Bragging rights are at stake every Friday night under the lights in Texas high school football. But the game is being rocked hard by a 40-year-old suburban mom, who last fall found steroids in her son's closet.
"I drove up to the school, told him to get home and asked him, 'What would ever make you think to inject this into your body?' And he said, 'I need to bulk up,'" says Lori Lewis.
Her son said he wasn't alone. He claimed other players on the Colleyville Heritage team were doping.
"He goes, 'Mom, the pressures we get from the coaches. The pressures we get from our peers! To get that starting position on varsity, you got to be big!'" recalls Lewis.
Lewis called the school and blew the whistle, but she says officials denied any problem. And when she went public, "It was extremely hurtful, because I knew the information I gave the school was legitimate," says Lewis.
It would take three months of pressure, but finally nine athletes admitted taking muscle-building drugs.
"It really opened our eyes and [we] started looking into it even further to see if there were any other students involved and the impact," says Robin McClure, spokesman for the
Grapevine-Colleyville Independent School District.
Lewis' anti-steroid campaign is having an impact. Despite the cost of steroid tests — about $150 each — this month, Lewis' district will consider random testing of athletes.
In Colleyville, at a town hall meeting on steroids, denial is giving way to action.
"I've heard from many parents thanking us for helping to bring this issue to the forefront," says Coleyville Heritage principal Robin Ryan.
That's what Lewis wants, but at a price. Her son was threatened and had to transfer to another school. Meanwhile, neighbors stopped talking to her.
"I'm not in this for a popularity contest, at all," she says. "Even if it saves one child's life, it's worth it."
She's just a tough Texas mom, challenging the biggest game in the state to take a hard look at the cost of winning.
