Barbara Walters Discusses Her Daughter's Teen Drug Abuse and Residential Treatment

By Jane St. Clair

Among the memories shared by television legend Barbara Walters in her best-selling autobiography, Auditions, is an account of her daughter's troubled adolescence. Walters entitled the section about her daughter, Jackie Walters Danforth, "The Hardest Chapter to Write."

Walters told reporters although her memories were very painful, she and her daughter believed that publishing their story could help other families who are going through the ordeal of teenage drug abuse. But in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, Walters told a reporter that she could never re-read "The Hardest Chapter" because its "details of the disintegration" were too difficult for her.

According to the Chronicle article, Walters said, "At one point, I took the chapter [on Jackie] out totally and said to my editor, 'I just can't do this,' and he said, 'it's maybe more important than anything else in the book, leave it in.' But that part is heartbreaking for me, I had no idea what her life was like, I had no idea that she was on drugs, I had no idea that she was staying out all night, and I didn't know what to do about it, or how to cope.

During her appearance on the Oprah Winfrey Show, Walters recalled, "I said to Jackie, 'Do you want me to talk about this? Do you want me to talk about the drugs?' She said, 'Maybe it will help other parents understand. Maybe it will help them feel less guilty.' Maybe some of the things that she and I learned together - because I learned along with her when she went away -maybe it will help."

"I was not always there for her," Walters told Chronicle staff writer David Wiegand. "Jackie says today that I was always there for every major event and that she never knew that I wasn't there, but I knew I wasn't always there. But for Jackie I think what [was especially difficult] was that I was a celebrity, and people expected her to be a particular way.

"That's all in the book, and I think there are parents who are going through it today, maybe even more than when Jackie was growing up."

During an interview with MSNBC's Jane Pauley, Walters described how Jackie stayed out all night at famous New York nightclubs like Studio 54 and routinely skipped school, and then how she went missing for an entire month in 1984 when she was only 15-years old.

"When I first found out all the things that she had done, I was so shocked," Walters said. "And Jackie is so open. Sometimes I think I wish I didn't know. You know, don't tell me. I don't have to know that, right? And I do, I do think, 'Oh my God. I mean she could have been raped, she could have been killed.'"

Walters described how she finally found a therapeutic boarding school in Idaho at a time when schools like this very uncommon.

"Even though Jackie, you know, probably kicked and screamed, she knew that things were getting so desperate, she had to go," her mother said. "But to send a child away is heartbreaking. My baby? My baby's no longer with me? I have to put her in someone else's hands? And I did."

Danforth spent three years in the alternative boarding school, and now operates a wilderness camp for troubled girls in Maine. Danforth told her mother that she wanted people to know that "if we can get through it, everyone can too."

"I'm doing interviews like this because Jackie said to me, 'Tell other parents,'" said Walters. "I get calls all the time from people who say, 'How did this happen? We have a very good marriage. We have given our daughter everything. How did it happen?' Tell them, Mommy, if it can happen to you, it can happen in any family."

Thousands of parents and teenagers are going through the same thing that Walters and her daughter experienced. According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration, about 1.2 million people entered substance abuse treatment in 2006, with 7 percent (84,000) of these enrollments involving individuals under age 18.

How Residential Treatment Works: Clearing a New Path

Residential treatment is often the last stop for an out-of-control substance-abusing teenager. It offers a "time out" from situations that trigger self-destructive behavior, a chance to experience predictable and consistent consequences of behavior, an opportunity to participate in community, and for family bonds to be repaired. In the process, self-esteem -- the major antidote to alcohol and drug use - is increased.

How does this happen? Let's follow Joan J. through several aspects of her treatment experience.

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Choosing a drug rehab program for your teen can be complex and confusing. How do you find a reputabled addiction treatment center? Is residential treatment right for your teenger? So many questions and you're in a hurry to get your teen the help they need. Read on to learn what Questions to Ask When Choosing a Drug Addiction Treatment Center.

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Drug Rehab
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Substance Abuse Treatment
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