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Addiction Recovery
The Addiction Recovery Podcast is the ultimate destination for individuals battling addiction or supporting loved ones in their journey towards recovery. With a focus on providing informative, educational, and persuasive content, our podcast aims to engage and guide listeners towards healing and transformation.
Addiction Recovery
50: Fentanyl, Fake Pills, and What Every Parent Needs to Know
"Never take a pill that didn’t come from your family’s doctor."
That one rule could save a life—and it’s the heart of an urgent message about the fentanyl crisis sweeping the country.
Fentanyl-laced counterfeit pills are killing people of all ages—middle schoolers, college athletes, honor students, adults—after just one mistake. These pills often look identical to real medications, but even a single dose can be deadly. There’s no stereotype for who’s at risk. It could be anyone’s child, friend, or teammate.
What makes this crisis worse is how easy it is for kids to get these pills. Dealers use apps like Snapchat, secret chats hidden in Google Docs, even emoji codes, all to fly under the radar. Parents may not even realize a drug deal is happening right on their child’s phone.
And unlike other risks, this one allows no margin for error. It’s not about experimenting or learning a lesson—one pill can be the end. Would you take a 1% chance at Russian roulette? That’s what taking a random pill amounts to.
So what can parents do? Talk to your kids—often. Keep the conversation open, honest, and age-appropriate. Teach them to say no to any pill not prescribed directly to them, no matter who offers it. Awareness and education are the most powerful tools we have.
Questions or concerns? Reach out to us at hello@restoredetoxcenters.com.
Together, we can save lives.
Helpful Links:
Learn more about Restore Detox Centers
Filling the Void book by Steven T. Ginsburg
Overcoming the Fear and Lies of Addiction e-book
How to Love and Set Boundaries Without Enabling Addiction e-book
Call Us for Addiction Recovery: 1-800-982-5530
DISCLAIMER:
Welcome to the Addiction Recovery podcast, brought to you by Restore Detox Centers. We are dedicated to providing valuable and insightful information on addiction recovery. However, it is essential to understand that the content shared in this podcast is intended for educational purposes only. While we strive to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information presented, we cannot guarantee its completeness or suitability for individual circumstances. The topics discussed in this podcast are based on general knowledge and should not be considered a substitute for professional advice or treatment.
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Any pill outside of the realm of that type of parental or supervised control must be declined.
Steve Coughran:This is the Addiction Recovery Podcast with Stephen T Ginsberg, founder of Restore Detox Centers in sunny California. Enjoy your experience, stephen. Today I want to bring up an episode that we've done in the past where we talked about fentanyl, fake pills and just how that's infiltrating society nowadays and it's really becoming this major crisis. First, I want to get your perspective on this, because you run restore detox centers. You see a lot of people coming into your facility and I know you have your finger on the pulse of, like what people are getting into nowadays. So let's talk just higher level, like what are you, what are you seeing as a trend? And then I want to get into how this relates to families and what every parent needs.
Steven Ginsburg:So Steve, thank you. A remarkably relevant topic, A sense of urgency, absolutely. Life and death. Very cut and dry too.
Steven Ginsburg:Bottom line as soon as your children are old enough to even understand and comprehend the linguistics of what this applies to, every child must be told and shown, and have properly explained to them, properly explained to them. They must never, never, never take a pill that is not provided by their family, through their family, from the family's doctor, in any way, shape or form, no matter what phase of their life they're in, from their young years, k through six, through their middle school years, through high school, through college, through onward, through their middle school years, through high school, through college, through onward. There is so much danger. There is story after story after story out there of these pills that are pressed. They've got fentanyl in them, there's no proper dosing and they're fatal and there's person after person dying. So that message must be delivered often and consistently. And then examples must be shown to our children that we never, never, never take a pill that is outside of those realms of our parents and our doctor's control.
Steve Coughran:Now you're in California, where it seems like life moves a little bit faster, but are you hearing anything else from other areas across the country regarding this fentanyl crisis that's occurring?
Steven Ginsburg:It's nationwide, it's a global crisis. It's horrific. Again, story after story after story of families being permanently affected there recently in Utah, there were middle school boys who the older brother ordered some pills online. They were pills that had a caffeine element or like a thermogenic element to it and they both wanted to try it to be fast and it turned out that they were pressed in China. They had fentanyl in them and both of these middle school boys died. If people out there like you're listening folks, if you Google it, if you look into it, if you do a search, you will see heartbreaking story after heartbreaking story. And the hardest part is, once they consume this pill, they don't have some violent reaction, they don't foam at the mouth, the people get really tired, they go to sleep, their respiratory system completely shuts down and they die. It's horrific.
Steve Coughran:Well, and I think this brings up so many different avenues to discuss and from a parent perspective, let's talk about parents, what parents need to know, because I think there are so many ways for kids to be sneaky, secretive and fly under the radar. I remember growing up I don't know how it was with you, but when I was growing up, my mom had this rule that whenever I got home and we had a curfew right, but whenever I got home I had to go up to her room and kiss her on the lips, which might sound weird to people. You're like, oh, you kiss your mom on the lips, but she did that because then she would be that close to my mouth to be able to smell. Were you drinking alcohol? Were you smoking weed or anything else? Were you smoking cigarettes? And she did that right. Number one she loved me, but that was her little mechanism to to test me, Right, and we've talked to you know, Steven, and you and I have talked about drug testing kids. But let's just talk about some of these sneaky things going on. Number one if you're a parent, if you don't know this, but the emojis that are on your kid's phone, you might think they're texting cute little emojis to their friends. But there's this secret code with emojis which I didn't realize until I saw something about it and I was like, wow, I didn't know that. You know whatever a watermelon represents, you know something else, right, Crystal, or whatever it is. I just made that up, but there's this secret code that exists out there. So if you think your kid's being innocent, texting a heart and a unicorn to their friends, maybe they are, but maybe there's something else going on Also. I just want to share this. And then I want you to take the mic, Steven.
Steve Coughran:My brother is telling me. He's like, okay, I have a son, and this is my brother talking. He's like my son, and obviously I know his son. But he said, yeah, so my son was doing a homework assignment over the weekend. And so he he comes downstairs, my brother, on a Saturday and he sees his son working on the computer and he's like what are you doing? He's like, oh, I'm just doing my homework. He's like, okay, that's kind of weird. I mean, what kid does homework on S aturday? And then time goes on, and then he comes back and the kid's still sitting there a few hours later. He's like what are you doing? He's like I'm just working on this project and everybody's like that's weird. So he goes over and he's like let me see what you're doing.
Steve Coughran:Then he realized that his son was having this chat through a google document. So, like, if you're not familiar with that, Google like has word, like a word type document, Excel, PowerPoint. You know, that's Microsoft's version, but Google has its own. But the difference is you can have live chats within these documents, right, and it's all live. So you could like type something in the document and then somebody else could type at the same time and you almost have this like secret thread going on. And it's not that his son was doing anything bad. It's not like he was, you know, trying to deal drugs or doing anything terrible, it's just a little kid doing, you know, this innocent back and forth play over the doc, you know.
Steve Coughran:And then, you know, I found this app on my daughter's phone Lemonade, lemonade. And it's like lemonade, right. And I didn't even know what the heck it was and I approve all her apps and I thought it was just some game. You know little, did I know it's TikTok's version of, like a Pinterest, right? And I was like what is this? And I got into the app because I checked and I saw that she's spending a lot of time on it and then I realized it's a social media app and I was like wow, there are so many ways for kids to join forums or chats or communication right underneath our noses and right underneath the roofs yeah, and it's very apropos to what we're talking about ,S teven.
Steven Ginsburg:So bringing it back home. There is nothing more powerful than having those times and that time where you sit down with your child and children and you walk them through the paces and you show them the truth about what's occurring. People sit there and they're like, well, that'll give them ideas. Listen, they don't need any help getting ideas to your point of what you just shared. Right, the ideas are everywhere. I mean you want to see an entire community of underground drug dealing? Jump on Snapchat. I beg parents, do not allow your child to have Snapchat. It's an underground market. It's unreal what's going on. It's happening elsewhere too, but that's really prevalent.
Steven Ginsburg:Where fentanyl is concerned, the stakes are so, so high. They've got to have that ongoing dialogue where the children are able to see the counterfeit pills. The children are able to see the inception of it, where it comes from, how it ends up here, and the children have that moment where a teammate says to another teammate your back hurts. Here I have this thing called a soma. Take half of it, your back won't hurt. That teammate may have no idea where that pill came from and the teammate that they're offering it to has no idea where that pill came from. They must be programmed and know to not take that pill. So many children die like that and I cannot belabor the point enough. And if you saw and I think I've shown you this graphic before steve, it shows a penny and it shows a few grams of fentanyl. That'll kill you and I brother. So we've got to have these children tuned up. They've got to know and we've got to have those hard conversations, yeah, and I think that's really important to point out too.
Steve Coughran:And just another personal story on my end. I was having a conversation with my kids just on Sunday for a couple hours and we were just talking about truth as an unrelated topic. We weren't relating it to drugs. But you know, the the generation coming up, they have this idea of relativity when it comes to the truth. And so what I mean by that? We're talking about this, this subject, and my daughter was saying well, dad, you know, but you know, sometimes it's like this. And I said Ava, that's. My daughter said Ava, you have to be super careful with your choice of words and how you describe things, because it's precision that matters here, in this situation.
Steve Coughran:And then I related it to fentanyl and I did the same exact thing. I had some crumbs from a little cracker and I had it on the coffee table and I said see this right here. And they're like what I'm like. See this Like what we can't see it. I was like exactly that, right, there is fentanyl. You take that much, you die. And so I said the same thing is true with the line of truth. Some things are black and white, the line of truth. Some things are black and white. Some things are gray. Okay, there could be some gray things, but some things you don't mess around with. And, steven, you and I have talked about this before. It goes back to this idea of what's the probability of getting pregnant. Well, if you don't ever have sex, it's zero
Steve Coughran:What the probability of getting a DUI and killing somebody in a head-on collision after drinking alcohol it's zero if you don't drink. And if you don't drink, number one it's zero. And if you don't get behind the wheel, it's zero. I think what happens with these kids? They may think, hey, I got these pills, dude, it's fine. It's the quarterback he gave them to me, it's my coach, it's whoever it's. This one time it's fine, and it's like you could be fine. Sure, maybe it's a 1% chance of what we're talking about, but, dang, do you want to put the revolver to your head and pull the trigger and say, yeah, it's one in 10?.
Steven Ginsburg:I want to throw it over to the adult side for one second. It was not too too long ago. Guys were tennis buddies and he had gotten a batch of pills that wasn't from an American pharmacy and he gave one of these pain relie that wasn't from an American pharmacy and he gave one of these pain relievers and anti-inflammatories to his buddy and it wasn't the one who was the giver who got the one with fentanyl in it, it was the one who received the pill who got the one with fentanyl in it. That guy went home, went to sleep but didn't wake up. So the conversation has got to be had again and again, and again, and any pill outside of the realm of that type of parental or supervised control must be declined back in the day.
Steven Ginsburg:There's less of this now, but we've got to be on guard. It's love to go to these parties where they would clean out medicine cabinets, throw stuff in a bowl, mix it all up and take handfuls of the pills. None of that can go on with our children, because someone is going to end up dead. And we've got to be mindful. And we've got to your point. We've got to play the right side of the numbers. Well, what are the right side of the numbers, where there's no exception to the rule in any way, shape or form? They are alarmed and they are going to err on the side of caution because of the way that we've leaned in and been intentional and explained, with a sense of urgency, how high the stakes are with these choices that our children, our precious blessings, are making Exactly.
Steve Coughran:And it's to your point, it's zero, like it's never, it's not. Oh, sometimes I'll take pills, sometimes it's never, ever, ever, never take a pill that is not prescribed or is coming from a sealed bottle, from some legitimate like I don't even know what legitimate is steven, to be honest. I mean it freaks me out, like if somebody on the street says, hey, here's vitamin c, nothing I'd be like no way, you can't do it out of my mouth.
Steve Coughran:You give me a piece of gum and I don't even know who you are, and it's in a wrapper.
Steven Ginsburg:It's just there's, it's just dangerous. And again, the conversations have to be had with our children. They and they have to be shown. When I do work with the schools what I love. It's hard for me because I get really emotional, because I show the pictures of the kids who have died and they look just like the kids I'm talking to and I say to them like, look, do you really see any difference between these children and yourselves? And they all acknowledge that there isn't any. They made a poor choice that wasn't prudent. They didn't have the proper information and they've got to know. They've got to know even when they're at a friend's house and if it's an overnighter and if the mom offers them something, they've got to check in with their folks. I mean, they've got to continue to be on guard and air on the side of caution. And it is life and death and there's so much at stake and knowledge is power and that is the way we are able to keep our children safe.
Steve Coughran:Yeah, and I agree and what you said about you know what kids look like. Let me just piggyback on that and go a little bit deeper, because I've been to restore multiple times, by the way like the view is incredible. I mean, it's just, it's such a great place to be, just like such great vibes, and I've met a lot of the community members there and they're amazing people like the biggest hearts in the world. That's why I love going there.
Steve Coughran:And there've been times where I go to the house and I don't know who the people are per se, you know are familiar faces. But sometimes I'm like, is this somebody coming back from, like you know who's been clean for 10 years? They just stopped in to say hi, cause you have so many friends and people who love you. And I remember one time you're like, yeah, here's this guy and he's athletic, he good looking guy. And you're like, yeah, he's in for blah, blah, blah. And he just, you know, he just relapsed this other day and I was like what really, that guy looks like the you know the Barbie model, right, that looks like Ken, you know. And and it he doesn't look like the, the crack addict that you, you envision it, you know, on TV with black eyes and scabs all over the body. No, he's a great looking kitty. He could look like my neighbor, my son, right.
Steve Coughran:And so I think, to that point, you know, we have to be very, very careful, because I think parents can sometimes naively and this this brings back the whole communication thing I brought up with they might naively think my kid would never do that. And I think the dangerous thing is like I think in some ways pills and fentanyl could be way more dangerous than like a heroin addiction because, like, at least there's like progression where you're like, oh my gosh, like here they are, like day one, and then six months later they're missing teeth and stuff and you were like, wow, with this other stuff they could be the high school quarterback, the straight, a student, the good church going kid. One night they go to a party they're dead.
Steven Ginsburg:One bad choice, one pill and they are gone forever. And it is again. I want to encourage if you're out there and you're listening to this, please jump on, do a search, chat, gpt, google, any search method you want and pull up the images, pull up the stories. They look and they are our children, all of ours. You know, this isn't some, it's not a third world issue. Uh, this isn't some foreign issue. This isn't some issue of a different demographic. It is an equal opportunist issue and you will see it. And it's, it's star athletes who are dying like this.
Steven Ginsburg:It's the head of the student body. There was an honor student, and God rest her soul graduated from Oceanside high with honors, was getting ready to go on a huge missions trip, went out camping, decided don't ask me about these decisions she tried cocaine for the first time. There was only going to be that time. It had fentanyl in it. She died. It's one poor choice, but we must arm them with the truth. We must create and provide that narrative with a sense of urgency. We must prayerfully keep our children safe together. Yeah.
Steve Coughran:And I love it, and we have a ton of resources at restore detox centerscom and, best of all, we have an email address for you. So if you ever want to email us, we'd love to hear from you. I'd love to hear from everybody in the community. Hello at restore detox centerscom, if you send us a message, we'll get back to you. You can share what's on your heart. Maybe you have some ideas for the podcast. Whatever you feel, you can share what's on your heart.
Steven Ginsburg:Maybe you have some ideas for the podcast, whatever you feel, you know, is just on your mind anything so questions, concerns, thoughts or ways that we can come alongside you, your family, your community. I want you to know like. That's where we're called, that's what we're here for. I'm just so grateful, steve, for the for this imperative empirical topic. I'm so grateful that together, and some small part, we can help to protect families, to protect their children. So grateful for my brotherhood and my friendship with you. We love and we are praying for you all, everyone. Have a safe and sober day and God bless you. We look forward to hearing from you all soon.
