Is problem drinking in a parent always a sign of unhappiness? AIBU to assume it is?

[Decanteref]

When my mum was the age I am now she was a problem drinker often getting aggressive after alcohol. She also couldn’t care less whose feelings she hurt in the process -I was a primary school child at the time.

Luckily I haven’t followed suit.I don’t suffer from problematic drinking.

AIBU to think that my mum’s drinking pattern was a sign of unhappiness? She drank lots of strong gin - not much T

Your dm sounds like mine. She was in a difficult marriage with an emotionless man...they married during the war. She drank a lot of gin . Dead at 62.

Only an individual can say why they drink. Some people have underlying emotional causes and some people become dependent on alcohol which creates the problems.

It's really tough having an alcohol-dependent parent. Sorry you had to go through this

Sorry to hear this. Mine dead in 60s also

It can be.

But ultimately it’s an addiction - so, the addiction may be what is causing the unhappiness.

I’ve known many alcoholics and each one had a traumatic childhood in sone way.

Hi OP, I’d say yes, to your question about unhappiness and that it’s a sense of unease within themselves rather than anything or anyone around them. I’ve been in that position and in AA for many years. People in the rooms talk about not fitting in and feeling different from an early age. There’s often a huge focus on children and the effect that their drinking had on them - and that, despite loving their children more than anything, the addiction was too powerful.

i was one of those mothers once. I can only make living amends to my daughter now, on a daily basis.

I’ve had cause to think about this a lot in recent years. I don’t think anyone who frequently drinks to excess is genuinely happy, even the life and soul of the party people. I think they are probably compensating or have a reckless, don’t give a fuck, attitude covering up underlying unhappiness. And none of the alcoholics I’ve known have been happy.

Maybe some happy people are unknowingly prone to alcoholism and get hooked very quickly.

I also have a theory that whatever mood people are in when they start drinking is ramped up by the alcohol. As your mother became aggressive she was probably starting out with some anger that she may have been bottling up.

I assume you are trying to make sense of her. I don’t think that will be easy but I hope you find some peace with it.

Interesting as not the case here.

My DH’s ex wife is functioning alcoholic, held down a professional job, usual family life of decent parents, holidays, great times.

My DH’s daughters also are alcoholics. All under control now due to complete abstinence. There are times when they return to alcohol though.

My DH is not an alcoholic.

I see it as a genetic link as there are no traumatic experiences in their background.

Thanks to everyone who’s taken the to reply to this thread ❤️

Personally, I view anyone who has a dependence on alcohol as someone who is holding up a very loud metaphorical banner above their head which says "I am mentally and/or emotionally struggling".

OP it can be painful to look back on our childhoods as adults and question why our parents behaved the way they did. I'm sorry you experienced this as a child. Bravo for breaking the cycle.💙

My sister 56 is a functioning alcoholic that’s exasperated by her unhappiness
wont have a drink until 7pm then necks three bottles of wine
husband also heavy drinker , separate rooms for years now
their daughter who has just turned 18 hates her drinking
she is type 1 diabetic with all sorts of social issues surrounding confidence
it’s take years for me to persuade my sister to seek professional psychiatric help for her and my niece
what a mess

Yes all the ones I know who are proper alcoholics are because of past trauma, same with serious drug users.
People who are happy inside might dabble but have no need to escape into that feeling every day (generally)

Yes I can relate to this sadly ❤️

Exactly. It's a "What came first, the chicken or the egg" issue.

My sister cannot see how she has isolated herself from all of her family who used to be quite tight with cousins etc
On paper she should have everything she wants for a happy life , own home financially secure , doesnt need to work
She is obsessed with saving money and increasing her wealth
I have pointed out before that all of that is worth nothing without being best friends with her daughter , she is unable to keep her eye on the prize
My niece has had multiple suicide attempts over the last few years

She would never listen to anything I say so I have had to negotiate a very careful path

I think she uses the alcohol to deaden her pain without realising its probably the cause and certainly exasperating her unhappiness

My husband has had a drink problem since I've known him, 25 years. I guess he's never been happy

Just adding, DH’s daughters describe it as using alcohol as a crutch for social anxiety and for when things are difficult ( so could be a learnt behaviour, perhaps they observed more than their parents are aware) but more seriously as having no ‘off button’. One drink can lead to days of drinking, out all night, drinking without a break.

No childhood trauma necessary - personality disorders, genetic tendency, some careers & difficulty as an adult are just a few of the known triggers that send people to the bottle. Oh, and choice.

I think there's some genetic predisposition to it, from my own observation.

I was at a party a while back and we were having a late night chat around the dining table. It turned out every other person there had at least one alcoholic parent, except me. And every other person was piling down whatever alcohol could be found at the party, except me.

I do drink alcohol but it doesn't seem to produce any good feelings or particular euphoria for me. So late at a party, I'm happy to be winding down. I drink in moderation because I don't like feeling sick and dizzy. Whereas my friends who were related to alcoholics were all searching the cupboards hoping for an old bottle of Bailey's or something they could finish.

It's just one example, but I've seen it time again where certain friends will not accept the party is over and stop drinking because it's making them feel good, even when they look green with it.

It's only anecdotal but I do believe there's something alcohol does to some people and not others. Mix that capacity for alcohol to produce euphoric feelings with a person in a miserable situation or with an unhappiness inside them - and I believe that's how you get an alcoholic.

I should also mention that I had an absolutely awful childhood, as did everyone at the party. My mum just doesn't drink. No one in my family really likes it. I have as much reason to hunt out late night bottles of Bailey's, but no desire to.

Presumably their parent’s marital breakdown would have been traumatic for them, as well as the fact they were primarily (?) parented by a woman in addiction. That would have been pretty traumatic?

Yes this. I am a recovering alcoholic. I have a very happy marriage- happy life- wonderful children.

I drank because life was overwhelming for me. Just getting through life was difficult. I had a fairly good upbringing but my mother was violent and abusive and was had unmedicated depression. I left my home country more than 30 years ago and have been happily married to DH for 20 years, with him for 25. I can honestly say i have lived in a situation of great joy. yet i also have depression and alcohol put a veil between me and the world and me and pain.

I'm working on it. And I can honestly say that I am parenting in a way i was never parented. My children know only love and affection and support and my DH has shown me nothing but love. I am lucky. But the underlying addiction and attempts to escape my own thoughts can be overwhelming.

Their parents marriage didn’t break down until the DD’s were adults. DH couldn’t live with his DW any longer. None of the DD’s lived at home by then. They already had issues with alcohol by that point.

Discussion with them is always that they very rarely saw their DM drunk, they talk of ‘she might have had a few’, nothing more. My DH was the one seemed to have managed the situation, remained sober, chose when they needed to go home, made sure his wife was safely in bed etc. etc, hoping to limit the impact on the DD’s.

I think some people can accidentally fall into alcoholism by developing a habit of drinking every day which can lead to their body needing it until there's no "fun/relief" element anymore, only addiction.

I think addiction almost always had its roots in unhappiness, in some way. But it doesn't have to be what most people would call an "abnormal" amount of unhappiness, like a major trauma. We all have negative emotions to some extent, but some people never learnt healthy ways of dealing with them. Some people don't have good coping strategies, and turn to drink. And there's often an element of learnt behaviour: if you grew up around adults who hit the bottle every time they weren't having a great day, you learn to do the same.

Sometimes it's not so much happiness as personality traits, maybe. Like people who are very shy find alcohol gives them social confidence and then can't do without, or people who are naturally quite anxious start relying on booze to relax and take their mind off little things which wouldn't really bother most people in the first place, but which bother them.

And then there's people who have a strong genetic predisposition to addiction.

I think it's a complex mix of unhappiness / trauma, personality, culture, circumstance, genes and learnt behaviour.