I kept dreading that when the new baby came, they would discover alcohol in his system and then CPS would whoosh in and take all of the kids. Things had come full circle when it came to alcohol. I was the child of alcoholics and now my daughter is an alcoholic and has children. I didn’t think she would, but she called me on the day the baby was born and I went up to see him. He was gorgeous, full head of hair, 10 fingers, 10 toes and he seemed very responsive. I breathed a sigh of relief. The adoptive parents came in and so did the doctor. The doctor informed the adoptive parents that my daughter had consumed alcohol while pregnant and it could lead to problems but they were already in love with the baby they had named Asa.
I still worry about Asa. In the end, my daughter decided on an open adoption for which I am thankful. In the beginning she said she didn’t even want to see the baby or pick out his parents. My daughter continues to drink and heaven forbid, but the last time I saw her, I turned to my youngest daughter and said “Does she look like she’s getting thicker again”?
This daughter is the one of whom I have always been so proud. She was a good girl and out of all of my children, she is the last one I would have expected this from. I see the grandkids from time to time now, thankfully. I usually have them one night a week or so. At one point, in frustration over the alcoholism muttered “Thanks Mom and Dad”, who are both gone now. Then I realized that I had grandparents who had been alcoholics as well. My daughter didn’t choose to become an alcoholic, although she is choosing to stay one. The same goes for my parents and grandparents.
Alcoholism doesn’t discriminate and it can be totally random. Since I was not an alcoholic, I certainly didn’t expect any of my children to be. I worry for my grandkids. I hope they all, especially little Asa is spared the dreaded addiction. His life was spared, thank goodness, so let’s hope that he will be spared a life of alcoholism too.
I was in complete shock to learn that my oldest daughter was pregnant with her third child in 2 ½ years. I did not find out until she was very far along in her pregnancy and it meant she had been lying to me for months about it. Then I realized the amount of drinking she had been doing and my heart sank. Having studied in the medical field, I knew what fetal alcohol syndrome could do to a child and worry was an every day part of my life from that day forward. When I confronted my daughter about being pregnant and drinking, she moved out that very night.
She was also an alcoholic
My daughter became someone I didn’t know. She would hang up on me if I said anything about the kids or the unborn baby, and she would say things like “Oh, you think YOU were a good mother?” This was my sensitive and sweet daughter, mind you. This is the daughter I would never have expected this behavior from. She didn’t come over very often and in the beginning, I didn’t see my two lovely grandchildren at all. I was so concerned about the baby that it would make me physically ill. I found out the baby was a boy and I also learned that my daughter had planned to give him up for adoption.
She was staying with a woman who was great with the grandkids, but, she was also an alcoholic. Her doctor called CPS and they paid me a visit, among others. The last thing I wanted was for all of the babies to be taken away from my daughter and yet I was so concerned about the drinking. I informed CPS that IF it came down to it, I did not particularly want to raise any more children, but I would care for my grandkids for as long as it took for my daughter to get sober. He agreed that even over her protests, if the kids were taken away, they would come to me. I simply could not believe all of this was happening. Now, I had a grandson on the way and had no idea what complications he would have as a result of the alcohol my daughter had consumed throughout the pregnancy. It wasn’t going to be long before he was here, and we would all find out.
Alcohol and/or drug addiction has done a lot of damage in and to my family. My father was an alcoholic and my mother was an alcoholic and addicted to codeine. Life was a little (to say the least) chaotic at our home even though my parents tried as best they could to raise us and give us what we needed. There was an obvious struggle emotionally for them between the good values they had instilled in them and the outbursts that came as a result of the alcohol and drugs. Although 2 of my sisters became alcoholics (and are now recovering) and I abused drugs for a couple of years in my youth, I never became addicted to drugs or alcohol.
As an adult I was so thankful that I never became addicted and since my sisters had never relapsed, I thought the ordeal was over. Never in a million years did I expect my own daughter to become an alcoholic. The thought just never occurred to me. I just wasn’t looking for the signs, and therefore, I didn’t see them until it was almost too late. I knew that before she had her children, she would go to the club and occasionally have parties at her home. Typical youth behavior, I thought. She had her first baby in 2006 and shortly after that, she moved back in with me. Everything went fine, she drank occasionally but when I found out she was pregnant with her second child (only several months later) I didn’t see her drink. After the second child was born, the drinking increased, but I put it down to depression over having lost her car and her job (which she had worked very diligently at).
Then I noticed her waist getting thick again.
I repeatedly asked, “Are you pregnant again?” and she always said no.
I noticed her drinking more often and keeping a bottle of vodka in her room but up until then, she had taken exceptional care of her two children. Then things began to change. She began yelling at the kids more often and over time she spent more and more time in bed. The older child would come out for me to fix her something to eat and then I’d get the little one and feed him. Then, quite by accident, I found out the shocking truth (or one of them anyway), she was pregnant yet again.
