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<DIV><FONT size=4>Fron: <EM>LA Times</EM> 11-18-05</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><A
href="http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-chokinggame18nov18,0,1614419.story?track=tothtml">http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-chokinggame18nov18,0,1614419.story?track=tothtml</A><BR>
<H4>COLUMN ONE</H4>
<H1>Sasha Is Dead, but Why?</H1>
<H2>We give our children loving homes. We trust them and respect their space.
And we think we know them -- but their friends know better.</H2>By Sandy
Banks<BR>Times Staff Writer<BR><BR>November 18, 2005<BR><BR><I>"Mommy! …
MOMMY!"<BR><BR></I>The cry had the kind of blood-curdling edge that tells a
mother something is horribly wrong. It shook Kamelia Sepasi from the camaraderie
of friends, sent her rushing upstairs to her daughter's room.<BR><BR>There,
13-year-old Sunny stood frozen in place, staring toward the open door of her
sister's closet. "Sasha's not moving," she shouted. "Sasha isn't moving,
Mommy!"<BR><BR>Fourteen-year-old Sasha Sepasi lay slumped on the floor of her
walk-in closet, one end of a belt fastened around her neck, the other looped
over a hook on the wall. Her eyes were closed. Her cheeks were cold. Her legs,
splayed out in front of her, were mottled with blotchy bruises from pooling
blood, evidence that death had taken hold.<BR><BR>Kamelia Sepasi cannot recall
exactly what she said or did next, only that she could not believe that her
funny, fearless oldest daughter had purposely hanged herself. But what else is
there to think when you find your child with a belt around her neck, alone and
dead?<BR><BR>She broke free of friends trying to comfort her and began tearing
through her daughter's backpack, dresser drawers and desk.<BR><BR>"I knew there
must be a note," she said later, sitting on her daughter's bed in a room exactly
as Sasha left it — backpack open against the desk, eyeglasses resting on a
notebook on the nightstand, her clothes for the next day laid out on the
bed.<BR><BR>There was no note. And Sasha's parents would soon believe their
daughter's death was no suicide.<BR><BR>"The police officer, a woman, came in
and looked at her and told us, 'This looks like the choking game,' " Sepasi
recalled. "I had no idea what she was talking about."<BR><BR>By morning,
Internet searches had unearthed a thick stack of articles detailing dozens of
deaths blamed on the choking game. Self-asphyxiation, it seems, has become a
popular adolescent pastime.<BR><BR>"I was totally, totally shocked," Sepasi
said. "A game? Where children choke themselves?"<BR><BR>There's no way to know
how widespread it is. The phenomenon has been discussed on talk shows and online
forums. A chat group begun last summer by bereaved parents has more than 50
members and maintains a list of more than 70 deaths. Yet experts have been slow
to document the practice and its widespread appeal.<BR><BR>Children play the
game by compressing the carotid arteries in their necks, reducing blood flow and
oxygen to the brain. That produces a momentary loss of consciousness, preceded
by lightheadedness. When they release the pressure, a surge of pent-up blood
flows to the brain, creating a euphoric rush.<BR><BR>They do it in groups, at
parties, at sleepovers, in school locker rooms and in lavatories. But they've
added a dangerous element to a game some of their parents played as children.
Now instead of just squeezing one another, they wrap belts, ropes, ties, dog
leashes, even bicycle chains around their necks to produce the fainting
sensation.<BR><BR>This allows the game to be played alone, when one mistake — a
belt too short, a rope too tight — can doom a child.<BR><BR>"These are typically
not kids who are using drugs, but they're doing it for the same reason that kids
use substances," explains Julie Rosenbluth of the American Council for Drug
Education. "It's an opportunity to get high that doesn't have the stigma [of
drugs] attached to it."<BR><BR>The game is seen as a clean, quick, drug-free
high by teens like Sasha — children with good grades, nice homes, doting parents
and too little life experience to consider its dangerous
side.<BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>