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A
TRUE STORY
First
I'm going to tell you a little about me and my family. My
name is Jeff. I am a Police Officer for a city which is
known nationwide for its crime rate. We have a lot of
gangs and drugs. At one point we were # 2
in the nation in homicides per capita. I also have a
police K-9 named Thor. He was certified in
drugs and general duty. He retired at 3 years
old because he was shot in the line of duty. He lives
with us now and I still train with him because he likes
it. I always liked the fact that there was no way to
bring drugs into my house. Thor wouldn't allow it. He
would tell on you. The reason I say this is so you
understand that I know about drugs. I have taught in
schools about drugs. My wife asks all our kids at least
once a week if they used any drugs. Makes them promise
they wont.
I like building computers occasionally and started
building a new one in February 2005. I also was working
on some of my older computers. They were full of dust so
on one of my trips to the computer store I bought a 3
pack of DUST OFF. Dust Off is a can of compressed
air to blow dust off a computer. A few weeks later when
I went to use them they were all used. I talked to my
kids and my 2 sons both said they had used
them on their computer and messing around with them. I
yelled at them for wasting the 10 dollars I
paid for them. On February 28 I went back
to the computer store. They didn't have the 3 pack
which I had bought on sale so I bought a single jumbo
can of Dust Off. I went home and set it down beside my
computer.
On March 1st I left for work at 10 PM. At 11 PM
my wife went down and kissed Kyle goodnight. At 530
am the next morning Kathy went downstairs to wake
Kyle up for school, before she left for work. He was
sitting up in bed with his legs crossed and his head
leaning over. She called to him a few times to get up.
He didn't move. He would sometimes tease her like this
and pretend he fell back asleep. He was never easy to
get up. She went in and shook his arm. He fell over. He
was pale white and had the straw from the Dust Off can
coming out of his mouth. He had the new can of Dust Off
in his hands. Kyle was dead.
I am a police officer and I had never heard of this. My
wife is a nurse and she had never heard of this. We
later found out from the coroner, after the autopsy,
that only the propellant from the can of Dust off was in
his system. No other drugs. Kyle had died between
midnight and 1 Am.
I found out that using Dust Off is being done mostly by
kids ages 9 through 15. They even have a name for it.
It's called dusting. A take off from the Dust Off name.
It gives them a slight high for about 10 seconds.
It makes them dizzy. A boy who lives down the street
from us showed Kyle how to do this about a month before.
Kyle showed his best friend. Told him it was cool and it
couldn't hurt you. Its just compressed air. It cant hurt
you. His best friend said no.
Kyle's death
Kyle was wrong. It's not just compressed air. It also
contains a propellant. I think its R2. Its a refrigerant
like what is used in your refrigerator. It is a heavy
gas. Heavier than air. When you inhale it, it fills your
lungs and keeps the good air, with oxygen, out. That's
why you feel dizzy, buzzed. It decreases the oxygen to
your brain, to your heart. Kyle was right. It cant hurt
you. IT KILLS YOU. The horrible part about this is there
is no warning. There is no level that kills you. It's
not cumulative or an overdose; it can just go randomly,
terribly wrong. Roll the dice and if your number comes
up you die. ITS NOT AN OVERDOSE. Its Russian roulette.
You don't die later. Or not feel good and say I've had
too much. You usually die as your breathing it in. If
not you die within 2 seconds of finishing
"the hit." That's why the straw was still in
Kyle's mouth when he died. Why his eye's were still
open.
The experts want to call this huffing. The kids don't
believe its huffing. As adults we tend to lump many
things together. But it doesn't fit here. And that's why
its more accepted. There is no chemical reaction. no
strong odor. It doesn't follow the huffing signals. Kyle
complained a few days before he died of his tongue
hurting. It probably did. The propellant causes
frostbite. If I had only known.
Its easy to say hay, its my life and I'll do what I
want. But it isn't. Others are always effected. This has
forever changed our family's life. I have a hole in my
heart and soul that can never be fixed. The pain is so
immense I cant describe it. There's nowhere to run from
it. I cry all the time and I don't ever cry. I do what
I'm supposed to do but I don't really care. My kids are
messed up. One wont talk about it. The other will only
sleep in our room at night. And my wife, I cant even
describe how bad she is taking this. I thought we were
safe because of Thor. I thought we were safe because we
knew about drugs and talked to our kids about them.
After Kyle died another story came out. A Probation
Officer went to the school system next to ours to speak
with a student. While there he found a student using
Dust Off in the bathroom. This student told him about
another student who also had some in his locker. This is
a rather affluent school system. They will tell you they
don't have a drug problem there. They don't even have a
dare or plus program there. So rather than tell everyone
about this "new" way of getting high they
found, they hid it. The probation officer told the media
after Kyle's death and they, the school, then admitted
to it. I know that if they would have told the media and
I had heard, it wouldn't have been in my house.
We need to get this out of our homes and school computer
labs.
Using Dust Off isn't new and some
"professionals" do know about. It just isn't
talked about much, except by the kids. They know about
it.
April 2nd was 1 month since Kyle died. April 5th would
have been his 15th birthday. And every
weekday I catch myself sitting on the living room couch
at 2:30 in the afternoon and waiting to see him get off
the bus. I know Kyle is in heaven but I cant help but
wonder If I died and went to Hell.
Jeff
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