A question you may be asking yourself is, ‘is my parent an alcoholic? Can they or will they stop?’ I want to start at the basics here, because maybe you’re not sure. It can be hard to determine, and while I think it’s important to have that distinguished for yourself, the title alcoholic or addict may not matter much. In my situation, even though I would consider my parent an alcoholic, they have never admitted that to themselves or anyone else as far as I know. I do think it’s important for you to decide if you think they have a problem for your own sake and calling it what it is instead of questioning it.
There are varying degrees to which someone can drink or use drugs, such as socially, when they are at parties or dinner. Binge drinking could mean they may not drink everyday, but when they do they have many drinks quickly to get drunk fast. It becomes an issue when the drinking is uncontrollable and the person is preoccupied with alcohol or drugs. Alcoholism is now known as alcohol use disorder and again it may be hard to gauge what level it is on. Symptoms include a strong urge to use alcohol, having issues controlling how much they drink, and could have withdrawals when decreasing the usage.
In my household, it wasn’t until I was a teenager that I started using the term alcoholic to describe my parent because it really wasn’t a term used in my household, and also my parent did not let alcohol affect work. They always went to work, but as soon as they came home they had a hard drink or two along with beer for the rest of the night. I can’t remember a time that they did not have a drink at night, unless it was during a time where an ultimatum was given, and even then I don’t remember it lasting very long. So in my case my parent would drink every day after work and more on the weekends. If that is the case in your household, then they may be an alcoholic, on a functioning level.
There are others who can’t even work due to that addiction, and there are others who may binge drink only on the weekends. There are so many different ranges and if you search online there are quizzes you can take to help identify if it is an issue in your house. In my house it was rarely talked about openly or discussed with me as a kid, so it was confusing; ‘Is this how it is for everyone?’ ‘Why do they act like that when they drink?’ ‘Why do they feel the need to drink?’ ‘Is it my fault?’ SO many questions that I wanted answers to. There are so many aspects to this and I will be diving in to as many as possible to help get through this time.
Please comment any feedback or questions you have for me,
Until next time.
Bloom