Any family members of alcoholics/drug abusers?

Its hard - my mum did the exact same thing for a number of years after my father died.

Basically tried to commit prolonged suicide through alcohol.

Its hard because you can't really help someone who doesn't want to be helped.

Just try reminding your dad that he's still that - a dad - and his kids really really need him. Remind him of what he has to live for rather than what he's living without

Because when you lost your mum, Im guessing it feels like you lost your dad as well.

Either way tho mate - I wouldnt wish what I went through on anyone so be as strong as you can and try and make your dad understand how much he's hurting the people who love him most by doing what hes doing.

RD

my brother refused to go to rehab, but the courts (due to some alcohol-related incidents obviously) made him or else he'd never drive again. he's been sober for 6 months now. alcoholics don't usually trust their families, sometimes it takes an outside force to straighten things out. it's sad to think, but sometimes it's the way it is.

unfortunately I've never met my mother's father because of his attachment to the bottle. he died when she was in high school. so do whatever it takes to help your father. a week's worth of drunken hostility cannot measure up to a sober future.

Unfortunately, until your Dad is ready to seek help, or until the law steps in and makes some sort of rehab a part of a sentencing guideline, there's not a whole lot you can do to make him address his drinking problem, and that sucks. I feel for you, 'Bacchus, I went through something similar with my ex-husband, (his drug of choice was meth as opposed to alcohol, and it's taken several stints in prison to get him to a point where he was ready to face his addiction)

My advice to you is to seek out an Al-Anon group in your area. It's a support group designed to help the family members of a practicing alcoholic. Even if you don't buy into the whole "12 step" thing, or are not comfortable with the spiritual aspect of the group, sometimes it can be a blessing just to talk to others who are going through the same things that you are facing.

Other than that, there's not much you can do, except keep trying to get through to him that you all love and support him, even in the face of his hostility. Good luck, man.

I come from a long long line of alcoholic mental defectives. Nearly all my family really. My mother is recovered, my father is still hitting the bottle pretty hard. He recently beat his little dog so bad he broke her back. Both my parents have been on Prozac and they are both prone to complete nervous breakdowns where they can no longer function, they've both quit their jobs for long intervals because they couldn't deal anymore. Thank gods they don't live together. They have done some pretty fucked up things but I guess this is what makes life interesting.

I guess I'm trying to say I can sympathize, I'm not sure what kind of advice I could give you, I haven't found any way to make things better, I usually just deal by avoiding them as much as possible. I suppose you should just try to be there for him as much as you can, and listen if he feels he can talk about it. Just don't try to force him to change, since that will make him fight you harder, and try not to get so involved you get hurt. A bit of detachment is generally a good thing.

Half my family is alkies or drug addicts. They will only quit when they want too and the last thing they want is family intervention. Not sure what my point is, but I'd let him live his life, worrying about him isn't what he wants I'm sure, if he wants to quit later on he'll ask for it, all you can do is wait. It's hard but that's life.

Yeah, my dad's side are all drunks - especially my grandmother - and my mom's side is all insane AND alcoholics. My mom won't admit to having a problem but she starts drinking very early and MUST drink with every meal or she's insufferable - constantly talking about how she needs a drink, in a horrible mood, belligerent, etc.

My dad had 3 DUIs before he died. He drank large amounts of primarily scotch,. When him and my mom got married (he eventually had a grand total of 5 wives) he was a successful high-up in the early days of Federal Express. By the time I was grown he basically jobless and homeless, depending on the kindness of friends he had made when he was cool. He fell off his pier one night and hit his head on some concrete pillars that lay on the shore and was knocked unconscious and then drowned. He was totally alone. It makes me so sad.

I don't really drink - I mean, maybe once a week, but in moderation and I hardly ever get totally plastered. I don't really ever have a yen to drink...I think it skips a generation. My boyfriend has an entire alcoholic family. He doesn't drink either. My mom (stupidly) encourages me to drink MORE.

But my dad would NEVER have admitted he had a problem. He had to go to AA as well after his DUIs, but it never lasted or anything. He would just come home afterward and drink. It was really bad. And if you did try to talk to him about it he would just get really mean.

Thankfully nobody on my side of my family hits the alcohol that hard. My fiance's grandma lost her husband a year ago and my fiance says that she drinks pretty hard sometimes. This woman is in her 60's so we kind of joke about it, but she lives alone out in the country and it's becoming a little concerning.

I don't go to Al-Anon regularly, and I have a hard time relating to other children of alcoholics. Partly because not seeking help is part of my own pathology, and partly because my mother is what the clinicians call a "high-functioning alcoholic", and I can't usually relate to the common base of experience. My mother was a loving and omnipresent parent and a cheerful hostess, and I spent my childhood as deep in the dark as anyone else who knew her. I'd see her drink, but that was, to my mind, part of the normal set of adult behavior. I mean, isn't it?

It was only after my brother and I moved in with her in the wake of her divorce from my father (which was, according to all parties, almost completely based on his own issues as a pathological liar, which deserves a whole 'nother post) that we began to grasp the truth, finding bottles of vodka under the towels in the bathroom cabinet or tumblers of "ginger ale" that warranted a stress on the first syllable. This was worrying, and she would mention her parents' alcoholism in passing, which my brother and I made due note of but filed away. We would occasionally talk about it with her brother, but at root, nothing seemed to be wrong.

Based on what I've gathered from comparing notes with my uncle, her drinking would wax and wane based on stress in her life, but it finally became unignorable for us on a night in 1997 when I was home from college and she had a seizure in front of me. Too frantic to remember which way to turn a sufferer's head to keep the tongue from clogging the throat, I jammed my fingers into her mouth to clear her airway, and she stutter-chewed them until they bled. Luckily, my brother called 911 and the ambo got to the house just in time to see her come to. She seized twice more in the hospital until it was learned that she'd been seizing due to a dehydration-based potassium deficiency, which had its roots in guess what.

She spent the next year zoned out on Dilantin, and resumed drinking in secret at some point after that. I was out of the house by that point, and took her word that everything was fine. If she couldn't handle it herself (or with the help of her second husband, a reformed oiler himself), I feebly reasoned, what help could I provide?

Unhappily, I was proven right eight months ago, when I went to see her in the hospital and saw her in bed, with her limbs too swollen to move and her skin an orange-yellow color. Stepdada had resumed drinking after losing his job, and given that he was putting away a box of wine every two days, he didn't happen to notice that she was in the early stages of cirrhosis until it became unavoidably obvious. I bear him no ill will, because he managed to cowboy up after that, and took responsibility for her care. She's out of the hospital now, and at least this time, the conventional wisdom was true, and now that she's scared, she's sworn to me that she won't drink again. I check up on that as frequently as I can, and I believe her, even if only because she's suffciently fucked up by her other medications that there would be no pleasure in drinking.

I don't know if I have any first-hand information that would be helpful to you and your dad, ChewBacchus, but what I would suggest is that you spend a lot of time talking to your dad about how you feel about your mom's death. It sounds like that's the elephant in the room, and if you talk about your mom, her death, and how it didn't give you an excuse to put your life in neutral, it may break the cycle of "nobody understands me, I'm all alone, fuckit, it doesn't matter" that is running in his head. Alcoholics are not curable, but the outlook that makes them able to justify their drinking to themselves can be changed, and through that can come lasting changes in behavior. I hope you will update us if you feel like it. Good luck.

Wow - are there that many alcoholics out there or is it something to do with film fans??

Seriously though Bacchas - good fucking luck mate.

RD

There are reasons why people spend whole lifetimes avoiding reality.

You mean, like spending dispreportionate amounts of time on internet messageboards?

Hmmm...

As an observation on what I see a lot of people have to say about their lives here I would say yes. I mean Jesus how desperate do you have to be to internationally advertise the terrible details your personal life.

And yes I am aware of the irony.

and like that, like a puff of electronic smoke, he was gone....

help

ChewBacchus:

While I do not have an immediate family member who has dealt with the disease of addiction, I used to work with a place called Metro Atlanta Recovery Residences
(MARR). I know the CEO there quite well. His name is Doug Brush and you can reference me should you decide to contact him.

Dealing with the disease is not something that you or your father can do alone, otherwise nobody would ever need treatment. That you have even put the call for help out there is admirable. I hope that your father can get treatment before that option passes.

My best wishes to your family.

Jason Brennan

Yes. Honestly and truthfully: my heart goes out to you -- to all you all.

I'm glad you don't have to live with him, though you will always be affected in some way, because someone you love is a practicing alchoholic. Good for you for trying to help. There is absolutely no guaranteed method for you to get him to quit, as you seem to know, thankfully.

For some people, alchohol is like heroin. My ex-husband, whom I am divorced from since December 03 after nine years of marriage, is one of those people.

My only advice is that you can't help him until he hits rock bottom. Be ready to catch him when that happens. He will need you the most then.

My sister is a recovering narcotics abuser.