‘I used alcohol to cope with my problems, but quitting booze made me happier, healthier and a better mum’

26 Oct ‘I used alcohol to cope with my problems, but quitting booze made me happier, healthier and a better mum’

It would get late, and Becky would try to persuade her mum to go to bed. There was a smell that lingered around her mother that Becky still remembers, the smell that seems to seep out of the pores of someone who’s had a skinful the night before. And often she had a look about her too, Becky says. From a very early age Becky knew that her mum was a drinker, even though Pat never drank in front of her and never talked about it.

«Every night I’d be in my room on my own, and I knew my mum would be next door drunk,» she explains. And almost 11 million are drinking enough to harm their health. «When you picture an alcoholic you don’t think of an ‘ordinary’ person,» says Caitlin. Seeing her mum’s struggle with alcohol made Caitlin realise that anyone can get addicted. Caitlin Croft was 12 when she first tried to talk to her mum Tracey about her alcohol problem.

Supported living

My mum is a very kind and considerate woman who is loving and hilarious, until she teaches for wine or cigarettes, or has to deal with her own mum. My Nana is a controlling narcissistic person who we hate with a passion but the person who really can’t cope with her is mum, which depresses her even more and makes her so aggressive to us. When I was younger these things drove me to suicidal thoughts and problems that school tried to help. She lost it at me when she found out I’d been speaking to outsiders. Sometimes she’ll rage and be horrible but the next day when she’s sobered up she’ll cry and drag her feet around the house like a needy child. I no longer cry at everything she screams at me and occasionally I scream back which does cause me to cry because I hate loud noises or voices.

How to help someone who has an alcoholic parent or spouse

1. I have also found that I need boundaries, something I used to be too scared to implement.
2. Sign up for our newsletter and wake up to a healthy dose of Hello Sunday Morning goodness delivered straight to your inbox every fortnight.
3. She’d throw them away without a response.
4. And then there’s the loss of a loved one from your life – if not the world.

But he was made ill by alcoholism in our house. He simply tried to be the best dad and husband he knew how to be. Maybe my father would be alive today if he had. Usually, my mom woke up the next day, all xanax replacement sweet acting, as if nothing happened. Sometimes it was easier to pretend the drunken behavior didn’t happen. Other times, I was so hurt and angry such as when she’d disappear for hours, I couldn’t even speak to her.

There are people out there who want to help and support you. There has always been an overwhelming sense of guilt surrounding my mum’s illness, that I couldn’t make her stop, that I haven’t done enough, that I am not enough. But as I get older, there is also the realisation that I can’t ‘fix’ her. As much as I want her to change, it can’t be forced. She has to want it, and then she has to really work for it for the rest of her life.

«She would give me a hug if she knew she’d done something wrong, had upset me, or something dramatic had happened the night before,» Becky says. «That was her way of acknowledging what she’d done without addressing it. It was bizarre, to be honest, it was like she was a different person.» Eventually, Pat would fall asleep or pass out.

A Washington Post article written by Sara Amato, shares her story of struggle when confronting her mum about her relationship with alcohol and the positive opportunity she got out of the experience. It’s natural to close off your heart as a form of self-protection. It’s hard to trust people (including yourself). You hold back emotionally and will only reveal so much of your true self. This limits the amount of intimacy you can have with your partner and can leave you feeling disconnected. Addicts are often unpredictable, sometimes abusive, and always checked-out emotionally (and sometimes physically).

Parents drinking in lockdown – what children say

But it wouldn’t work for everyone with alcohol dependency. She says she realised that her mum may not have known how much she was drinking. So Caitlin says she learned to confront Tracey in the mornings when she was sober, instead of talking to her while she was drunk.

The five best ways to talk to mum about her drinking

After a few years, I moved out of my apartment and back home. We all lived together in chaos again for about five years. But even after I moved out again, I still spent nearly all of my free time with Brooke and at school and sport events.

She hasn’t drunk for about 16 years now. There are plenty of alcoholics who make the colossal effort to change and choose not to drink. You have my sympathies as I know exactly how you feel.

She is not entitled to ruin your life simply because she chooses to ruin her own. It reinforces to her that she shouldn’t be held responsible for her drinking and that others (i.e. you) need to be responsible for her well-being. Nothing could be further from the truth. I will never forget when my co-worker who became a dear friend, forced me to go to lunch with her shortly after my dad died.