. Philip Van Guilder: Yeah. Yeah, because the more they drink, the more they crave, I mean, at midnight, Joe and Charlie, talk about this two wonderful people that are in recovery that, that are both passed now,…
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