I’m an alcoholic and my child is on a child protection plan AMA

[Pengola87]

Just that really

@TabbyStar Which is precisely why children need to be protected from alcoholics including their parents. There is little more traumatising for a child than growing up with an alcoholic parent. Adults can make choices - including the choice to drink. Adults have autonomy in this, & they need to own it. Children do not.

@HopeClearwater I meant to send my condolences to you.

"Alcoholics" are generally people who have experienced some sort of trauma - they're not, interestingly. A lot of it is down to habit and heredity.

@HopeClearwater I absolutely do. It's not a world I ever thought I'd know anything about, but having been through what I have, I see it as clear as day. I appreciate I may sound harsh & unfeeling, anyone who knows me IRL would tell you the opposite is true. But I will no longer play the game & talk the soft talk around addictions. No addict ever got clean & dry by not recognising the basics - they are making a choice, they can make a different choice. Ultimately the rest is semantics & excuses. If we love alcoholics & we want them to get dry we don't do them any favours by telling them anything else.

@Supersimkin2 My late partner admitted that her alcoholism was due to habit not trauma, & my now partner says that trauma was rarely significantly present in the hundreds of cases she saw in her career as an addictions counsellor. That's not to say those cases don't exist, but it's another hook we often hang addiction on.

What are your living arrangements and what income do you have. How much do you spend on alcohol? Do you work? If not when did you last work?

What health problems do you have now because of drink?

@LaLaLandIsNoFun Exactly what i was thinking!

I agree with Mrscalypso. I really feel for you OP, but don’t you have to take some responsibility? You’ve said there is no help available now, but how about trying to take some positive steps? Tomorrow Start by drinking one less bottle of wine. No one else has ultimate responsibility and can save you or your child except you - the one person that should be willing to lay their life down for them.

@MrsCalypsoGrant thank you. And from what you say, it seems as if you have had a similar experience. My condolences.

I also think therapy and working through issues from the past is essential.

@Cantbutwill

Did you miss the part where oP tied to get help but was refused? Or the part where she turned to social services and asked for help? Or the part where she’s taken out a personal loan to pay for private rehab?

People like you who trott out the ‘cannot take personal responsibility’ when someone has a mental health problem/addiction problem are part of the reason these issues are still so heavily stigmatised and thus fester in the shadows until crisis hits.

LaLa yes I red those parts, hence I said, since it is not available right now, the OP has to take some positive steps by themself.

*read

@Pengola87 hi OP, how do you afford 5 bottles of wine per day? Must be a huge expense

@PotteringAlong

I despair at your assumption. You clearly have NO idea how alcoholism works.

With zero acknowledgment that the OP HAS taken several positive steps and the ONLY step that’s bed made available to her us the one where she’s had to take out a personal loan (which you conveniently just swept under the carpet too) @Cantbutwill

Perhaps it feels a little personal but I had a complete breakdown after years of abuse, ended up in antidepressants which made me worse and I had ‘friends’ telling me to take personal responsibility too (as I attended my fourth GP appointment and me goodness knows what number call to the crisis team) I was doing EVERYTHING I could but judgmental pricks STILL felt the need to bolster their egos by finger pointing - because mental health and addiction issues still seem to be fair game for judgment.

I hope your rehab works.... someone I know has just died In their early 30s because of alcoholism.

@LaLaLandIsNoFun @LaLaLandIsNoFun

My earlier point remains - someone who wants to give up will do so, regardless of support or lack of it. My late partner did give up at one stage, she sought support & services were so chronically stretched that they offered nothing of any use. She knew what she had to do - what all alcoholics know they have to do - stayed off spirits, switched to wine, cut down steadily in terms of volume & alcohol content until she was down to a glass a day. She had been drinking well over 300 units a week prior to that. Ultimately it is about the fundamental desire to give up, regardless of support available.

I know two very decent child protection senior social work professionals & in some cases the reason they are not putting support/plans in place to assist the addict to keep their children & appear to be going straight in with efforts to remove the children is because they know they are dealing with a recidivist alcoholic who is one of the 98% who will not get dry. They see too many similar cases to take chances - their responsibility is to the child.

LaLa, plenty of posters have congratulated OP on her efforts I didn’t think it was necessary for everyone to do so. I’m sorry you took my comments as offensive, they were not meant that way, I can assure you. My point was, if there is no help available at this point in time, is it not better to at least try some small, potentially achievable steps in the OPs mind, as opposed to doing absolutely nothing?

@Cantbutwill - you simply told the OP to take some responsibility - rewriting history.

That’s the issue I have - twisting things.

@Cantbutwill

And OP isn’t doing absolutely nothing - she’s taken out a personal loan to go into rehab..

How is that twisting things? A statement is not twisting.

Quite easily - you state yet again that the OP has done nothing: she’s about to go into rehab that she has taken a personal loan out for. THAT is twisting things. Yet you still bang on about doing it herself, at home, when she has said she’s physically dependant. My uncle tried that - fortunately a nurse lived next door to him and saved his life when he went into complete cardiac arrest. You’re not medically qualified to be giving that kind of advice and it’s pretty awful and bloody irresponsible of you to sit there and blart on about personal responsibility (suggesting she takes matters into her own hands without medical supervision) when the OP HAS taken personal responsibility

Anyway, I’ll leave it there. Good luck, OP. You CAN do this. You’ve taken far more responsibility than many do - SS are supposed to be there to support (despite what others say) Don’t let the bastards get you down. One foot in front of the other snd prove the naysayers and finger pointers wrong.

I know someone who does detoxing privately. Qualified addiction specialist. I can PM you the details if you are interested (depending on where you live obviously). You can get dates earlier than January.

[quote LaLaLandIsNoFun]@Cantbutwill

Did you miss the part where oP tied to get help but was refused? Or the part where she turned to social services and asked for help? Or the part where she’s taken out a personal loan to pay for private rehab?

People like you who trott out the ‘cannot take personal responsibility’ when someone has a mental health problem/addiction problem are part of the reason these issues are still so heavily stigmatised and thus fester in the shadows until crisis hits.[/quote]
I do think unless you have bled yourself dry and tried everything you can to help a person in this situation you can't understand fully.
I used to feel the same compassion. I tried everything with my Dad blaming a lack of help from services etc but actually he just didn't want to stop enough.
Same with my ex. I tried everything he had every help available and made zero difference.
The withdrawals are always the excuse. Don't want to feel ill etc.
Lack of real responsibility, not just saying you feel awful and guilty but actually acting on it for real and seeing it through.
The op has said alcohol comes before her daughter. That's a huge statement.
Think about that and the reality of it.
Her unwillingness to cut down herself and withdraw slowly which is entirely possible without rehab or outside help.......
Rehab is not a fix it doesn't cure anything. It only guides and offers different outlooks.
It has to come from within and like the previous poster said, the poster who was a heroin addict and stopped because the child she was carrying meant more to her than her high.... thats what matters and she should be so proud of herself.
The addicts who continue to only look inside and don't care enough about the devastation around them that they are causing by continuing down the same path, I will never have sympathy.
Anyone can fall down but it's your own responsibility to pick yourself back up