Living with an Alcoholic

Living with an alcoholic makes home life a living hell. A child of an alcoholic is always on guard and so are other family members. There is a love/hate relationship with the family member and there’s constant conflict. There’s trauma when you’re living with abuse or emotionally absent parents. So if you’re living with an alcoholic or your still suffering from the being an adult child of an alcoholic (ACOA) here’s what to do.

What to do

1) When you’re living in this dysfunctional family there’s a code of silence. There’s even a feeling of guilt that you’re somewhat responsible for it. So break the silence

2)Join Alanon meetings and become involved. This is a great support system for those who are in an alcoholic family and you’ll see that you’re not alone.

3)Develop a support system of close friends and confide in them. Share your feeling only with those you can trust. It’s always helpful link/to talk to a counselorexperienced in addiction issues.

4)Ask for help This is extremely important because it’s very difficult for most people living in an alcoholic/addict environment. You’ve learned not to ‘make waves’ and take care of things yourself. To break the silence relieves your burden.
Many partners living with an alcoholic are in codependent relationship. There are also CODA groups that can help you as well as self-help books on codependency. Melanie Beatie’s books can help you understand why you stay in an abusive relationship Once again Alanon, private counseling or spiritual counseling can help you.

If you are a parent and you are an ACOA, you probably have little confidence in your parenting skills. It would be helpful to read or take courses on child development. Joining parenting courses, is also effective. Many adult children of alcoholics have suffered so much childhood trauma that they avoid parenting completely and don’t trust relationships in general.

The healing begins when you take the risk to express the feelings that you’ve buried. Eventually you move out of the past and you’ll realize that you’ve been carrying a heavy burden. You can now accept yourself and value the person that you are. Your childhood was filled with pain, anger and resentment, but today should be different.

The painful past has got to pass.

If you’ve been living with an alcoholic parent Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACOA) can help. Private Counseling is focused on your specific needs and may get you there quickly but individual counseling may be too expensive, so recovery coaching may provide the answer.

Coaching is not therapy, but when you’re in crisis, you can zero in on a particular crisis and get strategies and direction on how to deal with it. Payment is for 1 hr., however, your time is flexible and can be used in 15 minute intervals – working with a different issues on different days, or when they come up. It gives you the advice and direction you need for immediate peace of mind.

Many members of the clergy offer counseling services, which are usually free. Getting help for a personal problem is always difficult, but you owe it to yourself to do it.

Your childhood was affected by a dysfunctional family, but today there’s nothing to prevent you from being free from guilt and shame.

If you have a personal question, want more information, or would like to sample a free 15 minute assessment of coaching Here's how to ask.

Children of Alcoholics share certain characteristics

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