Today’s column is about the impact of parental substance abuse upon their children. To ignite your mental engines, which you will need for today’s topic, here is a quiz about drug/alcohol problems.
A. The number of children in America who live in a home where one or both parents have a substance abuse problem.
1. 200,000
2. 1 million
3. 5 million
4. Over 20 million
B. The term coined for children who have grown up in families with alcoholic parents is:
1. ACOA — Adult children of alcoholics
2. AA — Alcoholics Anonymous
3. NA — Narcotics Anonymous
C. What is the root cause of drug/alcohol problems?
1. Lack of will power.
2. Genetic vulnerability passed down in certain families which increase the risk for addiction.
3. Pre-existing psychiatric illness, such as anxiety or depressive disorders.
4. Poor moral character and sinful behaviors.
D. Substance abusing parents are unpredictable. This unpredictability strips away family trust and security. Which of the following sayings capture the power of drugs/alcohol to cause chaos?
1. “Get drunk and be somebody.”
2. “What kind of drunk is dad today? Happy, sad, mad or glad?”
3. “First, the man takes a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes the man.”
4. All of the above.
E. The self-medication theory of drug/alcohol addiction states the following:
1. Pre-existing psychiatric illness -clinical depression, panic/anxiety, trauma -are managed by using alcohol or drugs as an attempt to reduce painful symptoms (insomnia, fear, sadness,
anger, hopelessness).
2. In most cases, the person who self-medicates with alcohol/drugs has no awareness that they possess an undiagnosed psychiatric condition.
3. Self-medication is just a part of denial, where a person with a drug problem refuses to face the fact they are an addict.
Answers: A.) 4 B.) 1 C.) 2, 3 D.) 4 E.) 1, 2
Ready for today’s story?
Raised on the strings of yo-yo parents, held captive on a never-ending roller coaster ride through the valley of fear, children in families with addiction must learn how to survive their whack-a-mole existence, where something new, bad and scary pops up, disappears and Presto! It suddenly reappears. How do children survive? Having no money, legal status, power or property, children survive by creating a mental fortress whose shields, coping skills and defense mechanisms protect them. Here is one commonly utilized childhood defense:
Lies:
Lies are arrows, shot from the mouths of children to protect them from the kaleidoscopic caldron of parental addiction.
Here is a story about protective lies.
The Case of Michelle:
“Michelle!” screamed her mother, Robin, “How many times do I have to tell you to take the dog outside so she can poo?” The dog is an old, tiny Chihuahua, purchased by Robin 10 years ago, named Taco.
Robin is a binge drinker, who, from Friday night to Sunday stays intoxicated. Michelle is a 12-year-old girl who lives with her mother. At 5 on a Friday night, Robin explodes, “Taco left you a present on my kitchen floor. Clean it up now! And bring me another beer.” Robin is priming the pump with beer, to get ready for serious whiskey drinking at the bars.
At 6 p.m. Robin leaves Michelle at home with Taco.
At 6:15 p.m. Michelle lets Taco out in the backyard.
At 6:30 pm. Taco is missing! Michelle looks everywhere. How did Taco get out of the fence?
At 7:30 p.m. Michelle calls her mother: “Mom, something horrible has happened, Taco was killed.”
Robin, drunk as a skunk, yells “What happened?”
“Mom,” Michelle’s face runs with tears, “I let Taco out in the backyard and a falcon swooped down, snatched Taco up and flew away. It was horrible!”
Robin’s alcohol fueled mind projects an image of her tiny dog seized in the talons of a black, evil falcon. “Oh, my poor Taco!” “Mom,” Michelle sobbed, “can we get another dog that looks just like Taco?”
“Yes, Michelle, we can get another dog just like Taco, just settle down.”
Now that she knows her mother bought her lie, hook, line and sinker, Michelle settles down. As Michelle grows up, she becomes a chronic, habitual liar. What does she lie about? Little things, big things, her lies upon lies have stacked up like a platter of pancakes. Worse, because she has lied to herself her whole life, she can’t trust herself.
Conclusion: Today’s article has introduced you to the parent-to-child damage done by alcoholic or drug addicted adults. What can be done to fix problems such as Michelle’s pattern of lies? Plenty!
The content of this article is for educational purposes only, and should not be used as a substitute for treatment by a professional. The characters in this story are not real. Names and details have been changed to protect confidentiality.
For more information, here is the book this article was taken from “The Complete ACOA Sourcebook: Adult Children of Alcoholics at Home, at Work and in Love,” Dr. Janet Woititz, 2002.
Dr. Richard Elghammer contributes his column each week to the Journal Review.
