Renee Potter is one of them. She started smoking when she was 8 years old.

"For a while I kind of smoked cigarettes to run away from my problems," Potter said.

Her dependency quickly led to other addictions -- alcohol, pot, methamphetamine and cocaine.

"There's some people that can actually do that -- just experiment once in their whole life and never do drugs again," Potter said, "but it wasn't like that for me. I started and couldn't stop."

According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, Potter is not alone. She's among the millions of girls who suffer from what used to be thought of as a male problem -- drug abuse and addiction.

"We used to believe that boys were more likely to use than girls -- and that there were more boys out there using than girls," explains licensed professional counselor Heather Hayes. "And what this study has shown is that the numbers are the same now."

In fact, according to the new study, women are more affected by addictive substances than men.

"Some of the findings have found that every time a man has a drink and a women has the same amount, it's almost double (the) impact for her -- because of body fat, because she doesn't hold as much water," explained Hayes.

Experts say physical, along with hormonal and emotional stress especially during adolescence, can lead girls into a cycle of drug addiction.

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