Coming late into this discussion…I totally agree with Oldfort’s post #50, from actual experience. My d went to school 700 miles away. She was doing post-grad work prior to getting an actual graduate degree and was 22 yrs old. I spoke with her probably 5 times a week, she had a car that we had bought her but we were not paying the insurance or most other living expenses at that point. She worked 25-30 hr per week and needed a car to get to work. Late one evening (around 10 PM) received a call from her advisor (who we knew fairly well at that point) that she hadn’t shown up for an opera rehearsal, did I know where she was? I had spoken with her the day before but not that day. This was totally unlike her and he was concerned. No answer on cell, went straight to voicemail. He said he’d make phone calls and check around town. An hour later he called back with really awful news–she had spent the night IN JAIL after being picked up for DUI. She tried to call her older brother but not us, but he didn’t pick up on the one phone call she was allowed. The advisor got her released and made her talk to us. Since we didn’t know the local area, the advisor helped her get a very good (and expensive) attorney who eventually got her off because the arrest was made improperly. We fronted the money for the attorney, but required repayment of the attorney fees over time, and she also had to pay to get her car out of impoundment (we did not front her that money). She didn’t immediately have the funds so had a hard time getting to work for a couple of weeks. Also, her license was suspended for 30 days until she took alcohol instruction classes (not sure that’s what it was called) as part of the no-conviction deal, so that made it really difficult to get to work again.
In her original confusion after being arrested, she thought she could get all of it taken care of by herself without us finding out!
My d learned a lot of lessons from this: it was not fun to be in prison all night wearing an orange jumpsuit, it was humiliating and degrading. Two, there are severe financial consequences to being arrested. Three, she was exposed to a group of people she normally didn’t hang around with both at the prison and in the classes she had to take. Luckily there are no convictions on her record, but as other posters have said a conviction can have long-term consequences to your career.
Six years later, my d still remembers all this and absolutely will not drink and drive and basically doesn’t even drink much at all.
As for smoking (sorry this is so long): I am a scientist who does research on chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, of which about 95% of cases are caused by smoking…I cannot figure out WHY anyone would smoke after you see the long term results of smoking. My company does not allow smoking anywhere on its property, even including sitting in your car if it’s in the company lot. Smoking is a liability for many reasons, including long term health. Some places will not even hire you if you smoke (I believe my company is headed in that direction), and health insurance costs are higher.
Just wanted to relay my story…I believe that the OPs daughter is having serious alcohol problems with this third encounter and needs to have a wake-up call.