Zac Clark gives parents nine insights about today’s college experience

It’s never been “easy” to send children off to college. These days, it’s terrifying. Students face a constellation of dangers: A no-holds-barred party culture. Access to substances that are more addictive—and deadlier—than ever. Skyrocketing levels of depression, anxiety, and suicide ideation. What’s more, this generation is chronically sleep-deprived; addicted to their smartphones; and desperate to be seen, heard, and accepted.        

It’s a recipe for disaster, says Zac Clark, founder and CEO of Release Recovery, a substance use disorder and mental health organization based in New York that offers transitional living, case management, interventions, and other recovery and family support services. Many of Release’s clients are students, and Clark’s own addiction progressed while he was a student—as he explains on a new podcast pulling back the curtain on the college experience and showing parents the real challenges and risks their teens are facing. 

If Clark’s name sounds familiar, it may be because in 2020, he received the final rose on ABC’s The Bachelorette, where he publicly addressed his sobriety on national television. Clark is also the founding board member of the Release Recovery Foundation, a nonprofit whose mission is to remove financial barriers to treatment for underserved communities through DEI and LGBTQIA+ scholarships, to educate Americans about lifesaving tools like NARCAN, and to build community to break the stigma around addiction and mental health.

“Without a doubt, college students will be exposed to the whole gamut of drugs and alcohol while they’re away at school,” says Clark, who is the first guest on the premiere of The Mayo Lab Podcast with David Magee, which serves as a single source of research-based guidance for parents, educators, and students. (Listen on Apple and Spotify.) “Even the ones who ‘know better’ can make mistakes and get into serious trouble in no time at all.”

In other words, despite all your teaching and preaching, your children may still choose drug and alcohol misuse. Yes—even smart, talented, responsible ones. Clark knows this all too well. Despite being a great student, a three-sport athlete, and coming from a “good” family, he too descended into years of substance misuse before getting sober in August 2011. 

Partying is so normalized on campuses that it can feel like you’re missing out if you’re not part of that scene, says Clark. But he’s determined to use his story, and his insights on the joys of sobriety, to show young people they don’t need substances to have a fun, fulfilling life. 

A few takeaways from the episode:

Your children aren’t taking drugs to disappoint you. They’re all too aware that you would be upset by these choices. But they also want to fit in and be accepted, and often give into peer pressure in a moment of weakness.

“I’ll never forget the first time I ever did cocaine,” says Clark. “I was a junior in college. And I woke up the next morning, and the first thing I thought about was how upset my mom and dad would be if they knew. But I went back out the next night and did it again.”

Most overdoses are accidental. Even though suicide is on the rise (another epidemic threatening today’s young people), deaths from overdose are usually accidents. In 2013, podcast host David Magee’s own son William died from an accidental drug overdose. His other son, Hudson, nearly died from an accidental overdose on his college campus as well. 

“Every parent should know that overdoses occur regardless of whether the user has intentions to take their life,” says Magee. “Substances don’t discriminate. If you take too much, you could die.”

The young people who overdose aren’t always addicts… The young people who are dying of accidental overdoses are not just those affected by substance use disorder, says Clark. They are often students on college campuses who are trying drugs for the first time. That’s why every parent should be having open, honest conversations with their children before and during college—and it’s crucial that in these talks their child feels heard and understood. 

…And the teens who do become addicted to drugs or alcohol aren’t the ones you might expect. Today’s addicts are great students, gifted athletes, and have the world at their fingertips. They come from loving families and have plenty of friends and people supporting them. But drug addiction, especially in the era of highly addictive fentanyl, can happen to anyone.

Fentanyl’s not just addictive, it is deadly. Make sure your children know the facts. Accidental overdoses are on the rise, often related to fentanyl. This drug, which is cheap and easy to produce, is being added in minute amounts to counterfeit pills to keep buyers coming back again and again. But when crude production gets the recipe wrong, many counterfeit pills contain lethal amounts of fentanyl. It is everywhere today, including on college campuses, which is why your children must know the risks and stay away.

The people who are most successful in recovery have family support… “There’s a correlation between when the family chooses to dig in and do the work and the outcome for the identified patient,” says Clark. “As the family member of a person in recovery, you might not feel like you have any work to do, but now is the time to work even harder. This doesn’t always sit well with families, but it’s the truth. Now is the time to work on your relationship with your family member, work on your own actions and behaviors, and work on deepening your support.”

…And that includes taking a good hard look at your own substance use habits. “As much as we parents hate to admit it, children often learn about substances from us,” says Magee. “They are watching if we crack a cold beer at 5:30 every evening or rely on marijuana or other substances to make it through social events. That’s why supporting our children often means getting real about our own habits and making changes, especially in the early days of our children’s recovery. After all, addiction is a family disease.”

“We need to all ask ourselves, Are we obsessed with changing how we feel with substances?” says Clark.  “How can we expect our children to adopt any different behavior?” 

You still get to live your life in recovery. You just do it sober. A lot of sober people worry that their social lives are over once they start recovery. Nothing’s farther from the truth, says Clark. He is dedicated to making sober living look cool…because it is cool. 

“You don’t have to give up going to parties, concerts, tailgates, or bars and restaurants,” he says. “You still do all that stuff; you just don’t use drugs or alcohol. As long as the work is being done, you’ll be fine. The same goes for dating, another common concern for people in recovery. If you happen to date someone who doesn’t support your sobriety, they’re not the person for you.”

You are not alone. “When I tell people that I’m in recovery, they open up to me and tell the truth about their own struggles with substances, or the struggles their loved ones are going through,” says Clark. “It’s powerful stuff. People sometimes turn to substance misuse because they are desperate for connection, and then they find it in surprising ways when they get sober.”

Let’s close on an encouraging note: The sobriety movement is gaining ground. There’s a nationwide trend toward sober living, and some college students are choosing not to drink and do drugs, instead prioritizing their mental and physical health. 

“This is a great start,” concludes Clark. “Normalizing sobriety benefits everyone, including people who are not addicted but don’t need the strains that drugs and alcohol place on their energy level, finances, and wellness. We can build a world where our children, teens, young adults, and the rest of us value our lives enough to live every day with a clear mind.”