Posted on 11/18/2005 3:32:41 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
***Children play the game by compressing the carotid arteries in their necks, reducing blood flow and oxygen to the brain. That produces a momentary loss of consciousness, preceded by lightheadedness. When they release the pressure, a surge of pent-up blood flows to the brain, creating a euphoric rush.
They do it in groups, at parties, at sleepovers, in school locker rooms and in lavatories. But they've added a dangerous element to a game some of their parents played as children. Now instead of just squeezing one another, they wrap belts, ropes, ties, dog leashes, even bicycle chains around their necks to produce the fainting sensation.***
When we allow children to have everything available in life by the time they're 18, and never demand that they wait more than 13 seconds for any goodie, any gift, any experience that they want -- and we want to experience through them in our desperate desire to pretend we are still young -- then they're going to reach farther and farther for new experiences that they are incapable because of age and experience of realizing are deadly.
I don't know why people are surprised that more and more lives are ruined by the age of 18. We're dumping the kids into the Niagara River and telling them to swim -- and then we wring our hands when they're swept over the Falls.
Toward the end the author writes:
***Now, I look at my daughter, almost 15, and wonder about her private life — the hours she spends alone in her room, the new friends she's making at public school, the secrets she spills only to her journal. I could clamp down, bombard her with questions, scour the websites she visits for hidden hazards. But what would that accomplish?***
Stupidity is self correcting.
Psycho-babble...
I have talked to my kids about drugs, sexual molestation, kidnapping, alcohol, cigarettes, shoplifting, talking to strangers, internet safety, answering the doorbell, answering the telephone. I never once have talked to them about not hanging themselves for the fun of it. Note to self.
I'd heard about this as a sexual high but I had not heard of this.
We can give them some idea that the future is worth sticking around for and that there's a lot to look forward to in life, and that non matter what you think before you turn 18, there are many more important things in life than being popular and 'cool'. Then show them what some of those things are.
Of course its almost illegal to use in most communities due to death.
Kinda makes you long for the days when all they did was huff glue.
"I never once have talked to them about not hanging themselves for the fun of it. Note to self."
Right, me too. My daughter will probably think I'm a wack-o, but Mommy is going to tell her: don't be choking yourself, and don't let anyone else choke you either; and wear a jacket, it's getting colder.
I'm in my 50's and way back, in the dark ages, when I was in high school, there was something kids used to do to "pass out"...I think it was hyperventilating.
I really don't think this "choking game" is that new, been around for quite a few years.
I just think more kids might be participating now, thus resulting in more deaths and awareness.
Make sure you read than note later, and act on it. This is not as uncommon as some parents might think. If your child is not doing it, he or she probably knows somebody who is.
And there is a sexual aspect to it all as well, just to make it even more uncomfortable. But nobody ever said being a parent was easy. Becoming a parent is (usually) easy. Being a parent is work.
When I was in sixth grade, one of the kids showed us at recess how you could make yourself faint by crouching down, hyperventilating for 30 seconds, standing up quickly, putting your thumb in your mouth and blowing really hard.
I tried it once. It worked, but it freaked me out.
"They do it in groups, at parties, at sleepovers, in school locker rooms and in lavatories. But they've added a dangerous element to a game some of their parents played as children."
What? As a kid I had never even heard of this let alone do it.
Excuse me but do kids today have any brains at all? WHAT about old fashioned common sense? Any idiot should be able to realize how dangerous this is.
I really worry about this generation.
Likely heard it described in Sex Ed. My kids did. It's a common practice among gay men.
I like NEA schoolteachers less and less all the time.
Yes, we did it also, but hyperventilation or holding the breath is at least self-limiting. We thought it was funny to freak the teacher out by having the class start dropping like flies.
Adolescents are immortal, we/they think. We knew everything, too.
ping
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