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In the 2010 census there were 234 million people over the age of 18 in the US. According to Scientific American, "nearly 17 percent of adults in the U.S. reported filling at least one prescription for a psychiatric drug in 2013", that is nearly 40 million people. Are they all drug addicts? Maybe so, but then we have to change our perception of drug addiction, because I'm guessing most of these people lead productive lives and you wouldn't know they took those drugs unless they told you.
Well, logically, suppose he never drank and he still spent all that time tinkering with cars because that is what he enjoyed doing in his spare time. Would that be any different? Suppose his liver was in great shape but he died of a heart attack. Would that be any different?
My father was also a WWII combat vet and although he rarely drank I can't remember spending any time with him until my parents separated and he would have me on weekends. Those weekends were memorable. He taught me to swim. He took me to the planetarium and parks. We drove upstate and went swimming and picnicing by the lake. We hung out in his apartment and he cooked our breakfast and dinner. But I can't remember a single interaction with him before the separation. He would go to work and come home, that was it. When I was 12 I lived with him and his second wife and baby son for a year. Once again I can't remember more than two interactions with him that whole year.
That generation of parents didn't spend time with their kids. They told us to get outside and play until it was dark, and when we got home it was time for a bath and bed. For most, alcohol had nothing to do with it. My father briefly got to know his three grandchildren. But when we would visit he was normally quiet. He died of a massive heart attack running to catch a bus after work at the age of 64. He never got to retire. He wasn't a heavy drinker or an alcoholic. Most people aren't heavy drinkers or alcoholics. They all die anyway.
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Originally Posted by TabulaRasa
Nah.
My grandfather was a WWII veteran who came home and spent the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s raising his family, working as a factory foreman, and slowly drinking himself to death. He held down a job, supported his family, retired, had grandchildren, was active in the VFW, his church, and was much beloved. He controlled his drinking to the point of not losing his job. He did lose, I'm told, a lot of valuable time with his children, who adored him, by spending most weekends and off shifts tinkering on cars in his garage, where his refrigerator of beer was located (never drank in the house, only where nobody could see). In his retirement in the 1970s, he and his son, my dad, were in the process of setting up a business to run together, when he died of complete organ failure kicked off by liver shutdown. I was four months old.
He looked on the surface, if you didn't scratch really hard, at least, like somebody who was functioning and had his life together. He was assuredly a hopeless addict whose addiction killed him.
This whole, "It was the Mad Men era, everybody did it, so it was culturally normal and therefore fine, not really an addiction" stance is nonsense. People had families they left suffering, grandchildren they'd never know and who'd never know them, relationships that floundered and languished in the face of a stronger attraction to substances than to their loved ones. That's not normal or fine.
Are you talking about me?? I never said alcoholics can control their drinking
No? What you did say was, "I do not think that alcohol or other drug addictions is a disease." You then went on to say, "you have a weak character or low self discipline or self esteem and choose to take drugs." Then you followed everything up with, "this opinion is not backed up by any science."
Ya, you think? So, yes I was talking to you.
Now, I'm not going to call you a hypocrite, because I believe that we are all hypocritical at times in life. I'll just say that I hope that you have seen things in a different light.
I’ll be honest one of the reasons I made this thread is cuz I seen her dating someone else and it makes me wonder if she was just going thru a phase and fine now
I’ll be honest one of the reasons I made this thread is cuz I seen her dating someone else and it makes me wonder if she was just going thru a phase and fine now
Doesn't sound like it.
You have to get some perspective and understand that she has had this issue before you and she'll have it after you.
Reminders like that are not usually fun to deal with, but try to push it out of your mind and be grateful for what you learned from that experience.
My perspective, and experience, on the original question is no. Too many problems built in to a relationship with a person who has addiction issues. It could work depending on how much you want to put up with.
its mostly that I guess I miss her and I look back and see how critical I was of her behavior early on that likely messed things up.
I would say you're deluding yourself with this idea, from what I have read in your original post and this thread.
It isn't your criticism that 'messed things up', it was clearly her drinking problem. Maybe you brought criticism into the dynamic as a result, but your criticism was not the cause of the problems, her drinking was.
I've been in a relationship with a functioning alcoholic. You are saving yourself a whole world of pain by walking away.
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