Children of alcoholics. Part 4 – emotional life continued

In the first three articles on children of alcoholics we started showing how alcohol abuse by parents affect children’s life both physically and emotionally. There are important consequences of drinking most of the time ignored by people simply because of lack of information and proper education since early ages.

You can read these articles here:

1. Insidious damages inflicted on drinker’s family. Children of alcoholics. (part 1)
2. Insidious damages inflicted on drinker’s family. Children of alcoholics. (part 2)
3. Children of alcoholics. Part 3 – emotional life.

Today we continue with drinking consequences on children’s emotional life. The first article on emotional life showed how very young children and infants are suffering from family violence in general and how alcohol is most of the time the primary cause for such violence. A simple scene of both parents arguing is perceived by the child with much higher intensity than we can imagine and the memory of that feeling does not disappear while he grows, affecting his emotional stability.

In what follows, I will lay down an example (A clinical case) which [...Read the rest of this article at the new location of this blog. Click here...]

Children of alcoholics. Part 3 – emotional life

In the first article in this series we started discussing the consequences of parental drinking to the family members. The secondary article focused on physical stress alcohol consumption by parents causes to their children.

Now it’s time to discuss how emotions from an environment where alcohol abuse takes place affect the children of alcoholics for their entire life.

Read this new article at the new address of this blog.  Click here to go to “Children of alcoholics. Part 3 – emotional life” article.

Insidious damages inflicted on drinker’s family. Children of alcoholics. (part 2)

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In the previous article we started mentioning some of the damages and consequences an alcoholic parent inflicts to his children. Children of alcoholics are an important population who directly suffer both physically and emotionally because of their parent’s drinking.Let’s start looking at a first series of direct damages:

• Undesired children are born due to alcohol consumption. The presence of the undesired children burden their parents’ life but the consequences on the children are much more severe[...]

The article is continued here….

Insidious damages inflicted on drinker’s family. Children of alcoholics. (part 1)

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I participated to a group of Anonymous Alcoholics meeting one evening. The topic of the debate was about the troubles and the misfortunes alcohol generates to the Alcoholic himself.

That is, about the problems related to poverty, loss of job, improper qualification and limitation, the feeling of abandonment from the part of the partner or of his own children, the degradation of the person’s social relationship, and the release of his exploitation by the others; the loss of attraction, of stigmatization, fights and murders, driving and domestic accidents or of any other kin.

These have severe consequences such as: invalidity, death, loss of goods, the impossibility of succeeding in his own plans, projects or business affairs, the incapacity to manage his time with the loss of the deadlines, the incapacity to get and to use in his own benefit the outcomes and the success, the conflicts he has with the police, various civil and penal rights implications and many others.

I felt the need to intervene: yes, all these misfortunes frequently happen to the one who drinks a lot. But we are selfish if we complain only about what is happening to us.

Drinking consequences quickly overpass own persona and destroy beings and fates we would have never thought of. I am not talking here about the alcoholic’s partner, although the life spent with an alcoholic is so hard, and it could be understood only by the one who has lived such experience by himself. I neither talk here about the unhappy fate of that non alcoholic family whose parent was killed by a drunken driver on the zebra, after he had gone from the “Beer Festival” by car.

I am talking about children of alcoholics who suffer since before they are born if the mother drinks during pregnancy, who suffer when they are little and the parents fight, who develop most of the time heavy emotional and physical problems due to the fact that one or both of their parents are alcoholics. These children carry a burden all their lives directly inherited from parent’s deeds.

In the next articles we will start discussing the fate of the alcoholic’s children. We will try to list and discuss the damages the drunken persons inflict to their children without even knowing it. Before we start, what are your experiences on this topic ?

Read part two of “Insidious damages inflicted on drinker’s family. Children of alcoholics.” article here.

Alcoholism is not a shameful or guilty vice!

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One of the popular misconceptions is that alcoholism is a vice. “The others”, while looking at an alcoholic will always say or think: this is a bad person; shame on him to drink; he should quit and become a normal person.

It’s been like this for centuries. Only modern times medical research revealed that alcoholism is a disease which puts the alcoholic in the position of not being able to quit. When he started drinking more than the “average” people do on occasions, the disease was already installed and he was already unable to quit without either strongly acknowledging that he is developing a problem or by help from the others.

We notice on occasions that one of our friends takes one more beer than the others. It is a sign that he or she should learn more about alcohol immediately. It is the crucial moment in our dear friend’s life when he should be helped quitting or he will have bigger problems later. His will has began to fade already… And it is not up to him, it is up to us to bring his will back and save him!

Book: Alcoholism – amazingly simple!

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A “crash” course-type of reading on alcoholism and alcohol related problems designed to help you understand this disease and help yourself or your beloved ones. It is intended for a large range of readers – both licensed professionals and lay persons – all heavy, moderate, mild or NON- alcohol drinkers. A must-read text derived from decades of treating alcoholism by the author and from teaching alcoholism to undergraduate students. Click here for more information.

The alcoholic is not responsible for becoming an alcoholic!

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Alcohol is one of the most insidious drugs on earth. It builds the addiction without us even knowing it. Every glass of alcoholic beverage, be it a beer with the friends, or a cup of champagne at a festive occasion, modifies the nervous cells step by step, bit by bit, gradually increasing the appetite for the next glass.

From the first beer which most of the people do not like because of the taste and all the way to important daily quantities of alcohol, we cannot see the appetite increasing. And one day, when in the end we are forced to admit it, we are already ill of alcoholism, and by ourselves and without important help we are unable to stop drinking.

One thing, most campaigns against alcohol abuse fail to tell people:
It does not matter how long you have stopped from drinking. It does not matter if between two beers, for instance there have been months passing. The demand for alcohol by the nervous cells does not diminish in time!
If you take your next glass after three, or six, or twelve months, it will add to the existing appetite for alcohol. The physical demand counter does not reset like in nicotine for instance.

This is why, without proper knowledge and strong education since childhood about how alcohol really works and builds addiction, you cannot be held responsible for the fact that at some point you cannot quit. That point in time is – in most cases – too late to stop drinking without proper help.

This is why, only by developing and maintaining a strong and permanent desire to give up drinking alcohol, alongside with other medical and psychological methods – and not only by ourselves – but with help from others and from specialists, we are able to abstain and regain control over our lives.

Admitting that we might have an alcohol related problem is the first step to recovery. Because alcohol acts so undetected on us, it is good that from time to time we ask ourselves if we have not already developed addiction to it. It’s best to stay alert! Alcohol has tricked many great people into abuse, destroying many lives. Be curious and sincere to ask yourself! Try this self-administered test on alcohol addiction.

“Alcoholism begins in a group but it ends up in loneliness.”

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…it is a tragic truth we’ve seen too many times and so many times overlooked by parents when prepare their teenage children for the first party to attend.

The joyful days of youth when we started going to parties. Places and people we enjoyed and love to remember. If only at that moment someone would’ve told us that drinking and laughing together could be the start of loneliness…

We’ve all seen too many times youngsters drinking alcohol to get the courage to approach a girl or just to warm up and bring more life to the party. Can you count how many of them have become alcohol addicts ? I guess you all know some. And once they did, have the majority of people around them continued to treat them like nothing happened and stayed around them?
The loneliness part comes once the drinker starts making excesses and misbehave. The others will gradually start pushing him away, avoid inviting him to group gatherings, and eventually he or she will be completely rejected. The sad thing is that he or she will not realize that alcohol is to blame and will instead blame the others for the isolation and his problems.

Take other stories, like a drinker who once had a family, a job and work colleagues which are now all gone. Why? Because nobody told him before he started drinking that alcohol will take away all the persons around him and leave him alone.

Is alcohol a shameful guilty vice ? Can an alcoholic be held responsible for having become an alcoholic ? Is there hope ? …these are questions to be answered further in our discussion. Meantime, feel free to comment, add your own experience, examples or simply contradict what it is said above. We want to hear from you.

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Alcohol Help – dealing with drinking problems.

Welcome to AlcoholHelp.

This page tries to bring into discussion alcohol, alcoholism, drinking related problems, addiction, and most important: help directions and solutions, alcoholism treatment methods, what works and what not.

There are numerous popular beliefs about alcohol abuse and its effects. Some are true, some are just myths, and some are so obvious that we overlook them even if they are important when dealing with drinking problems.

When dealing with alcohol addiction, the medical profession is divided by various concepts, philosophical approaches, and – because we are error-prone – why not, numerous missconceptions. Different doctors will give you different explanations and different solutions.

One thing should be kept in mind: there is no final and omnipotent treatment method for alcohol addiction.

The truth is out there and has to be searched with an open mind and the best approaches come with experience in dealing day by day with alcohol related problems for many years.

Like in drugs addiction, dealing with alcohol addiction has some important characteristics to take into account when starting a treatment. We will try to outline and discuss them in this blog.

Do you think you might have a drinking problem? Try this alcoholism self-test in an attempt to find out.

Do you think you might have a drinking problem? Do you have someone dear who drinks too much ? Want to help someone quit drinking ? Are you a student willing to find out more ? Looking for alcoholism treatment methods ? …let’s talk.

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