Cohutta, GA“When I found out about the link between Monster Energy Drink and heart issues, I felt terrible, like I was a bad parent,” says Elizabeth. “I think that monster caffeine levels are to blame for my daughter’s chest pains and I let my kids drink it.”
Elizabeth tries not to let her kids drink Monster anymore, but she still buys the beverage - she admits to being addicted.
“I started buying Monster drinks for myself and my husband about a year ago,” she says. “We consumed one can only now and again, then we got into the habit of drinking one each on the way to work (we both work night shift and car pool: my husband works at amazon.com as a picker and I am a private duty nurse) to give us a little boost of energy. I guess you could say that we ended up getting really addicted - we went through at least two cases every week, so we were drinking at least a few cans each per day and we often stopped at a gas station to and from work for more.”
Elizabeth’s kids - two daughters aged 10 and 14, and her son aged 12 - started to drink Monster before she did and before she realized how dangerous Monster drink contents are.
“My eldest daughter started to complain of chest pains about six months ago,” Elizabeth adds. “I mentioned it to my friend and she said I had better ban all those energy drinks. Right away I looked online - ohmigod, I couldn’t believe it. I might as well have given my kids a beer or a cigarette!”
Elizabeth still buys the beverage, even though she is aware of Monster Energy Drink Hospitalizations. Elizabeth, a smoker, is so addicted to Monster she says that there have been times when she didn’t have enough money to buy both cigarettes and Monsters so she chose a can of Monster over a pack of smokes.
And even though her kids aren’t allowed to drink any energy drinks, she says they do so anyway. She will have one in the fridge and it will disappear - it’s like kids getting into their parents’ liquor cabinet.
“I know my daughter stopped drinking them because her chest pains stopped; I think that scared her into quitting,” Elizabeth says. “I looked at the Monster Energy Drinks website and there were no warnings directed at kids. I did read how you can send in tabs off the cans for merchandise and that’s what attracted me at first: their marketing blast for t-shirts and stickers got me sucked in. And I guess that’s what gets kids sucked in too.
“My son Benjamin said that kids in grades 2 and 3 are on the school bus drinking Monster and other energy drinks in the morning. Elementary, middle and high school kids share the same bus, and high school kids give them to younger kids.
“I like energy drinks like Monster because it makes me really hyper and I like that feeling,” says Benjamin, age 12. “The other day my mom bought a can with a new flavor and she didn’t like it so I asked her if I could finish it. She made me throw it out.
“Sometimes I get a chest pain after I drink a whole can or when I get really hyper. We aren’t allowed any soda drinks at school - we are only supposed to drink water - but kids will sneak Monster drinks into the classroom. Some kids think it is cool to drink them. I didn’t know they were dangerous and I am really surprised that they can harm people.”
Neither Elizabeth nor her kids knew about any deaths related to energy drinks. They do now. Another Monster Energy lawsuit was filed June 25, 2013, by the same team of attorneys that filed a lawsuit on behalf of the family of Anais Fournier, the 14-year-old girl who died after consuming Monster Energy Drinks in December 2011.
This latest wrongful death lawsuit was brought by a mother after her 19-year-old son, Alex Morris, passed away in July 2012, “following his ingestion of a toxic amount of caffeine and other stimulants through his consumption of at least two 16-oz. cans of “MONSTER ENERGY” drinks in the 24 hours before and per day for three years prior to his death.”
Elizabeth says she is going to be more diligent and not bring Monster drinks into the house. Meanwhile, she is pursuing a Monster Energy Drink Injury claim.
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