Mums buying drugs on the playground

Once you’re too old for club or college life, purchasing drugs can be problematic and risky – unsuitable for women with jobs and children. “It was fun when we were young, but not now that we want to keep control of it. We need it done efficiently,” says Rachel, 37, who is married with three children and works as a freelance photographer from her home in Bristol. She buys cocaine, mephedrone and MDMA from Karen, the mother of her son’s best friend, who goes to the same local primary school. And because it’s convenient, they swap the cash and drugs from buggy to buggy, while picking up the kids from school.

“No one would ever suspect, says Rachel, who’s active in the PTA. “There are a few like-minded parents who buy from her as well. It’s a nice primary school and they’d be surprised that some mums buy drugs in the playground.”

This is an extract from an article in this month’s Marie Claire about women and drug use. When I read it I actually just sat for a minute, open-mouthed, unable to say anything. What made the whole thing worse is that ‘Rachel’ almost sounds proud, as though her and all these other mums are playing some sort of kooky game.

If you’re thinking that perhaps I have taken this quote out of context, and that it was designed to shock, I don’t think so. The very next line in the article is this – ‘so far, perhaps, so unsurprising. But gradually a range of more extreme female-friendly outlets is surfacing.’

I’m sorry, have I missed something?? The journalist writing the piece may not have been surprised to hear that mums were buying drugs on the playground but I certainly was! Is that not an extreme enough outlet?

I am a parent and because of that I would never take drugs, end of. I certainly wouldn’t buy and sell them at a school, surrounded by primary and pre-school age children. Is that me being a terrible prude? I don’t think so. I read the piece out to a friend who has three young children and she was equally horrified, although less surprised than me. “It sounds like my son’s school,” she said. “One of the mums there asked me if I wanted to go to her house and take MDMA with them one weekend. She told me she thought I was a creative type and that it might be something I would be in to.”

Bonkers.

Since when did ‘being a creative type’ mean leaving your small children at home with a babysitter to go and take drugs? Presumably if they are going to someone’s house to do it, it might also mean there are kids asleep upstairs?

The article though, rather than condemning these women, seems to be impressed with their multi-tasking, as though they are perfect examples of modern mums having it all. ‘For female drug users, taking drugs needs to fit alongside their professional lives. They apply the same standards to buying their drugs as they do to the rest of their lives: discreet, controlled, safe and well organised; just one of a list of things to do scrawled in a diary or added to an iPhone Note.’

Ah well, that’s OK then, (note sarcasm in voice), so long as they are using an app to buy their illegal and dangerous drugs then that’s OK, hat’s off to them for being so efficient. Organic veg box ordered online? Check. PTA meeting in the diary? Check. MDMA purchased on the playground? Check.

Perhaps I am missing out on the perfect middle-class family lifestyle?

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42 Comments

    • 3 June, 2013 / 2:00 pm

      I think we must be. It is written in such a casual way – it must be everyone but us… #doubtful

  1. 3 June, 2013 / 11:35 am

    Wow. I am shocked. Not just at the buying and selling of illegal drugs in a playground but at the tone of Rachel. You’re right, she does seem proud!

    • 3 June, 2013 / 2:00 pm

      It’s weird isn’t it? Like we should all be super-impressed at how efficient she is at multi-tasking or how cool she is?! It’s nuts.

    • 3 June, 2013 / 1:59 pm

      Ditto. I was properly gob-smacked. I like to think of myself as open-minded but I couldn’t think of anything at all about this that was OK. Wrong on sooooo many levels.

  2. 3 June, 2013 / 12:09 pm

    I feel the need to comment yet I’m gobsmacked. Rarely am I lost for words but thats done it.

    Jesus, how would u even begin the conversation in the 1st place let alone come to the conclusion that buying in a school playground is a good idea?

    I’ve a few choice words I would say to these women but none could be repeated.

    • 3 June, 2013 / 1:58 pm

      I know right??! At what point do you decide it’s OK to go up to another mum and ask them if they want to buy drugs??!! How would that even come about??!

  3. 3 June, 2013 / 12:12 pm

    Jesus Wept – I am speechless, is this really, honestly…what the hell is going on!

    • 3 June, 2013 / 1:57 pm

      There aren’t many things that leave me literally lost for words but this was definitely one of them!

  4. Alison
    3 June, 2013 / 12:42 pm

    I have never seen anything going on like this at my sons old Primary (he left last July) but I was gobsmacked to learn that the village where the school was, was a complete druggy community. I even heard from a friend that a classroom assistant/dinner lady who was seen taking cocaine in the local pub & she used to say that when she was stressed at school she used to pop home & ‘do a line’ to help her get through the afternoon, so I wouldn’t be surprised if it was more widespread than people think. Although very scary to think about. By the way I have never even smoked a cigarette in my life so just don’t get the need for people to take drugs as if they were sweets.

    • 3 June, 2013 / 1:57 pm

      WHAAAAT??!! That is crazy!! I feel like I must live in a different world sometimes…

  5. 3 June, 2013 / 1:37 pm

    Irresponsible and immature, these women need to grow up.

    • 3 June, 2013 / 1:56 pm

      It’s so selfish and childish isn’t it? Some women just seem to want to believe that having kids doesn’t have to change your life but I’m afraid with some things it actually does!

  6. 3 June, 2013 / 1:38 pm

    Is this actually for real? I can’t think of anything more irresponsible than having drugs in a buggy and/or around small children – who would do that!

    • 3 June, 2013 / 1:55 pm

      Apparently so! I can’t get my head round it at all.

  7. 3 June, 2013 / 2:18 pm

    It is written so incredibly casually that you’d suspect it was everyday, but to be honest I think it’s just another example of a person assuming everyone is like them….

    I’ve been taking children to school for the last 15 years and I’m incredibly laid back about most things, and I’ve been offered drugs in the street and in clubs and pubs more times than I could ever count, but I have never ever been offered any, or even taken into conversation about them in a school playground.

    Maybe I’m not living the middle class lifestyle either – thankfully! :D

    • admin
      3 June, 2013 / 7:11 pm

      See now I have NEVER been offered drugs anywhere – festivals, clubs, on the street – nothing. I wonder what it is about me!?

      • 3 June, 2013 / 10:26 pm

        I haven’t either come to think of it! Even when I was younger and ended up out with “friends” taking stuff they never asked me. We must have a vibe and people respect it! ;-) x

  8. 3 June, 2013 / 2:22 pm

    Oh my goodness, that is absolutely shocking! So irresponsible and I can’t believe the magazine making out like it is acceptable in any way. In my opinion if people want to take drugs then they should get it out of their system before having children. No child should have to see their parent on drugs, or experience them the next day when they are going to be feeling awful x

    • admin
      3 June, 2013 / 7:09 pm

      Totally agree, not to mention the risks associated in breaking the law, children finding the drugs, what the parent might do while on them, risk of death… list is endless!!

  9. 3 June, 2013 / 4:15 pm

    OMG, mad, mad, mad, so shocking, disgusting. That magazine should not have been allowed to print the article.

    • admin
      3 June, 2013 / 7:10 pm

      It really is surprising isn’t it the things people seem to be able to get away with normalising?

  10. 3 June, 2013 / 7:36 pm

    Not shocked that it goes on, I certainly know people who haven’t moved past their partying days once kids come along. But very surprised for Marie Claire to be writing an article that glamorises something that is beyond idiotic and really quite sad IMHO.

  11. DoodlesMum
    3 June, 2013 / 7:47 pm

    Stunned silence……..ehh..am….nope, still stunned silence with a not so subtle undertone of WTF!
    I don’t know if I’m more shocked by the actions of these mums or the way such a high profile mag presents this as acceptable (at least) or even admirable!
    I did my share of partying and took drugs at Uni but that lifestyle was quite firmly put to bed when i started planning my family…you can not have it all, and it is unbelievably irrisponsable to try and advertise otherwise…. Ok, no longer speachless but still stunned!

    • admin
      4 June, 2013 / 11:33 am

      That was a good effort for someone speechless ;-)

  12. 3 June, 2013 / 9:02 pm

    Quite a shocking article. It is written in a way that makes us think it is common place but I am kind of doubting that. Does seem a little irresponsible to portray this kind of behaviour as normal and fine when quite clearly it is not.

    • admin
      4 June, 2013 / 11:34 am

      It does doesn’t it? I’m glad it’s not just me. I am all for keeping an open mind and not hiding away from the truth, but I do thing it should have been put in some kind of context to say that however common it might be, that doesn’t make it OK.

  13. 3 June, 2013 / 9:52 pm

    The end of your post made me really laugh out loud. Organic veg box order, check. MDMA purchased in playgroup, check.
    The reality is that that this is probably going on in most playgrounds you just don’t see it.
    I seem to be in the minority here that I am not in the least shocked. Maybe just the world and people I have grown up around (I’ve worked in advertising and it’s everywhere).
    It’s very sad that these people sound ‘proud’ or what they are doing YES. But if you look at statistics on drug use in the middle class, middle age, middle what ever, it’s everywhere. People in very prominent jobs, doctors, teachers, police, solicitors – all parents.
    Truth is that a massive proportion of society take either recreational drugs, prescription drugs or legal drugs (including alcohol which most of us are guilty of) regularly.
    It doesn’t shock me at all but it’s certainly not something they should be proud of. Being a complete lightweight that can just about handle a 2 glass of red wine hangover with kids I can’t understand how parents manage any of it but truth is that they do.

    • admin
      4 June, 2013 / 11:33 am

      I’m sure you’re absolutely right. My first daughter was born when I was just 17, so I have simply never been part of drug taking or anything like that – I was a sensible parent before I had the chance, although I doubt I would have anyway. To me then it is hard to accept as just something that a lot of people do, although I don’t doubt you’re right.

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  15. 4 June, 2013 / 8:56 pm

    Blimey I work in and school and I’m on the PTA.

    It’s like the calendar girls gone bad.

    Special cookies in the bake sale shudders .

  16. 4 June, 2013 / 11:10 pm

    I am beyond shocked! And disgusted! We’re supposed to keep children safe, especially our own, and yet they have drugs in the bottom of their pushchairs? Where a child could find it? And they have drugs parties while their children are asleep upstairs? And don’t even get me started on what I think of this as a teacher.

    I’m more shocked with the magazine for promoting it as normal and acceptable behaviour; drugs are illegal and they are effectively condoning illegal behaviour in publishing this.

  17. honeybee
    8 June, 2013 / 10:05 pm

    They sound like a bunch of sad, desperate women grasping at their long-gone youth – pathetic really.

    Had these ‘anonymous mothers’ been teen mums on an estate or just from the wrong side of the river, they would have been reported to the authorities, and publicly vilified.

    Somehow, Marie Claire interviewees escape the same treatment for their criminal & neglectful behaviour – I wonder why.

  18. 12 June, 2013 / 9:27 am

    While I don’t doubt that this sort of thing does go on I think the author of this piece is guilty of implying that it’s far more widespread than it really is. If these parents were indulging in habitual drug use it would soon become evident in their behaviour or indeed that of their children. I would go so far as to say that large parts of this article are simply fabricated…mums with a Sauvignon Blanc habit though, well that’s a different matter :)

  19. 12 June, 2013 / 9:30 am

    Of course it’s extremely unwise and irresponsible to be buying and selling drugs on school premises. But the illegality of things like MDMA and cocaine on one hand and the wide, legal availability of alcohol on the other is purely a quite arbitrary historical development: the idea that cocaine or ecstasy damage people or endanger children more than alcohol is demonstrably false. These women are not to be applauded for conducting illicit transaction on the playground. But the idea that doing a few lines or a couple pills at home and among friends is somehow massively worse than glugging down the pinot grigio is just a lie that you’ve been sold by a media sector which takes vast advertising revenues from the drinks trade (and which used to take money from the tobacco firms, remember). If you’ve ever had friends over to polish off enough wine to make you tipsy, loud and clumsy while your kids sleeping upstairs, in terms of any actual risk to the children’s safety right there and then, what you’ve done is really no different to when a dinner party is rounded off with the sharing a gramme of cocaine.

  20. 20 June, 2013 / 7:46 am

    Seriously? How would you even strike up that conversation?

    I hope its not as widespread as the article makes out.

  21. 20 June, 2013 / 8:43 am

    When I first saw your tweet, I thought it must have been a euphamism. I’m utterly gobsmacked! You are certainly not the only one. I used to work in an environment where I was the only one not doing drugs, my boss thought it was quaint. I can’t even fathom what these women & the author are thinking.

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