Are Super Moms Turning to Meth to Do It All?

June 18, 2002 -- -- On the surface, Debra Breuklander was a hard-working mother of three, a nurse, with an immaculate home in a middle-class, Midwestern suburb. But she had a secret.

That secret — an addiction to the cheap and easily obtained drug methamphetamine — cost Breuklander everything, and it earned her a bunk for 35 years in Iowa's Mitchellville Correctional Facility.

"It takes ahold of you and no matter what kind of super mom you want to be it will take you over," Breuklander told Good Morning America.

Sheigla Murphy, director of the Center for Substance Abuse Studies at the Institute for Scientific Analysis in San Francisco, says that methamphetamine — often called "meth" for short — is the drug du jour for some super moms who are trying to have it all.

"When they begin to use methamphetamine, they feel more energy, they feel more mastery, they feel like they can get it all done," Murphy said. "They can take care of their kids, they can do their job, sometimes two jobs. They can meet what is for many women today, an almost impossible ideal."

Methamphetamine is a highly addictive stimulant that can be smoked, snorted or injected. Some women mix it with coffee, calling it "biker coffee." The drug produces a euphoria similar to cocaine, but lasts longer, and is made from common household ingredients. Studies have shown that it damages brain cells, and that the damage persists even months after people stop using it.

Also known by the names crank, ice, speed or crystal meth, it is a drug more commonly associated with teens at rave clubs. But in 1999, adult women using meth made up 47 percent of patients in substance abuse programs.

A Woman’s Drug?

A woman's role of taking care of the children and working puts them at particular risk for trying the drug, Murphy said.

"Speed [one of the drug's nicknames] is a drug that people get into for functional utility," said Dr. Drew Pinsky, a substance abuse expert and an ABCNEWS' contributor. "Women today have unique circumstances. They're expected to be all things, all the time, and that's unrealistic. Not only are they juggling job and kids, but they are supposed to look good, and keep the weight off."

That was the case for 35-year-old Cindy Nichols, a divorced mom with two children. She is now a recovering methamphetamine addict who has been clean for seven years, and is working as a full-time counselor at a California recovery center.

Nichols, who had used meth in high school, really began using it in earnest after she got married and became a mother. It made her feel good, "like she could do or be anything," Nichols said. In addition, she was thin without ever having to work out because the drug kills hunger.

Now, Nichols looks back in horror at the things she would do while on the drug, believing that it actually made her a better, more focused and energetic mom. She worked at a family fitness center, and would baby-sit her own and other children while she was high, Nichols said. She also drove a car with her children as passengers while she was high on the drug.

Five years after the heavy use of meth started, Nichols was at the bottom of a long decline. She was divorced, on welfare, living with her two children in a single bedroom house, with a car that barely ran. Drug use was the main factor in her divorce. On Mother's Day, 1995, she finally woke up and decided, "I can't do this anymore," and that was when she decided to quit the habit, Nichols said.