General Discussion

of course we wear top line safety gear and assess risks constantly. But still, its what we do and the adrenaline rush is as addictive as crack cocaine I'm sure. The counselors are pretty blunt that we've probably modelled this for her and she's learned it from us. This is the sport that permanently paralyzed Christopher Reeve. People die. Our industry is rife with substance abuse and risky behavior. The Saturday night competitor's parties are notorious for lots of booze, drugs and easy sex (and of course you can't NOT attend since that's also where you sell horses, make sponsorship contacts, woo new clients etc). Both of her grandfathers were alcoholics so its in our heritage too.

We've done what we can to minimize our kids' exposure to the worst sides of it all but honestly competitive sports is crazy-time. We managed to walk our older girl through this minefield successfully but clearly our youngest is ready to par-tay. From the little I glean elsewhere its the same with NASCAR drivers or hockey pros or tennis or rock stars.... You do your best to shield them by staying at the "family" hotels when you're on the road, and we have strict curfews, regular chores, and of course we don't do drugs or alcohol or random sex hook ups ourselves.

One thing she decided on her own was to get out of competing. She knows how much that life style was sucking her in and she needed to cut off that part of her drug world in order to get clean. Of course there's still the kids at school but she's (hopefully) getting better at dealing with it. She knows unequivocally that we will never stop loving her or fighting for her. I read the saddest post on DU from another "wild girl" (nobodyspecial - her very unfortunate username) who told me to never give up on her - that the DUer felt like her parents gave up on her and let her just go into that downward spiral.

She finally fought her way back to sobriety alone but her words haunt me.