Those weren't my kids getting high on painkillers at Castle View High School, but I don't live in a state of denial. I have four teenagers. I also have oxycodone in my home. It could have been my kids.

Even if you don't have oxycodone, I guarantee one of your kid's friend's houses do. 6.2 million noncancer-related prescriptions for OxyContin (the sustained-release version without aspirin or acetaminophen added like Percodan and Percocet) were written in 2002, compared to 670,000 in 1997. That probably doesn't include internet purchases.

It could have been your kids, too. According to the 2005 Partnership for a Drug-Free America study, nearly one in five kids (grades 7-12) use prescription drugs to get high.

Pilfering medicine cabinets is nothing new. Growing up, I knew plenty of people whose Donna Reed/June Cleaver mothers had PMS before it became a diagnosis or struggled to regain youthful figures, providing ample supplies of Valium and Black Beauties.

Of course, young children with their own medicine cabinets are a relatively new development. One son reports Adderall (commonly prescribed for ADHD) is the college late night study session drug of choice.

When we dissected teenage behavior over lunch, one friend asserted not all teenagers drink alcohol. I agreed that experimentation may not be inevitable, but it is not unusual, either. According to the National Institute of Health, 75% report using alcohol (not just sips) by their senior year; 58% admit getting drunk. I think we can bump those self-reported figures up a notch; some people never admit anything on surveys. Also, determining your own drunkenness has always been inaccurate, judging by the number of people wanting their car keys back.

Although I'm less familiar with current vernacular, drug users once aptly dubbed dosage "a fix." We use medication to fix ourselves: to sleep, relieve pain, decrease anxiety, increase focus, lose weight, balance brain chemistry, stabilize blood sugar, eradicate infection. There's nothing evil inherent in this goal. Professional medical guidance informs our decisions, but that's no guarantee against consequences or abuse.

We talk about it in my house, like all the experts suggest. While I enjoy statistics, I tend to avoid scare tactics, unless you count the demeanor and appearance of addicts we know personally.

I'm not kidding myself, though. It still could be my kids.