a local conference were told on Saturday.

Speaking at the seventh annual PRIDE (Parent Resource Institute for Drug Education) Conference at Marriott's Castle Harbour Resort, Addiction Services counsellor Mrs. Gryneth Robinson showed parents what their children's drugs looked like, and how they were used.

Most parents know what a gun looks like, and "you ought to know what this looks like,'' Mrs. Robinson said as she displayed items commonly used for "freebasing'' cocaine into its purest form, crack.

"You're duty bound to learn some of this.'' The straight-talking Mrs. Robinson also encouraged parents to try to keep up with the ever-changing drug lingo that young people use. "Getting red'' is one of the latest slang expressions young people use for getting high, she told them.

Marijuana is a serious threat, she said, not only because the chemical that is its most active ingredient gets deposited in brain tissues, but because it is "a gateway drug'' that frequently leads to harder drug use.

"If I had the opportunity to show you the files of Addiction Services, you would see that 20 years ago the people who started using marijuana at age 13 or 14 are the same people presenting themselves with severe drug problems today.'' Mrs. Robinson told how she thought her daughter Debbie did not start using drugs until she was in her early 20s, when Mrs. Robinson found marijuana in her purse.

But she later learned her daughter had been using drugs in her teens, and there were traces of cocaine in her system when she died. "One thing I don't deny is that it was drug-related,'' she said of her daughter's death.

"I hope I have at least aroused your awareness, curiosity, interest, concern, and that you will look into this further. You can become as learned as I am on this; it's not difficult at all.'' Also at the conference on Saturday, Miss Deborah Carr of the Employee Assistance Programme, Bermuda Police Insp. Gertrude Barker, and child and adolescent psychiatrist Dr. Enid Melville tried to answer the question: "Are we messing up our kids?'' Miss Carr said the old maxim that "children should be seen and not heard'' must be discarded. "Things are different now,'' she said. "I think children need to be heard.'' Through open-ended questions, parents should encourage children to tell them not only what they did all day, but how they felt, she said.

Insp Barker said: "As far as I'm concerned, we're all messing up our kids.'' Parents were not taught what to do and were learning by their mistakes, she said.

And many school officials were afraid to speak out about problems they witnessed, for fear it would reflect badly on the education system, Insp.

Barker said.

While parents encouraged their children to say no to alcohol and other drugs, parents needed to learn how to say no to their children as well, she added.

Dr. Melville said parents could get help from books, magazines, support groups, ministers, and counsellors.

Communication is the most important thing, and "you can't wait until a child is 15 years old to start communicating,'' she said. "This has to start very young.''