[nexxo]

I'm sorry to hear of your parental troubles. Sort of reminds me why I have no kids myself... It takes no psychologist to know that kids do stupid things, and 15-year olds are no exception. It doesn't get much better with adults...

We all screw up big time at least once a year, and I guess this was her quota for 2003. As long as she realises the magnitude of her screw-up, and faces up to the consequences with responsibility, she'll be OK.

For the record, I think you're right to take this as seriously as you are. I grew up in Holland, where we have a pretty liberal drugs policy. Human civilisation has always used drugs in some form or other. Although I share the opinion that adults should use at their own risk (and in Holland, that actually sort of works), I feel strongly that the under age are not yet able to make such a big decision in any responsible or informed way.

It's like smoking: sure people smoke, but that doesn't mean it doesn't kills a lot of them. As a Clinical Psychologist I see it all the time, over and over; nobody, but nobody, is exempt. No matter how healthy or wealthy you are, how much in control you kid yourself to be, no matter how careful you think you are, in the end, it always gets you. Because if you feel the need to use drugs in the first place, you have a psychological problem that makes you vulnerable to becoming addicted (the drug does not cause the addiction so much as fulfill it... like a curse finding its shape). But if you are psychologically healthy, it has nothing to offer you anyway.

The school, I feel, overreacted a bit with her, but what your stepdaughter learnt is an important lesson and the most important lessons in life tend to be the most painful. Pain makes you think, thinking makes you wiser. She'll live and learn. I think moving her to another school is a sound idea. Don't let her miss out on Spanish, as in the US it's a must-have language (which no doubt you know better than me)!