Dear Dr. Wes & Jenny: My friends and I go out and party a lot. It’s usually all in fun, but the other night we got really drunk and ended up getting lost out in the country for hours. How can I convince them that it’s getting out of control? Trying to make new friends who don’t drink isn’t really an option.

Jenny: Always get a sober driver if you do decide to drink so that you don’t get lost, or worse, wind up very hurt or hurting someone else.

Secondly, if they were my friends, I would sit down with a couple of them one on one and tell them that you think it is becoming too dangerous. If you really want to talk to your friends about it, sit them down in a place they feel comfortable and tell them exactly how you feel and how it is affecting you.

I wouldn’t expect a lot, but if you truly are friends, then it could work. Talk to them one at a time so they don’t get backup from each other.

There are many alternatives to drinking. You and your friends could go watch games or go to a movie. I mean if you are really friends, then you must share some interests other than partying.

If that isn’t at all possible, then you can just decide not to drink. The amount of pressure to drink may be high, but if you don’t want to, nobody can make you.

If none of this works, then you may have to find new friends. There are always other people out there, and if you really don’t feel comfortable around the friends you have, then why are you still with them? There are some points in your lifetime when you have to take a step back and think about what you are really doing. I think, for you, this would be one of them. So look around and ask, “Is this really what I want to be doing?”

Wes: You raise a problem that is a bit more common than many adults realize. Some surveys of teens show rates of alcohol use during the last 30 days to be between 40 percent and 60 percent, with 30-day marijuana use at around 22 percent. I believe those estimates are low, as I suspect teens underreport their use patterns. In fact, many teens find it easier to get alcohol and marijuana than cigarettes.

I’m sure it is hard to find friends who do not use at least occasionally, and I applaud you for taking a step back and wondering whether the partying is getting a bit over-the-top. However, you’d be surprised to know how many other high school kids are having the same concerns about themselves and their friends. But even if everyone is thinking the same thing, most kids don’t want to come off looking like everyone else’s parent by saying, “hey, time to go home” or worse “let’s not go out tonight.”

Unfortunately, you don’t have any other good choices. First of all, it is difficult to tell when adolescent experimentation crosses the line into a serious problem. Your story suggests that the line has been crossed because you and your friends have gotten lost, literally and figuratively.

Second, as Jenny said, you are riding (or driving) drunk, and 35 percent of all fatal car accidents happen this way. So you have to sit down and have the talk with your friends.

I know there is a risk of losing a friendship that way. But I am not being overdramatic when I say that I also know kids who lost friends because no one was willing to set any limits. Those friends are dead.

Wes Crenshaw is board certified in Family Psychology and is director of the Family Therapy Institute Midwest in Lawrence. Jenny Kane is a senior at Free State High School. Opinions and advice given here are not meant as a substitute for psychological evaluation or therapy services.