Steven Ginsburg: 0:00

You've got a seatbelt. It's that panel test. Have them go pee and you have put the proverbial seatbelt on your child.

Steve Coughran: 0:08

This is the Addiction Recovery Podcast with Steven T Ginsburg, founder of Restore Detox Centers in sunny California. Enjoy your experience, Steven. I remember to this day when I was in California I was growing up that's where I grew up One of my family members was a little out of control and I could say that, because I have six siblings and so nobody would be able to identify them. But here this person was out of control and I remember being in the backseat. My mom picked them up and she was like okay, we are going to the hospital. And my sibling was like what are we doing? And she's like, yeah, I'm taking you to get drug tested, unless you tell me right now. Like, what are you on? Tell me exactly right now, or we will go to the hospital and I will drug test you and I will figure it out.

Steve Coughran: 1:02

And at first my sibling was a little stubborn to you and I will figure it out. And at first my sibling was a little stubborn and didn't say much. But as we approached, I think my sibling was like yeah, mom is serious. And so she spilled the beans and she admitted everything that she's on and we went from there. So I bring this up because we've talked about this before, steven, about drug testing, kids, and I just want to revisit this because I don't know if it's controversial, but maybe somebody can hear this and, just like right off the bat, they may think, dang, that seems a little controlling, a little obsessive and a little, you know, a little crazy. So I want to hear your thoughts on this.

Steven Ginsburg: 1:38

Oh, hey, Steve, thank you very much. I need an episode where we dive back into testing your kids. And very apropos too, we're going back into the school year, right? You and I both have children. That's relevant, and I think it's important to touch on this early, and I think it's important to touch on this often. And I want to bring it right to the point. Really, here's where I stand.

Steven Ginsburg: 2:00

From seventh grade on, I think everyone should be randomly testing their kids every week, every couple of weeks. Change the days, keep it going, keep the ball going. And let me get everyone off the hook right off the bat. This has nothing to do with everyone, including mine and yours. Perfect kids, these kids who would never drink before the legal age of alcohol, these kids who would never consume a drug, these kids who would never touch a drug, these kids who would never touch a pill out of their control. This officially has nothing to do with them.

Steven Ginsburg: 2:30

What does it have to do with? This is all one fold in nature. Keep these children safe and protect them from themselves by allowing their answer to anything and everything to be one fold. I can't try that, I can't drink that, I can't touch that, I can't take that why? Because my parents God bless their hearts are these ones who every week, every couple of weeks and I never know when drug test me, and if I pop positive for anything, you and no one else is ever going to see me again. You know game set match, and that is what we need. Peer pressure is out the window. You have taken it off them, you have firmly parked it on yourself. And I implore you, moms and dads out there in the world, hear me do this. Do your children a favor, do yourself a favor. Test them, test them, ask them.

Steve Coughran: 3:26

Yeah, and I agree. I mean to be honest. Let me just be honest with you. I remember when I was in California, we were driving around, we even went up to restore, you know, your, your detox center up there in Poway, california, and we had an amazing day. And I remember you brought this up and at first I was kind of like thrown back a little bit. I was like, huh, dang, that's.

Steve Coughran: 3:45

That seems a little crazy, right, maybe a little excessive, with, like drug testing your kids Like you have great kids, steven, so like really you need to drug test them. But then when you explained it to me, I was like, yes, that makes sense and I'm definitely on board with this too. Like for the sole purpose of how you explained it, I think it's like, hey, I'm going to just, you know, do it to be controlling of my kids. I want to lock them up in their bedroom, not let them go out and experience anything in the world, because you know I don't want them to. You know, ever fail and we're trying to prevent them from failure. Okay, that's one thing, maybe, but when you're saying yeah, it gives the kids an out right when they're saying, yeah, I can't do this because my parents are going to drug test me. I'm not a wimp, right, and I'm not a nerd, or whatever social pressures put on them, which I think is totally ridiculous.

Steven Ginsburg: 4:36

Ridiculous, of course, and it makes sense.

Steve Coughran: 4:38

Right, it totally makes sense.

Steven Ginsburg: 4:40

We win this for them before they even have to get in any kind of a game. We're not even going to go down that bunny hole of all the preposterousness of even having to deal with this. The world's fallen and broken. We got that covered. Let's get this out of our kids' radar. Let's take them off the hook.

Steven Ginsburg: 4:59

Very simple you test your kids and you do it consistently, and you do it early and often. Then you get with other parents who are like-minded with you, who you've got relationships with, and you're like listen, I'm testing them. Why don't you want to think about testing yours too? We're going to be removing all these pockets of kids from the enemy's crosshairs. Who doesn't want to do that? I mean, I would dare to say I'm not tooting any horns. My kids are pretty well-informed children. They certainly know my history backwards, sideways and forwards. They certainly know what dad does for work. They come up to her store all the time and they sure know that they're being tested. And so why would we have to test our kids? Well, we especially test our kids Again, because when John Smith comes up to my son in high school, I was like hey, have a beer.

Steven Ginsburg: 5:47

Yeah, I can't. I mean, it's not that I wouldn't, it's not that I won't, it's I literally can't. Why not? Because it's going to. I'm going to pop positive on the test he got at CVS and no one's going to see me until I go to freshman year of college. And again, it's just like, let's make it small for them. This world is so big and everything. It's just too dangerous. There's fentanyl everywhere. There's fentanyl on everything. There's dispensaries popping up everywhere. There's way too much underage drinking, don't we want to take this problem out of our children's silo? I do, and I want to encourage others to as well.

Steve Coughran: 6:24

Yeah, and I absolutely agree. So

Steven Ginsburg: 6:34

Yes, we, we, uh, we expect that, we expected it. We know about your talks at the highs. I've been doing freshman year talks and health classes for years and years now and sometimes they've sat in it.

Steven Ginsburg: 6:42

I'm going to be asking your parents to test you. I have to let you know that you must not touch a pill that's out of your family's control. It could have fentanyl in it. You must never, ever get in a car with someone who's altered. You must never operate a vehicle if you're altered yourself. I mean, this is like your last name's, Ginsburg, right? Kids? Yes, dad, that's how it is for them, Steve, yeah, oh, it is for them, Steve, yeah, like it's normal, and we should all normalize it because we protect our children from themselves and from peer pressure and from the failure. I don't need to do that. I can be giving the children. Well, all right. Well, let's assume you don't need to do that. You mean you don't want an extra safe, safe measure to keep your child even safer? Come on, who doesn't want that?

Steve Coughran: 7:25

Yeah, totally Absolutely. You know, it's interesting that while we're talking cause I'm a nerd like that, like you know what I'm going to just go on Amazon and I'm just going to Google drug tests because I wanted to see all right, if it's a hundred bucks of tests like dang, that could be cost prohibitive for some families. But here I am a five pack, easy at home, five panel instant drug test, testing, marijuana and other things.

Steven Ginsburg: 7:52

I mean, come on, nine bucks, nine bucks for five. I mean we go to Starbucks. We we spend 90 bucks. Right, you're not going to get some drug tests for our children, right, please?

Steve Coughran: 8:05

And here's another one, 15, 15 tests for 10 bucks. I mean that's less than a dollar a test.

Steven Ginsburg: 8:12

Thank you, and I love you for doing this. Thank you. And it's Amazon, cbs, walgreens, ebay, anywhere you want. You want drug tests, you can have them and, believe me, you can get them and go, get them and do your children a favor, do yourself a favor and set that bar. And then and what a beautiful conversation like hey, this is so you. I want you to understand there's a legal drinking age. I want you to understand, like, how danger marijuana is a proven gateway drug. We want you safe, we want you happy, we want you whole. This is a way that we ensure that that will occur, because we are going to test you, not because of you, because of others, and we love and believe in you. And then we want you to spread the good news. There's a real opportunity here, there's a real conversation to be had and, steve, together, you and I as fathers, and all the mama bears of the world and the parents, can make a difference. A child at a time and a test at a time yeah, I love that.

Steve Coughran: 9:14

So simple. That's what I love about just your strategies, your insights, steven. It's just like so simple, so easy to follow. It's not like you're like okay, to keep your kids safe. Here's my 15 check checklist here that you need to follow every single one. It's like go to Amazon, go to CVS, go wherever, buy the test, bring it home, put it on your calendar and test them randomly or as a type of cadence done.

Steven Ginsburg: 9:42

That's it. And what a great you're liberating your children. You're letting them be what Kids? Can't our children be kids for just a minute? I mean, what a gift you are giving your child or your children to allow them to be your child and children and to enjoy the childlike faith and pursuit of life and happiness and not be caught up in the darkness. It is coming. There will be a day. It won't be long, Steven, and this is a whole other podcast. Everything, everything's going to be legal. Everything, yeah.

Steven Ginsburg: 10:17

I'm not getting into what I support, what I don't support. None of that matters. Here's what matters how do we keep our children away from it? Simple to your point, brother.

Steve Coughran: 10:28

Yeah, exactly so, yeah, and I think this is a great tip. So when you share this with other people, what's their initial reaction? I'm sure you talked about this with your friends, and is there ever any pushback? And if there is pushback, like what do you say to that?

Steven Ginsburg: 10:44

I'm going to tell you. My response to it is to your point and I take it as an affirmation. My response to it is as basic and fundamental as the point you've affirmed me on. Well, you put a seatbelt on them in the car, right, yeah? But you're not expecting an accident, right? No? Why do you put a seatbelt on them? Well, I mean, it's obvious, driving's dangerous. And statistically, I'm like you want to go, okay, perfect. You want to talk about the statistical probability of them coming across fentanyl. You want to talk about the statistical probability of them coming across fentanyl. You want to talk about the statistical probability of what happens if they drink underage. And now you're telling me you've got a seatbelt, it's that panel test. Yeah, have them go pee, yeah. And you have put the proverbial people on your child, please.

Steven Ginsburg: 11:25

And you know what those same parents did, what you did. Hey, bud, thank you. I'm like, don't thank me. I'm an idiot, but this much I understand through my trials and tribulations. This is what the Lord has equipped me with and I want to help you and I want to help every family. And I'm not the be all, end all and the cool, and I aren't perfect parents. I fall short every day, but this is what God equipped me for, and I don't want children and families to suffer from the trials and tribulations of drugs and alcohol.

Steve Coughran: 11:52

Yeah, you've been there, done that. And look, you and I have both been through junior high and high school and I remember, you know, in high school being out with friends, of course somebody brings the beer or the bottle of liquor or the weed, whatever it is. And I remember there's one particular person in our friend group and he would abstain and not that like people will be like, oh, you're a loser or, you know, give them a hard time. But there was this like unwritten, like pressure there there was right, because like everybody's drinking and acting like a bunch of idiots, goofballs, right, and here he was like completely sober, so I'm sure that was tough. But look, then you know I follow this person, then I follow.

Steve Coughran: 12:32

Look, then you know I follow this person, then I follow other people that you know went down this path and they, they have struggles. They have struggles with drugs and alcohol and they're, you know, they're in and out of rehab and they've had a lot of difficult things divorces and all the other crap that comes from drug and alcohol abuse. And it's like dang if you just abstain. And I think back like on the day, you know, back when I was in high school, if I knew, you know I was being tested, maybe things would be different. But you know, the one thing that kept me out of a lot of trouble is my mom said, when you come home, come upstairs and you're going to kiss me goodnight, and I was like, okay, well, you can't really hide like smell like weed, you know weed or whatever, but she'd kiss me goodnight, she'd smell my hands, whatever it was. So it's just little mechanisms like that. It's just mechanisms like that Give me a kiss, take a drug test, little things that can make all the difference.

Steven Ginsburg: 13:25

All the difference and this is the 2.0 version of that brother to your point, and I love that and God bless your mom for doing that. And again, this protects our children from themselves, and why would we not want to in this day and age, and not the least? To which, again, sometimes this shoots off into other issues and we won't do that right now because we like to keep it concise, which is one of the values in what we provide. Neurologically, their brains are not nearly developed to where they need to be and we need to let them get through the aging process. We need to let them grow up emotionally and neurologically and physically and not have these substances on board with.

Steven Ginsburg: 14:01

It is proven, it impedes growth, it causes stress on the brain pathways and these are very often, all too often, gateway drugs and with so much fentanyl out there, someone could end up dead and we cannot have that happen. Exactly this is the way. This is the ultimate safety net and it's so simple and it's, to your point, cost-effective. And please, if you're out there and you're hearing us and you have any questions, you have any concerns, you don't know how to broach the conversation, anything, I assure you I will talk to anyone and everyone, and not only will I want to, if you can't tell. This is a passionate topic for me, because this is where the frontline begins.

Steve Coughran: 14:41

Yeah, I agree. So here's the deal. You're listening to this. You have any question whatsoever about this approach, this strategy with your kids, how to talk with your kids, you kids advice, whatever it may be, reach out to us at hello at restoreddetoxcenterscom. We'll respond. We'll get back to you, and Steven is obviously super passionate about this because he runs a facility Restored Detox Centers up in Poway, california, and this is his life's calling and obviously he works with individuals that, like, went down the path. I just want to point that out and send people to the email and to the website storydetoxcenterscom. You can go there and check out all the resources and other episodes that we do because we care about people's lives. That's, that's really what it comes down to, and I really love the simple tips, steven. So thank you.

Steven Ginsburg: 15:31

Steve, thank you so much for your ,S teven I want to make sure it never gets lost amidst everything. Thank you for what you are doing week in and week out with this platform, to where you are throwing me underhand pitches and continue to guide the conversation. You are part of that bridge that is helping families and loved ones save one another and have a better outcome and a better alternative and having a safe and sober life. So, brother, thank you for your part. Thank you for participating in the solution with me.

Steve Coughran: 15:59

Of course, I love these conversations with you, stephen, and for you who are listening out there, be sure to share and subscribe to this podcast. Spreading the word helps us make a difference in so many other people's lives, so we would appreciate you helping us get the word out there and, in the meantime, take care of yourself. Cheers.