When we develop an addiction to alcohol, most of us will cause damage to our relationships with the people most important to us. How do you explain the hold alcohol has on your life to your family and friends?
If you’ve been drinking too much for awhile, chances are that some of the important people in your life are angry with you or at a minimum just don’t understand why your drinking is so out of control. Sometimes we feel like the whole world is angry with us and we desperately need to explain this addiction that has taken over in the hope that our family and friends can ride it out with us or best case scenario even have a little sympathy. Most of us pile up regrets during our drinking careers and feel badly about our actions that affect the people we care about when we are under the influence.
What you will find in most cases when you try to explain the concept of addiction to a non-user is they simply will not understand it. You can explain it 15 different ways and they still won’t genuinely understand it, even if they happen to have a cigarette or food addiction for instance, themselves. And most of the individuals who tell you they understand more than likely don’t and won’t be able to truly understand the concept of the addiction to alcohol. It’s a difficult concept to grasp if you haven’t had the problem yourself.
Since many of us have attempted to explain why we do the things we do as a result of excessive drinking (and we have credibility problems to begin with) assuming the majority of the people who are close to us don’t really buy the idea that we are no longer running our lives, that alcohol has taken over, the obvious conclusion for them to draw would be that we are irresponsible to an unacceptable degree, that we must really want to drink, and/or that we are morally deficit. Unfair, but it happens frequently.
It’s natural for us to have the desire to give some sort of insight to the important people in our lives of what we are going through and why, but since it is difficult for people to grasp the concept of alcoholism and all it entails, it may be more beneficial to just focus on the basics – getting out from under the burden of this addiction and in the process restoring our lives and the relationships we value so much.
