To be annoyed about this alcohol support assessment?

[SquishyBones]

I drink more than I should so referred myself to an alcohol support service. I don’t feel like I have a massive problem but could do with some support ... I was thinking a bit like slimming world but for alcohol rather than food. At the initial welcome meeting they assured me I was in the right place.

However, I had my full assessment last week (via phone) and was left feeling a bit offended!

The woman seemed desperate to make me sound worse than I was. Kept asking if I was SURE I didn’t shake in a morning and was I SURE I didn’t crave a drink as soon as I wake up ... I told her I was more of a weekend binge drinker but she seemed to want to fit me into a different category by exaggerating my symptoms.

Then I was asked when was the last time I injected opiates. I said I never had and she was like “what, never? What drugs do you take?” I said “none!” She said “not even cannabis?” ... err no!

Then she seemed really shocked that I actually had a decent job. Asked me if I’d ever assaulted anyone or been arrested ...

I ended up saying “I don’t think this service sounds like it’s for me to be honest ... it’s way off”. She then suggested I was in denial.

I now want nothing to do with them! AIBU to be annoyed?

I think she was doing what she had to do. A lot of people referred for help will have difficulty holding down a job, or they might have a history of drug use. How would they ever find out if they don't ask?

And whilst I get that it comes across as her not believing you, the reality is that people do minimise things when they are asked about them, which is probably why they ask the same question in a number of different ways. They're not trying to catch you out, they're trying to assess you.

Bloody hell, I'd be annoyed too
It's probably to do with funding and ticking the right boxes
Hope you find the right channel to help you OP

Alcoholics do tend to lie and minimise their usage. Could explain her approach.

She was doing her job...many would lie/minimise reality so they have to ask multiple times....a lot of alcoholics do have the shakes in the morning, do have trouble holding down a job, and do get arrested....that is some people's reality...you sound like a bit of a snob and annoyed to be put in the same category as them...you obviously need help or wouldn't have reached out so now you have to fully accept the help or it won't work

I don’t feel like I have a massive problem but could do with some support

The thing about having an alcohol problem is, that either it's a problem or it's not. You evidently felt it was a problem, enough to seek help, yet have tried to downgrade it in your own head and to others as 'just going to slimming world'. I'm not really surprised the woman on the phone had a bit of difficulty understandingthe 'truth' of you, when you won't even be honest with yourself. On some level, you read like you are in denial. I'm not sure we can really tell how rude the woman on the phone was, or how much you just wanted to be offended by a normal survey - just because you associate drugs and no jobs with an alcohol problem, doesn't mean she does.

I wasn’t annoyed at her asking these questions ... it was the way it was asked.

Have you ever injected opiates vs when was the last time you injected opiates for example.

The suggestion that I was lying about not doing any drugs

The surprise that I actually had a job ...

I know some people do suffer these problems but it was the way she seemingly didn’t believe me when I said I didn’t.

'Have you ever injected opiates vs when was the last time you injected opiates for example.'
I think she asked like this to try and make the person answering the question that it was okay to answer yes. People will want to say no, she's trying to nudge you not to (assuming that you were, of course). People need permission mentally.
It's the opposite of when someone goes' You don't need an X, do you' and then moves on without giving you a chance to say 'Actually I do.'

I gave up drinking 9years ago never thought I had a massive problem or that my drinking was too excessive didn't drink everyday (didn't need any services to stop just did it myself) but after 6months off not drinking my dad asked me how much I used to drink in a typical week and wrote it down and I was mortified on how much it was.

When your in the I'm going to stop you don't actually realise how much you are drinking, until you've been sober for a while

And the questions are all very much standard as a lot off alcohol services are now duel services for drugs aswell so that may be the case in the service you've reached out to.

Also well done for getting help it's not always easy.

I get you, OP. I know someone who gave up going to AA meetings because everyone there had such grim lives. He kept up with the non-drinking though.

I have a friend who spent 5 weeks in a residential program 3 years ago. She would drink a bottle of wine and a couple of vodkas every night.
To this day she knows the counsellors in the centre don’t believe her. They tried every which way to get her to admit that she drank in the morning and at lunchtime. They told her husband that he was a liar too when he told them her drinking pattern.

It's perfectly possible to drink more than is healthy without taking drugs, getting into fights, being arrested, shaking in the morning, or even affecting your job or ever being that drunk. Millions of people will be in this position, and some will feel that they should cut down, but find it hard to do so.

Eg if a couple share a bottle of wine every weekday evening, drink one each on Friday and Saturday and 'be good' by abstaining on Sunday nights, that's 4 bottles of wine per person per week, which is 50+ units so at least 3 or 4 times the maximum weekly recommended amount and likely to be detrimental to the health of anyone who does this long term.

I can understand why you might be a little weirded out by the questions, OP.
I think you should probably give the service a go before deciding its not for you though.
A friend of mine was in a somewhat similar situation, with a Valium addiction.
She had to go to a drug treatment programme where she was the only person with a job or stable housing. The only person without a criminal record. The only person addicted to something other than heroin.
Her valium prescription from the clinic was a photocopied sheet with the word "methadone" scribbled out and the word "valium" written in, in pen.
It was socially awkward at first and perhaps she didn't feel like she had too much in common with the other patients (on a superficial level at least). But she got really good care. And it was the right place for her.

I read an article a couple of years ago about people who fall through the cracks when it comes to alcohol dependency. Groups like AA and the like don't necessarily suit everyone and people who feel that they need support with alcohol are put off by the all or nothing stance of the counsellors. I have a friend who feels this way - she feels she has a problem with alcohol but it's nowhere near so bad that she would need AA and wishes there was support that wasn't so black and white about it. Maybe it would be good to have more of an in-between service really for those who don't fit so neatly into the "alcoholic" category but still feel alcohol is a problem. Like an early intervention service or something.

@barbaraofseville, your maths is out although your point remains... a bottle of wine is around 10 units so 4 in a week is just under 3x the recommended limit of 14 units/week, not 4-5 times. Still needing to pull back from, but not so far to go.

Depends on the strength of the wine. I only drink cava which is 10-11% alcohol which I think is around 8-9 units a bottle, but many people drink 'big reds' at 13-14%, so maybe around 12 units a bottle, OK still not 50+ units, but still a lot.

I'd bet my house that the vast majority of people approaching this service have far, far worse problems with alcohol than you do, OP, and, having worked with alcohol misuse clients, I'd say that the majority are also drug users. Even those that aren't currently using often have, historically. (Actually, this also applies to friends that are/have been booze hounds)

People vary a lot in what they consider to "count" as drug use, too. Some will regard "a bit of weed" as normal (because in their milieu it is) and won't disclose it when asked about drug use; some will happily misuse prescription drugs because they're "medicine", not recreational and consequently won't disclose it. I had a client taking an amount of co-codamol that would have knocked me out for a week, she was also misusing zopiclone and pregabalin, but she was adamant she didn't use drugs!

Alcohol and addiction trainers will always tell you that people with dependency issues 1) underestimate their usage and 2) tend to grossly understate it because they are ashamed. Given that your alcohol use is low and "part-time", I can understand her pressing you more on some of your answers, although it sounds as though her interviewing technique leaves a lot to be desired.

We were trained to ask questions, ideally "open" questions, in a discursive, rather than interrogative, way and never, ever, to sound shocked or be judgmental. People disclose more when they are interviewed like this. I'd be minded to give this as feedback, as this woman isn't doing clients any favours and would benefit from some training in interviewing and assessment skills.

She may have been thinking "Why on earth is this person referring themselves when their problem is so minor, there must be more to it". Or the service may well have a triage system that bands clients in terms of priority. She could have have been trying to elicit an answer that would get you into the next priority band. I've done that, too, where I've felt that someone is likely not to engage if they have to languish on a waiting list for 3 months.

YANBU OP. I do this very same job, assessing people by phone for an organisation that helps people recover from their addictions, and I think it is super important to ask questions in a non biased way.
We do ask people questions that may seem irrelevant to them, e.g. whether they have ever injected (this is, by the way, so we can refer for Hepatitis testing, needle exchange etc if appropriate). However, I would never phrase the questions the way you describe.

I would say, hard as it is, don’t let that one person put you off the entire service- they’re unlikely to be the person you end up working with and you could still find the service useful.

You’d also be perfectly reasonable to make a confidential complaint so their manager can look at their telephone manner.

As for all this talk of ‘alcoholics do this, alcoholics do that..’ No. Not helpful. Everybody’s different (yes, even people struggling with addiction) and understanding that is key to good recovery work.

See another thing was she kept banging on about hepatitis tests and asking whether I’d had one. I told her I’d been tested as part of my job but she kept going on and on about it asking when the test was, was I sure it was a hep test, what was the result ... then seemed to suggest that I had got mixed up and would need another test! I’m sorry but having a few too many cans on a weekend doesn’t mean you need a hep test ... I’m not injecting carling ffs

The assessor was hardly doing a good job if she's turned the op off a service that she'd made contact with out of her own free will!

There has to be a tactful way to encourage people to disclose all the facts. There seems to be an assumption that everyone lies and everyone fits into the same pattern which I would find both unhelpful and offensive.

Had a similar-ish thing recently. Makes you feel you haven't been heard.

Bloody hell, she sounds rubbish. She wasn’t actually listening to you and making lots of assumptions. Yeah, I’d be put off too.

Wow! I don't blame you. Reminds me when I was much younger and I found out where there was a place in town that gave careers advice. I was trying to reach out for some sort of guidance as my parents just weren't emotionally invested in me whatsoever, and my sixth form wasn't too bothered with my work as I had joined a school from the two tier system to a three tier where everyone had already bonded (despite getting really good gcse's from my previous school).
Anyway I turned up with my usual openness and initiative, manners etc, asking tentatively just a few of the right questions I had prepared, and they treated me with such suspicion because I clearly came from a well off family so why should I be booking an appointment with a service that dealt with kids who didn't have enough to eat/ who's parents were on benefits or who were troubled in other ways. I left after having filled out a questionnaire they handed me in response to my questions and I never heard from them again.
Not sure how times have changed but in the end it seems that support services seem to fit people into a box of either a) complete down-and-out financially or b) comfortable financially AND supported emotionally by family.

Alcohol/substance services in england ask all those seeking help to answer those questions as standard. The list is designed to efficiently assess precisely what help you need. Not to offend.

I think the group is not for you. That outlook would not work for me either. My saviour is Annie Grace and This Naked Mind and the Alcohol Experiment. It is exciting to know you can actually complete the 30 Days. Also Club Soda and Hello Sunday Morning. Scout around to find the right support. AA is not for me and I dont think ypu have to descend into hell before youu can make changes. We are all different, what works for one is not for another