What is the most audacious killer of our teenagers?

Oh, did I get your attention? Are you curious as to which is the most audacious teenage killer? I know I would like to know. I won’t keep you waiting. It really is easy. No, it’s not drugs or alcohol, it’s car accidents. Yes, that’s what it is. The number one killer of our teens is car accidents!

I was an almost intimate bedmate of the killer a week before Christmas one year. My son was returning home from his destination. He was coming home to surprise me for Christmas. How good is that? Well, the 10 hour trip went well; it was the last ten minutes of the trip that almost took his life.

You might have been tired, driving too fast, or anxious to get home. Whatever the reason, my son turned a corner on Kentucky back roads just ten minutes from his house and his wheel hit the curb enough to stop him. He flipped his new Cadillac over and over and over.

Then he calls me on the phone and says, “Hey mom, don’t be scared, but I had a little accident and I want you to come pick me up.” me and we drove to go look for him. When I got there and left my care, I’m not sure I can express what I felt when I saw his car backed into the creek about 40 feet from the road. It was totally flattened, all the windows broken and the doors smashed.

I went out and at that moment the highway patrol arrived. He watched the accident and wrote the report and then told my son. “Merry Christmas, as you have just received the best gift you could have received, your life.” He then went on to say that had he not known there were no fatalities, he would have expected one alone at the crash site.

My son lived, but there are many other sons and daughters who did not. There are at least 3,600 deaths of our teens from car accidents in the United States each year. Fifteen of them die every day from inexperience behind the wheel, speeding, overcrowding or alcohol. There are many parents and families who are grieving and have lost the joy in their lives.

There was another story in the paper that I read that night and I cried like a baby. Some mom and dad had lost their child the day before. The story goes like this: It was a good day, it was Oscar’s birthday and if he passed the driving test he would be in for a surprise, a very big surprise.

He easily passed the exam and, with his new driver’s license in hand, he headed home. What she received was an amazing new car for her birthday. The keys jingled in her hands. Now this is what dreams are made of, right?

However, this dream did not last long and on a rainy autumn night, a little less than two months after his birthday, he was out for a walk, just having fun, the curve came unexpectedly and he could not keep his attention on the road. She crashed and her life ended at that very moment.

I was at risk for a car accident for many reasons. Why do some children do the same things wrong and survive? There are no answers. All we can do as parents is teach our teens as best we can about the ins and outs of driving.