Have you ever noticed how alcohol advertising in the UK promotes the use of alcohol as offering a good time? And yes, it cannot be denied alcohol does help us to feel less self-conscious when socialising, comparatively more confident, and dare I say sexier. However, in real life, too much alcohol in one evening can end up looking pretty ugly, and not how the adverts make drinking alcohol look for some relationships and families who are experiencing the problematic end of the wedge of alcohol drinking, which is the not-so-sexy and unsocial aspect of this problem for both the drinker and the family. The bitter, problematic end of drinking alcohol is called alcoholism. It is not a lifestyle choice. It is a result of what I believe to be stepping over the invisible line from a social drinker to a regular dependent drinker to alcoholism, a term which is gradually being phased out in favour of being known as alcohol addiction or alcohol dependence. It is defined as a category of alcohol use disorder in the medical field.
The Impact on Family Members
In a home where a family member is suffering from alcoholism, so are the other members of that family or relationship. For the person who is alcohol dependent, their priority is to drink wherever, whenever possible, not always every day but nonetheless impacting. This person may be the most loving father, mother, son, or daughter, but when the craving to drink or withdrawal symptoms take hold, the relationship or family will fall way down the list of their priorities to fulfil the need to imbibe alcohol.
To manage living with alcoholism, family members will adopt varying roles around the person who is an alcoholic, from ignoring them, being angry toward them or becoming dependent on smoothing out the tension. The atmosphere in the alcoholic environment will often feel like it is on the edge of conflict, which can be an aspect of living with an alcohol-dependent family member.
In relationships where there are incidences of partner abuse [domestic violence or abuse], the use of alcohol can trigger violence, and so can the lack of access to alcohol.
A family member or partner’s alcohol dependence can have a considerable impact on their household income, which has a further effect on being able to provide decent food, clothing, and activities for any of the children in the home. Being impoverished is not necessarily an overriding hallmark where alcoholism exists in a family, but there will be a certain sense of being denied the needs for a family or a couple to flourish.
The Impact on Children
Children whose lives are affected by alcoholism will experience their home being an unpredictable and chaotic place. They may also not be getting their emotional or material needs met because a parent’s alcoholism has taken priority over what the child requires and perhaps the money. Growing up in a home where everything is unsafe has a considerable impact on the child’s nervous system, causing stress, anxiety and depression. They may also learn to adopt behaviours and find ways of limiting conflict in the home by ensuring they are well-behaved and not adding to the problems they see around them. They may become parentified children who care for their parents and take on responsibilities that should be met by the adults, such as caring for younger siblings, feeding them, and getting them to school. Some children may take care of the home and lie on the parent’s behalf to protect them and themselves from the judgment of others. Children can often blame themselves for their parent’s shortcomings and carry the shame of living in such dysfunction. They can become pleasers and rescuers, a characteristic seen in parentified children.
The child who has learned these ways of surviving could become the adult who sees these problems continuing, inadvertently and unconsciously, into adulthood, potentially experiencing difficulties with mental health, issues with addiction or the need to control other relationships to maintain a sense of psychological and emotional safety.
When an Adolescent or Young Adult has a Problem with Alcohol
When it is an adolescent or young adult who has a problem with alcohol, parents can be left feeling powerless to act and frustrated by their inability to stop it. There is self-blame, and they feel ill-equipped to address the issue and end up accommodating the challenging behaviours of the young adult because they think this will keep them safe. Get support from organisations such as Adfam, who can provide non-judgemental help and understanding of what you are going through. They can offer ways to begin communicating and setting boundaries. The process can be slow, so patience and consistency are necessary.
The Effects of Alcohol in the Family, Community, and UK?
It is saddening to see how alcohol dependence has an impact on families, communities, and the UK as a whole. When drinking alcohol stops becoming a social lubricant and instead becomes something used to face life, then it is a problem that is having an impact on our social environment.
Above I have talked briefly about the impact of alcoholism on families and children. Its further impact is on the community; this includes the health service, the workplace, and the economy.
The Impact on the Health Service
Alcohol, for many, is no more than a treat once a week with friends to catch up on the latest news. They may drink no more than a few glasses of wine, get a takeaway, and go home and watch the remainder of something they have been watching on Netflix. No real harm, and units wise for a 175ml glass of wine is only 2.1 units. The suggested guideline is 14 units per week for both males and females if one avoids irreversible damage to their health.
In my practice, I see people who drink one bottle of wine each evening, ten units per evening, if they have not opened another bottle. For them, it is relaxing and supports stepping away from the day’s stresses. This habit in the evening did not start with a whole bottle; over time, it went from a glass to half a bottle, to the entire bottle maybe over six months to a year, depending on what had motivated this drinking pattern in the first place. Because alcohol provides an escape, it helps to reduce stress momentarily, be a social lubricant and glue, and, for some, help them to sleep; it can be difficult to stop the habit, though not impossible.
The impact for many drinking this amount of alcohol may be feeling badly dehydrated and having a banging headache until lunchtime. While this may be regarded as simply the cost of too much to drink, the impact of alcohol can have far more enduring effects said to be linked to over 200 health conditions, which include heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and seven types of cancer ( Journal of Public Health (Oxf) 2018). One in ten visits due to alcohol-related illness are made to accident and emergency each year. Alongside this, the treatment of injuries from violence and anti-social behaviour is more than 1.2 million incidents a year (NHS, 2022).
Days Lost to Alcohol-Related Sickness
As mentioned above, you have a feeling of a heavy head, dehydration, and just being unable to eat to stave off that yuk feeling. This is the inimitable hangover. Too many of these lead to too many days off from work. Seventeen million days are lost due to those enduring headaches and other alcohol-related illnesses. It costs 7 billion pounds to the economy (Alcohol Awareness Week 2023, Directors of Public Health). That loss of income in the economy is only seen when it affects the home budget. Some of those days lost working are jobs lost, significantly impacting relationships and self-esteem.
Alcohol and its Effect on Relationships
The hangovers, lost income, the possible loss of employment, and persistent ill health will all affect relationships. It is here where the real impact of alcohol, when it has become problematic, will be seen first and denied. I know from my work with clients it takes a lot to admit that their alcohol drinking has now become a problem. Because of the role alcohol is assigned in a person’s life, which is to alleviate all issues at that moment and create fun, it can be difficult to imagine life without it. It can have a compelling hold on a person, which should not be underestimated so much so that the love of a partner or family member can pushed down the list of priorities in favour of what alcohol provides.
Some people describe their alcoholic partner as a Mr Hyde type person because their personality can become highly opposite to the person they know without alcohol. Living with someone who changes in this way can have an immense toll on their mental well-being, causing stress, anxiety, depression, and distrust in the relationship. Either because the partner who has the alcohol problem has promised to stop or they are the cause of another disaster, and the shame is now becoming too overwhelming.
In sum, I have said at the outset that alcohol is seen as a benefit to the social scene. A glass of wine can help remove the feeling of self-consciousness for the person who is not too confident at parties or get togethers. However, there are those whose drinking impacts all areas of life: communities, family homes, relationships, health services, employment, mental health and our economy. The losses in all these areas can be great, but the most significant toll is seen in the family.
Alcoholism affects families by stealing everyone’s safety and peace of mind. It can affect the family’s ability to relate to one another authentically because they will adopt behaviours to manage the chaos of the alcoholic. All the members of a family or the partners in a couple will be guided by an instinctive need to survive this secret battle happening in their home.
If your life has been or is being affected by the alcohol dependence of someone you love, I provide a supportive and understanding space to help you explore the impact on you and ways of regaining your life. You have been through a lot. The energy of alcoholism is a pervasive one. Leaving you distrustful as you may have spent sometime believing you can change it or manage it so as not to be faced with the shame and judgment of others.
I want you to know that you did not create the alcoholism or cause it, nor can you change it, but you can begin to transform the situation by starting with yourself.
If you feel ready to talk about how alcoholism has affected your life, you can drop a request through the contact form on this website or email directly to
I wish you great health and happiness in your quest for wholeness.
Best Wishes,
Susan
