Parenting columnist Ian Munro has some advice on teenagers and drinking this festive season.
What you can do this festive season to keep your teenager safe from themselves and others, as well as keeping others safe from them?
It's legal to drink alcohol at 18, it's socially acceptable to do so, and it's a pleasurable activity.
Alcohol is readily available and on offer on just about every festive occasion. Under-18s are therefore going to drink.
For under-18-year-olds, drinking can be both a symbol of maturity and adulthood and of rebellion. Just telling them not to drink doesn't work.
This week I offer some ideas sparked by a recent re-reading of Hiram Ginott's book, Between Parent and Teenager.
• A teenager needs help in learning how to handle drinking. The advice to teach responsible drinking in the home is a good one, so long as your own drinking is responsible. The occasional drink before or with a meal, for example, takes from alcohol its mystery. It becomes an accompaniment to food and conversation rather than the be-all and end-all of the occasion.
• It takes courage to refuse a drink and a teen needs to learn how to do it without explanation, apology or excuse. The "No, thanks'' needs to be said firmly, with an expectation that it will be accepted and respected.
• Drinking for enjoyment requires learning how to nurse a drink, to make it last by sipping and to eat along with the drink. Advise them not to argue with a drunk friend about his or her drinking. That's something to be discussed once they are sober.
• Don't travel with a drunk driver. Clarify alternatives: a taxi, a phone call home for a ride.
• Let them know they don't need to accept a drink just because someone offers one. They should decide for themselves whether they actually feel like one right then. If the other person is unhappy at having to drink alone, that is that person's problem. It is always possible to be sociable with water or a hot drink.
• Show how it is possible to have fun without alcohol.
• Help them develop an awareness of the subtle ways in which alcohol is paired with lifestyle, popularity, sport and other activities purely to sell a product.
Dr Ginott recounts an old Hebrew legend that is a good one to share with your teen. When Noah planted grapevines, Satan revealed to him the possible effects of alcohol. He brought him a lamb, a lion, an ape and a pig.
He explained: "The first cup of wine will make you mild like a lamb; the second will make you feel brave like a lion; the third will make you act like an ape; and the fourth will make you wallow in the mud like a pig.''
