Watching ‘Intervention’ Should Be Required for Local Teens

Idaho Falls Teenagers: you must strive to watch Intervention, an hour-long program airing on Sundays on the A&E channel. This show could be so important to your long-term life success that you should go to a friend’s house to watch if you don’t get A&E at your home. I do not mean to preach, but watching how addiction wrecks these people’s lives could have saved myself many troubles over the years.

Intervention showcases one or two addicts each show. The addictions range from the expected alcoholism, cocaine, crystal meth, etc., to the unexpected like sex, gambling, rage, and video gaming. The addicts think they are participating in a simple documentary of their addiction, unaware that their family and friends are organizing an intervention to confront the addict and ask them to seek help. The actual intervention is shown, whether the addict chooses to get help or not, and the show ends with an update on how the addict is doing months later.

The show is quite real and unscripted. The subject is treated with respect and not at all in a gaudy-Jerry-Springer-like manner. Some addicts reject their families and friends and refuse treatment. Some addicts fall out of treatment, and some complete treatment but lapse back into abuse later. The show is heartening because many addicts do turn their lives around for the better.

The power of Intervention really comes from its weekly showcases. Many times addiction stories are presented to teenagers as a single incident. Kids hear stories of junkies, but the stories are always sporadic examples that only tell of isolated abusers hitting rock bottom. Teens can appreciate that one person had a serious problem, but they can then say it won’t happen to them. By watching these addiction cases for several weeks, the problems can be seen as generally happening to anyone rather than isolated cases. Viewers see many different addicts and how the circumstances of addiction is actually quite similar for all of them.

I think our teens could also be helped if they take note of how each addict seems to have a significant event in their lives that caused them to turn to their addictive behaviors. Many are molested or raped, but others suffer from a car wreck or emotionally abusive situation. Teens who have suffered through a significant event such as this should realize they need to be extra aware that they could also walk the path of addiction like the people shown in Intervention.

Intervention is an important show for parents to watch with their teenagers and preteens. Given that many parents do not watch TV with their kids (for whatever reasons), I am encouraging our local teenagers to watch it themselves. A&E airs it on Sunday nights, but find anyone with a DVR and watch it with a group of friends anytime during the week. In fact, I would love to see groups of teenagers watching Intervention together weekly so they can discuss amongst peers the devastation they witness from addiction.

Please comment and tell us of how this show has helped you or someone you know, or to let us know if your friends are gathering weekly to watch this important show together. Many Idaho Falls residents residents suffer from alcohol, sex, and drug addictions, and it would be nice if something as simple as watching a weekly TV program could help alleviate these burdens for at least some of our population.

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