Town hall teens detail lost youth

Joan Talarico, 18, and Kiara Keith, 15, look as pretty and normal as any other teenagers.

Yet they don't spend their days praying for a prom date. They pray for another sober day that stretches into the rest of their lives.

Keith got drunk the first time at 13. Talarico tasted her first alcohol when she was 11.

As they speak of their lost years, they seem much older than the dates on their birth certificates.

"That kind of life - it grows you up a lot faster,"

Talarico said.

The two teenagers will share their stories Tuesday at a town-hall meeting on the dangers of underage drinking. The forum begins at 7 p.m. at the Kalispell Center WestCoast Hotel.

Talarico now serves as a mentor at a Christian youth home in the Flathead Valley. Keith was sent to the home when alcohol and then drugs sent her life reeling out of control.

The two girls both recall that older teens first brought booze into their lives.

For Talarico, older friends introduced her to both marijuana and alcohol when she was in the sixth grade.

"I remember smoking weed first," she said. "Weed and alcohol go hand in hand."

Talarico, an American Indian, said she began to spend a lot of time with older teens on the reservation even though she didn't live there. By the time she was 13, she had a serious addiction.

"I drank people under the table," Talarico said.

She could go through two-thirds of a bottle of vodka on her own. Soon, she was drinking every morning before school.

"I still managed to keep a 3.5" grade-point average, she said. "My mom had no idea."

But that didn't last. Her grades fell along with her interest in activities she once loved, such as mountain biking with her dad.

Keith got her first taste of alcohol when she joined her older brother and his partying friends. She was in the eighth grade.

Her brother lived in the apartment above her family's garage. Keith was thrilled to join him and his 17- and 18-year-old friends.

"I wanted to be like my brother," she said. "He was the cool kid."

Booze became an intoxicating escape for both girls from the tumult of adolescence. It wasn't like each hadn't been warned about the dangers of drugs and alcohol by parents and school officials.

Talarico said she was raised in a middle-class home by adoptive parents who loved her. As recovered alcoholics, they never drank when she was in their life.

She said she knew she had a higher risk for addiction because her birthfather was an alcoholic who died in prison. Talarico was informed but unable to resist peer pressure.

"It was my own personal battle," she said.

Keith lives with her father but also has contact with her mother. She said her father was adamant that he would oust her from the house if she ever took drugs.

When it came to alcohol, his attitude was more permissive.

"He said, 'If you want a beer, do it in the privacy of your own home," she recalled.

When Keith's brother joined the service, she found other older companions who raised the bar to mind- altering drugs. She tried marijuana, then LSD, mushrooms and prescription painkillers.

Keith learned all the techniques to keep herself supplied.

"I'm not proud of this, but I'd go through my friends' medicine cabinets," she said.

If she didn't consume the pills herself, she sold them to others for up to $4 a pill. Keith used the revenue to buy herself other drugs.

Talarico told a similar story. She said that alcohol was easy to acquire either through older people or through shoplifting.

She also graduated from alcohol to drugs, ranging from OxyContin to Ecstasy. She was sent to her first treatment center at 15.

Just two weeks after release, Talarico was using again. Her mother refused to let her stay at home so she lived in her car or with a sympathetic aunt.

Eventually, her aunt joined her mom in insisting that she return to treatment. When Talarico asked for a different facility, her mother found the Christian youth home in the Flathead Valley.

She stayed at the home as a resident from August 2003 to August 2004.

"I found God and I came to the church," Talarico said.

While at the home, she completed two years of work to earn her high school diploma.

After returning to her home state of Washington, she found herself confronted by temptation once again. Her old friends refused to accept her.

"They were determined that drunk Joan was who Joan was," she said.

Instead of giving in, she picked up her backpack and left the old life. She called the home to ask if she could just stay the night but ended up staying as a mentor.

Talarico joined Teens in Crisis in speaking in the Flathead and other towns around Montana. She found that she loved helping others through sharing her story.

At the youth home, Keith also has caught up her school work and has found that God gives her a rock to hold on to in the storms of adolescence.

"It gives you hope and faith," she said.

Both girls were amazed to find out they could enjoy music concerts and other events even more when they were sober.

Both Keith and Talarico believe that teenagers need a strong set of values to keep their footing in a culture glamorizing drinking and popping pills as the quick fix for every problem.

"Trouble will find you if you don't have those strict values," Talarico said.

According to Keith, her father now says his biggest failure as a parent was not getting his children involved in religion.

As they look back, both teens wish their parents would have stepped in earlier.

They also criticize the education system for confusing the ups and downs of alcohol and drug abuse with mental disorders. Both Talarico and Keith were diagnosed as suffering from bipolar disorder.

They hope to convince parents at the Tuesday meeting to set unwavering limits and to impress upon teens not to drink.

Talarico said she knows it's not easy to resist peer pressure or for parents not to give in to or give up on their teenagers.

"Sometimes it's kind of hard to be a stand-up person," she said.

Reporter Candace Chase may be reached at 758-4436 or by e-mail at cchase@dailyinterlake.com.