Teen At Party Pressured Into Trying Steroids

IRWIN, IA--The major league baseball steroid crisis hit home Saturday night for Brittany Ludlow, a 16-year-old high school student who was pressured into trying Tetrahydrogestrinone (THG) at a party. The teen injected a syringe full of the designer chemical into the meaty part of her thigh in an effort to fit in with the “A” crowd.

Afterward, Ludlow regretted her decision and vowed never to succumb to peer pressure again.

“I should never have done that, but all the kids were taunting me and calling me chicken,” said Ludlow a sophomore at nearby Roosevelt High. “I just thought it would be a cool thing to do because everyone else was doing it. I was wrong, though. Next time I’m just gonna do the right thing and stick with ecstasy.”

The party was populated by popular students and Ludlow said she felt enormous pressure to join them in their drug abuse.

“I just want to fit in like everyone else,” she said. “All these people were sitting on the couch and doing THG and acting like it was the coolest thing in the world. They were all laughing and high fiving and stuff. It looked so cool and hip, but when I said I didn’t want to, they were like ‘What are you, a chicken? Are you a little crybaby?’ Then this guy I like told me to stop being such a square and take the steroids. So I did. The needle really hurt. You know who I blame for this? Mark McGwire. He’s been sending the wrong message to our nation’s youth.”

Others who attended the party said that steroid use is spreading among teens, in part because of the glorification of them in Jose Canseco’s book, “Juiced.”

“Everyone at Roosevelt is doing steroids,” said one student, a junior, who asked not to be identified. “It’s the latest craze. It all started when that Canseco book came out. See, today’s high school students are obsessed with baseball players. We don’t like 50 Cent or Eminem or anything. Nope, we emulate baseball players from the early 90’s.”

When the steroid scandal broke last year, officials were concerned about the mixed messages being sent to young people. With so many big stars suspected of injecting the designer chemicals, many feared that children and teens would follow suit. It appears those fears were justified, as a recent survey suggests that over 87 percent of US teens have experimented with the popular drug Tetrahydrogestrinone.

“It’s sweeping the nation. Our fears have been realized,” said Eugene Montague, national director of D.A.R.E. “THG and other designer performance enhancers have become extremely popular, and the concern is that they will replace ecstasy as the club drug of choice. Students will take the steroids and sink into a drug-induced reverie resulting in increased promiscuity and irrational behavior. If that sounds unrealistic to you, then you’re not being alarmist enough.”

Even though many students say they have no interest in trying steroids, the peer pressure to conform is greater than ever. As Brittany Ludlow found out, that pressure can be overwhelming for a 16-year-old.

“You have to understand that everyone is doing it,” she said. “It’s like, totally the in thing right now. If you’re not doing steroids, you’re not part of the cool crowd and that’s it. Some kids are even getting their hands on the Crèam and the Clear. It’s an epidemic. It doesn’t really feel good or anything, but if Rafael Palmeiro is doing it, it’s got to be cool.”

In response to the growing steroid epidemic in our nation’s schools, Major League Baseball is producing a series of public service announcements to warn children against using them. The first round of spots will feature commissioner Bud Selig and union head Donald Fehr speaking out about the dangers of illegal supplements.

“Kids, I know you think that steroids are ‘rad’ and ‘hip’ but you couldn’t be more wrong,” Selig says in the first PSA, which will hit the airwaves next week. “In fact, most baseball players are clean and never use steroids at all. I know there’s a lot of pressure at school for you to fit in and be ‘happening’ but steroids use isn’t hip, and anyone who tells you differently isn’t your friend at all. So take it from me, Bud Selig, and my friend Donald Fehr: with the possible exception of a few track stars, a home run champ, and dozens of other millionaire athletes, winners don’t use steroids.”