Drug Addiction Stories & Info

When I was four years old, my mother and father ended their relationship, I was in a terrible condition of confusion.

It is my hope to all of you who find themselves in this state of existence, to find the help that is needed to bring you out of it. If unhandled, you may find yourselves spiralling downwards in life, and never have the opportunity to properly handle that condition – and bring happiness to your life as I have.

Christopher L.

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Camping trips are mostly remembered for being fun.  Yes, my parent’s drank, but we were camping, there was no driving involved.  Most of the trips were very enjoyable although they do come along with the memory of my mother and father getting drunk.  The worse times were when they were both drunk and they argued.  Oh, we hated that.

They were really cruel to each other when they argued.

They were really cruel to each other when they argued.  Of course, they had sharp tongues anyway, but for two people who were supposed to love each other, they were cruel.  My sisters and I hated it when they argued.  For small children, their parents are their foundation.  When they fight, the foundation cracks just a little.  I can remember many times getting tense just sensing they were going to argue.

Camping trips were always with a bunch of other people.  All of who drank.  We would go to lakes and familiar camping grounds quite often in the warmer weather.  The kids played, the women gossiped, and the men played cards and drank in the camper or bus – we had an old bus converted into a camper.  Although there were many good times, I still remember being anxious when my mother or father said something with a tone.  I didn’t want them to argue, and even then I tried to be the peacemaker.  I tried to smooth things over before it escalated into an argument.  So, intertwined with the wonderful and happy memories of camping is the memory of feeling responsible to keep my folks from arguing.  That’s a big responsibility for a small child.  That is what all alcoholics do to their children; however, they just may not realize it.

Adults who drink and get drunk in the presence of their children are speaking volumes without ever saying a word.  They are putting their children into the role of being an adult because the adult is incapacitated.  They are making their children referees because alcoholism spurs anger.  Alcoholics are forcing their children to grow up way before they are ready.  They don’t mean to, I know my parent’s didn’t intend for that to happen, but it did.  My sisters and I were scared a lot.  Scared they would argue or fight, scared Dad would drive when he’d been drinking – generally scared.  Alcoholics taint the memories for their children.  Otherwise happy memories become happy memories tainted with anxiety.  Children shouldn’t have to live like that.

Read the first part: Daddy, I’m scared – Part 1

Little girls only understand the black and white.  Things like alcoholism and disease are foreign concepts to little children and I was no different.  On alternating weekends, my parents and their friends used to go over to each other’s homes.  One Saturday they would come to our house and the next, we would go to theirs.  My sister and I were the same ages as their two girls.  Oh, we had great fun almost every time.  We kids would play.  The women would talk (and drink) and the men would play cards and drink.

He was a good man, a family man…but he was an alcoholic.

My favorite times were when we were allowed to spend the night over there because the alternative was riding home with Dad driving.  It terrified me.  I would crouch down in the back seat and try not to look at the way he was driving.  Back in the 60’s, there was an advertisement billboard, which had what appeared to be the back end of a car sticking out of the sign.  We called it the “Car in the sign”.  My father, in jest, said “Oh, someone had too much to drink and missed that turn!”  That was all it took.  I was a child, of course I believed him.

Those memories are still so very vivid to me even years after my Father is gone.  He was a good man, a family man…but he was an alcoholic.  Even as a young girl, getting into a car when he had been drinking literally terrified me.  I’m sure that affected who I was and who I became in many ways.  The blessing was we never did get into an accident.  I can’t account for that because there was so many times that my Dad was blind drunk and could barely walk.

I can remember being all of 7 or 8 years old and having the courage to tell my Father; “Daddy, when you drive and have been drinking, I’m scared.”  My Father held me tight and said something I’ll never forget.  He said “I’m sorry, kiddo.  I’m being the only kind of Father I know how to be.”  The alcohol was so much a part of him, he could not distinguish the fact that his drinking scared me, he didn’t.  And so, it continued and I knew that on alternating weekends, my friends had to deal with their Dad driving drunk.  Then there were the camping trips…