LONDONDERRY, N.H. (AP) – The last thing 14-year-old Destiny Foose remembers about last Friday – the day she almost died at school from alcohol poisoning – was chugging what remained of a bottle of Seagram’s 7 whiskey.

“I remember saying, I think I’m a little buzzed,” she said. “But I was trashed out of my mind. It tasted like water to me because I was so drunk.”

Her next memory was waking up that night in a Boston hospital room.

“I woke up with a big pipe down my throat, trying to breathe, but I couldn’t,” she said. “I tried to pull it out, but I couldn’t because my arms were numb and tied to the bed. It was scary having a big breathing tube down my throat, but when they took it out, it was worse.”

The Londonderry High School freshman spoke via telephone Tuesday from her hospital bed at Boston Medical Center, where she was taken Friday after school officials found her near death in the woods behind the gymnasium.

Destiny had nearly succumbed to alcohol poisoning, saved by the cold snow bank where her friends had left her and the assistant principal, Art Psaledas, who carried her over his shoulder from the woods. Her mother, Lisa Foose, said the cold slowed the absorption of the alcohol, sparing her life. Destiny’s blood alcohol content was .387, according to her mother.

The freshman said she did not think she had a problem with drugs or alcohol. But she hopes her friends and peers realize Friday’s incident was not a game it was life or death.

“I want people to learn from my experiences,” she said. “I feel like I can do anything and nothing will ever happen to me, and I just need to wake up and realize I was pretty close to dying.”

When she and her friends arrived at school Friday morning, they went directly to the walking trails behind the gymnasium, a place she said they met often to smoke marijuana before school. It was a coincidence that several of them had brought alcohol that morning, she said.

A few of the students returned to school while Destiny and a female friend decided to stay and finish the alcohol, she said.

When she became ill, the other student with her tried to use her cell phone to contact a friend for help, but left Destiny and returned to the building when she could not reach anyone. She told another student, who reported the incident to a teacher, who then notified Psaledas.

When Psaledas found Destiny shortly before 9 a.m., she was near death.

“They said its a miracle that I’m alive today,” she said.

The high school freshman has only attended the school since September, but in her time there said she has witnessed dozens of students trek behind the gymnasium before, during, and after school, to use illicit drugs and drink alcohol.

“If you were to go out there one morning, I’m sure someone would be out there smoking a joint or blowing lines,” she said.

But high school officials maintain the area is monitored often by school resource officers.

Drinking and drug use during school hours among students is rare, Principal Jim Elefante said. Students who do participate in those activities are appropriately disciplined, and represent a minority of Londonderry High School students.

The students who were with Destiny last Friday were suspended for 10 days and may face further disciplinary action.

“We have kids that are involved (in drugs), we know who they are, and we deal with them,” Elefante said. “I am not naive enough to think that kids don’t get themselves involved in drugs. Londonderry is not any different than any other community.”

High school administrators disciplined 17 students last year for drug- or alcohol-related offenses, including possession, sale, and use of prohibited substances, according to school records. During the first quarter of this school year, they dealt with five related incidents a small number for a school of 1,800 students, Elefante said.

“Yes, there are a minority of students that would be involved in something like this,” Elefante said. “But I think that discredits the wonderful, overwhelming majority of our students that follow the rules, live healthy lifestyles, that come to school to learn and have fun, and don’t use alcohol or drugs in school.”

For the minority of students who may participate in such activities, however, Destiny said drugs and alcohol are easy to find in Londonderry. At 14, she said has already tried marijuana, Ecstasy, cocaine, peyote and mushrooms.

Destiny was transferred to a New Hampshire rehabilitation center Tuesday afternoon, but said she does not know how long she will have to spend there.

Her father, Shannon Foose, said the family is trying to file a CHINS petition Child In Need of Services petition to help keep his daughter under control. Foose and his wife, Lisa, said they are unsure this most recent incident has taught their daughter a lesson.

She has always been open with her parents, but her promises to clean up and devote more time to school have been empty thus far, Shannon Foose said.

“My concern I think mostly is, Where are we going to go from here?” he asked Tuesday night. “I don’t have resources enough to put her into a long-term program, if the need be.”

Destiny admitted the true test will come when she returns to school.

“Nobody puts the bottle to your mouth you do it,” she said. “But it’s going to be hard going back and still being friends with (the same crowd), and I think I’m probably going to have to take some space from them for a little while and just understand that it’s not a game anymore. It’s life.”