TOMORROW'S ALCOHOLICS
Ellinwood, Martha
Tomorrow's Alcoholics By MARTHA ELLINWOOD YOU an alcoholic? I don't believe it. Aren't you over-dramatizing yourself a little bit?" This sentiment, phrased a dozen ways, is one I have met many...
...The alcoholic must learn to live in our complex world without seeking escape from its complexities by dulling his perceptions...
...Save the list and answer the questions again in six months...
...Most people have a false and preconceived idea of what the alcoholic is and what he looks like...
...The knowledge frightened me, for even then I was aware that if I took one drink more would follow, and again the day would come to its same befogged end and the next would start with the inevitable headache and overwhelming lethargy...
...Try to find out why you answered the questions as you did, for you may be a potential alcoholic...
...It seemed reasonable to believe that, having been diagnosed, alcoholism could be arrested and treated more easily in the early stages of development, and that the sooner I started the better...
...Eventually he sought help, but even then I refused to acknowledge that I, too, had a similar problem...
...As I look back on my own life it seems to me that such admonitions are even more harmful to the potential alcoholic than to the confirmed and chronic dipsomaniac...
...It lives on both sides of the railroad track...
...The disease knows no barriers of race, religion, nationality origin, sex, or economic and social position...
...If you have more "Yes" checks than before it may be a progressive symptom of alcoholism...
...Keith Ellin-wood, her husband, is a staff member of the American Friends Service Committee...
...As an industrial social worker accustomed to working with others' problems, I could not acknowledge inability to run my own life efficiently...
...3—Am I usually the one who suggests a drink...
...In the last analysis, the decision is one which he has to make because he, himself, is convinced it is the only thing to do...
...EUinwood studied at Dennison University, Ohio Northern, and the University of Pittsburgh...
...I know now that it is not necessary to wait until middle age to know one's alcoholic potentialities...
...Usually it is based on the reeling, fumbling, sometimes funny or fighting, and always degraded drunk of fiction and movies...
...Although he may realize that something is wrong with his drinking, being able to do it is important to him, and the thought of a completely arid life is intolerable...
...But there are others who, given the knowledge to do so, will recognize the tell-tale symptoms early enough to help themselves...
...7—Does my drinking cause any hardship, unhappi-ness, or embarrassment to others...
...8—Does my disposition undergo marked change when I drink...
...I knew it was only a question of time, five or six years at most, before I reached the same desperate situation in which he had been...
...But, first, he must be entirely convinced that he is an alcoholic...
...But two alcoholics have a bond of sympathetic understanding...
...This cannot be done in all families...
...In this country six out of very 100 users of alcoholic beverages become alcoholics...
...No longer need I pretend to be something I am not...
...I knew some of the danger signals, a little about what makes alcoholics as they are, and something about the process of rehabilitation...
...The 100,000 members of Alcoholics Anonymous, alone, are spectacular testimony to this fact...
...It was possible to discuss alcoholism "in the abstract" without reference to myself...
...I felt that if Keith could recover after losing so much it must be possible for me...
...And it is used by him in the same way morphine is used by its victims, to deaden or dull the perceptions so as to make reality less real and to make pain, mental or physical, more bearable...
...Alcoholism is a disease...
...Most alcoholics are not so fortunate...
...But there was a compulsive force which seemed to make me continue...
...There were several reasons lor my delay...
...That problem drinkers can recover and they are worth helping has been proven by those who have found their way to health and happiness with the help of some of the rehabilitative methods developed in recent years...
...It took me another two years...
...He tries endless experiments, drinking only rye, or beer, or mixed drinks, or eating ice cream or fish before drinking...
...I think the answer is obvious to anyone interested in public health, public costs, and the welfare of others...
...For him alcohol has become a narcotic as deadly and vicious in its effect as is morphine to the drug addict...
...An alcoholic, if honest about it, would answer "Yes" to most of the questions...
...I had had no trouble with the police...
...But I discovered that no matter how urgently the occasion required sobriety I could not get through a full day without drinking...
...Its cost to society is great...
...We alcoholics know good excuses are a dime a basket...
...It even tasted unpleasant...
...There may always be some who will have to go through the entire progression of the disease...
...But they must have sufficient knowledge to recognize their potentialities...
...Study the following questions carefully and check your answers: Yes No 1—Am I more at ease and a better conversation...
...Many doctors regard it as an allergy...
...I knew he was working, was not drinking, and was preparing a home so that I could join him...
...What they do not realize is that all during the long descent to "Skid Row," long before he becomes a horrible example, he is an alcoholic...
...But—if you are a member of the average family of four the likelihood that neither you, your husband or wife, nor your children will develop alcoholism is reduced to 231/2...
...Besides, it still was fun to drink—sometimes—even though before each party I was filled with apprehension and dread of what might follow...
...As alcoholism becomes more acute so do the troubles, and the more advanced stages often bring loss of jobs, broken homes, bankruptcy, serious illness, difficulties with the police, institutional confinement or even death, frequently by suicide...
...There are many who, like myself, can recover before others are aware that they are alcoholics...
...However, it does distrub me that people who had known me well did not see that my drinking differed from theirs and was for a different reason...
...The trouble usually falls in one or all of three categories, social, economic, or health...
...If your answer is "Yes" to more than one don't try to find excuses for it...
...10—Do I drink more often than I used to...
...We discussed alcoholism and did considerable reading about it...
...However, I was fortunate...
...Once it is crossed he can never again become a normal drinker...
...Penologists estimate variously that from 35 to 70% of the inmates of state prisons are there either because they are alcoholics or because of acts against society committed while under the influence of drink...
...4—Do I spend more than I can afford on drinking...
...Having once developed a social dependence on alcohol, I continued to rely on it with increasing frequency as I grew older...
...alist when I drink...
...11—Do I drink in greater quantity than I used to...
...And should all this not be enough, remember—you may help to save a life, possibly your own...
...But why should you be concerned...
...He left home for several months...
...He lee-tures before schools, medical societies, and service clubs on the cause and treatment of alcoholism, and works with a group of alcoholics in one of the large New York prisons...
...I was greedy and did not want to lose those years...
...My husband's drinking was obviously abnormal, and I had blamed my own excesses on worry about him...
...I first realized there was something wrong with my drinking at the age of 34...
...While Keith was working out his own rehabilitation I drank only periodically...
...The case histories I read and heard discussed were of men and women whose condition was more advanced than mine...
...It takes intelligence and courage, but there are definite signposts along the way if one will watch for them...
...6—Do I enjoy recreation which includes drinking more than that which does not...
...I did not want to drink...
...I am only happy that I was able to recognize the symptomatic pattern of my drinking as early as I did and thus avoid years of increasing un-happiness, frustration, and mental anguish...
...Continued admonitions only develop in him a deeper sense of frustration and confusion and a stronger defensive attitude...
...It does no good, in my opinion, and it may do harm to tell an alcoholic that he cannot drink...
...9—Do I ever feel guilty about drinking...
...I had lost no jobs and never drank during working^hours...
...That is, convinced that he was an alcoholic, and after a period of education, study, and application, he learned to prefer not to drink...
...Simply defined, an alcoholic is an escape drinker who cannot drink without getting into trouble...
...MARTHA ELLINWOOD, a former school teacher and industrial social worker in Ohio and Pennsylvania, lives with her husband in upstate New York, where they are active in community affairs...
...Instead, start watching your drinking habits...
...It worked, and life has been increasingly good since that time...
...Their difficulties were so much more serious than any I had encountered that I could not identify myself with them...
...His addiction was much more acute and of considerably longer standing than mine...
...After rejoining my husband, the following two and a half years were miserable for both of us...
...He did not criticize...
...In the early stages, although he may realize that his drinking pattern differs from that of his friends, unfortunately the alcoholic lives in the hope that the next time will be different...
...But if you need to develop your interest on a more personal basis, let me put it this way: You figure that you are not an alcoholic and never will become one...
...His cure, like that for the diabetic, does not remove the disease, but arrests its progress and prevents likelihood of relapse as long as prescribed rules for healthful living are followed...
...The end result is the same, and before he realizes it he has become literally dependent on alcohol and apparently is more normal when he drinks than when he does not...
...But there came a time when I no longer could do so...
...Keith recovered...
...Too often the moral aspects of drinking, magnified by misconceptions resulting from ignorance and personal hurt, color the conversation so that the subject becomes one to avoid in the interest of domestic harmony...
...Although I drank with Keith, worry about him and the need for self-preservation forced me to exercise some self-control...
...Unfortunately science has discovered no innoculant which can prevent a man from crossing the invisible borderline between social drinking and compulsive drinking...
...Conservatively estimated, in wage and production loss, jail and hospital care, welfare costs and preventable accidents caused by drunkenness, alcoholism costs the American taxpayer more than one billion dollars annually...
...2—At parties do I spend most of my time near the source of supply...
...The only cure for the alcoholic is rehabilitation...
...In the early stages it may show itself in absence from work, decreased interest in the job, occasional unwarranted domestic tiffs, impatient creditors, chronic tiredness, or increased susceptibility to minor ailments...
...Neither do they realize that before he reaches the bottom step, perhaps even before he starts going down the steep decline, he sometimes can be helped...
...That friends question my judgment and sincerity causes me no personal concern, for the fact that I am an alcoholic is one of which I am neither ashamed nor proud...
...And second, he must believe that drinking will not help solve his problems but will only make them increasingly difficult...
...I have even been accused of professing alcoholism to help my husband who, also, is a self-admitted alcoholic...
...Eventually I realized that, although I had not yet reached the same stage of acute alcoholism, my pattern of drinking was no different from what Keith's had been a few years earlier...
...and although you use alcoholic beverages to some degree, there is a 94% chance that you never will become a problem...
...By informing yourself on the problem, learning what your public library has to offer, what your doctor knows about it, what hospital and treatment facilities are available, how alcoholics are handled by your police and courts, and how the subject is taught in your schools, and then by working for increased awareness and improved methods of treatment, you will be able to contribute much toward checking America's most rapidly growing public health problem...
...And when you consider all the other intimate relationships in life, the chance that you will not have close personal association with alcoholics is small...
...12—Do I ever feel as though I need, really need, a drink...
...This sentiment, phrased a dozen ways, is one I have met many times in the past few years...
...Consequently I acquired some education on the subject...
...The latter is approaching the time when, in desperation, he may seek some way out of his dilemma...
...In addition, he must adjust his habits of living and thinking so that he will not feel the need of such an escape...
...During the time I continued to drink Keith displayed remarkable patience...
...At last I feel I am no longer a psychological adolescent, but am beginning to develop a reasonable amount of maturity which is more than a superficial pose...
...In my own case I started drinking to relieve shyness and self-consciousness...
...Altogether, it was almost five years from my first serious fright before I recognized that I, too, was an alcoholic...
...5—Is my ability or attention to work during regular working hours affected by my drinking...
...The potential, being younger, still has some of his youthful physical resiliency, and his affairs have not yet reached an intolerable condition...
...In that case it is high time to look for the cause of your drinking, for it is not the drinking that is your trouble, it is the things which make you drink...
Vol. 14 • September 1950 • No. 9
