Can I have my alcoholic father sectioned/seen to without consent?

[fiddlemethis]

Hi all, my father has drank all his life but over the last few years it has seemed to got worse, he looks completely vacant, he doesn't have any interest in anything apart from booze. He has also been collapsing (due to his weak hip of course ) and falling down the stairs. He gets very out of breath if he walks anywhere so as a result he sits in his chair, drinking his wine and does little else. He takes various tablets and I'm sure he shouldnt be drinking anything let alone 3 bottles of wine a day.
My question is this, could I get someone to assess him and take him off for treatment? I think he will die soon unless someone intervenes and forces him to stay off it for a period of time. Hopefully that would make him assess how much he has been under alcohol's control.
Todays episode has been my mother calling me up in tears because he is collapsed on the floor upstairs (conscious) and can't get up and has shit and pissed himself.....nice.
My mother won't go for any help, she seems to think that talking in groups isnt for her but I think she is actually worried about my dads reaction to it.

Alcohol withdrawal can indeed cause hallucinations. My ex gets them when she periodically dries out. Three bottles of wine a day is a huge amount of alcohol. He's permanently drunk; all that changes is just how drunk he is.

If he stopped drinking overnight he'd be at significant risk of seizures if not worse. Alcohol is one of the few drugs that can kill you during withdrawal.

The sad truth of the matter is that no matter how much better you think his life would be if he stopped drinking, he doesn't agree. He can stay permanently pissed for the rest of his life and provided he didn't cause a public nuisance or tried to drive he'd be breaking no laws.

For whatever reason your mother is wrapped up in his alcoholism almost as much as he is. This kind of co-dependency is desperately sad and can be all-consuming. It's very hard to break out of that kind of lifetime habit. And it's very easy for additional bystanders such as yourself to get dragged into it too.

You do have the right to re-define your relationship with your father and your mother to protect yourself from the effects of his drinking. Eg, when she phones you to talk about him being passed-out drunk, do the broken-record thing: "Your father's on the floor and I can't wake him up!" "Call an ambulance." "But I don't want him to..." "Call an ambulance." "But then everyone will..." "Call an ambulance." "You don't understand, it's just..." "I'm going to put the phone down now so you can call the ambulance." Same for when she wants to just complain about his drinking, but substitute "Speak to the GP".

You have my sympathies. Alcoholism is a horrific addiction and the fall-out on friends and families can be severe. It distorts relationships into groteseque parodies of what they should really be about. You cannot change him. But you can change how you react to the chaos and drama he creates.

Fiddle - Snorbs just answered that question. So yeah the hallucinations your Dad suffered were most likely due to no alcohol. It's part of the withdrawal process called Delirium Tremens (DT's) and typically happen between 6-48 hrs after stopping alcohol - then the risk of withdrawal seizures kicks in around 3-5 days after withdrawal, although it can be earlier/later.
It's for this reason that high doses of Diazepam or Chlordiazepoxide are used during a medical assisted detox - these drugs quieten and substitute alcohol in the GABA receptors in the alcoholics brain so it's not such a shock to the system - hence why the body doesn't have the above symptoms during the treatment. It's usually around 5-7 days in hospital to do a detox properly and safely.
Some of these symptoms could possibly be relieved if your Dad is not deficient in Thiamin (vit B1) but many many chronic Alcoholics are. I'll let you look for yourself if you want to, there's too much info about it and most, for the Alcoholic, doesn't make pleasant reading.

When a person is physically and chemically addicted it goes above and beyond just the need/want to have a drink and be pissed.

Many if not most large Hospitals in the UK have an addiction ward and an Alcohol team but you must be referred by the GP and you must work with them - the alcoholic must reduce their intake while they wait for the detox, begin counselling sessions too sometimes and have appointments with the alcohol team. When they are happy then the person can be admitted into hospital to begin. As you can imagine your Dad would have to be 100% committed to this for it to work.
If your Dad was taken to hospital in an emergency alcohol related situation and your Mum said he wants to detox, he's an alcoholic (of course your Dad would still need to agree if he was capable) then some hospitals would begin it immediately (where I've worked in some places not 2 miles apart, 2 hosps had different policies)

Is your Dad aware that there's so much help available to him? from the actual detoxing, counselling to medication he can take to help keep alcohol out if he doesn't feel strong enough to resist temptation at first.

I do think your Mum needs to take a look at the bigger picture and maybe educate herself in some of the darker stuff like mentioned before but don't be too hard on her- yes of course she can walk away - but something keeps her there, be it love, worry or fear. She's lived with this for a long time and has been complicit in helping your Dad hide it - it's probably become a 'normality' to her now. Maybe she could speak to her own GP and get all the factual information of how to help without the enabling, if not the GP would be able to put her in touch with a local Addictions counselling service which family and friends can also use for advice.

I really feel for you fiddle it's not an easy place to be but ultimately whatever you decide is acceptable or not in YOUR life and therefore your own family, is the most important.

OP: My Mum is a recovering alcoholic. Much like your Dad, she was having falls. After a couple of years, her blood levels were through the floor. I think her haemaglobin level was about 5.5 or something. She was thiamin deficient too. She was fobbing my brother, sister and I off with different stories, so my sister rang my Mum's GP. It turned out that my Mum's GP (who is my GP also) was also very worried about my Mum. My Mum at this stage had had a second bad fall.

My Mum got taken to hospital where she partially dried out as the consultant ignored the liver and concentrated on diverticulitis. Mum was discharged and drank again to a lesser extent. She had another fall where she fell down the stairs, banged her head on a radiator and lay there for about 9 hours.

My sister found her and got her taken to hospital again. This time, they took us seriously and listened to us telling them about her drinking. She had a blood transfusion, a saline drip, a calcium drip (to counteract high potassium levels), had the ascites drained off from her abdomen and was put on high vitamin B shots.

She was told that if she didn't stop drinking, she would be dead quite soon. In fact, she was given 6 months to live in March last year. She has had intensive counselling and has carers going in twice a day (set up by the council through the hospital).

We have prepared ourselves for the worst, but hoped for the best. Mum has made it through Christmas, which is better than predicted, but it is one day at a time. She's an adult and as such, has the choice to look after herself or not.

The ripples run wide. At the end of the day, you can only do so much and then your little family comes first before someone else.

Oh, forgot to say that my Mum was also delusional and bloody argumentative about it too. That was down to withdrawing from alcohol.

Thank you all for taking time to talk and share your knowledge and experiences, I am finding it a huge help in staying afloat right now. My dad won't even accept he has an alcohol problem, let alone think about seeking help about it, I think he is never sober enough to see it. If you mention about him drinking too much he just looks at you like you are crazy and shakes his head like he can't fathom why you might be saying it. I guess that gives me my answer doesn't it, I can either be in his life and keep being a part of the drama and upset that it causes or I can withdraw and protect myself and my children.

The silver lining on the cloud is that I myself am now very aware of how much I drink, I have got a tendancy to drink for a few nights in a row then stop myself but I have had enough of it, I don't want any part of it in my life anymore. I dont think my dad chose to be like this, he has used it for so long and now it controls him instead of the other way around. I dont EVER want to be controlled by alcohol.
I will try to get the doctor to speak to my mum about some support for her, she might take more notice if it comes from him

I have a 29 year old brother full blown alcoholic. Fits has no control over himself. I am up usually round the clock as I don’t know when the tap is going to come to my door to say he’s dead. I have two kids myself can anyone help ?

@Kel1106 you need to cut and paste your message into a new post. This one is from 2013 and people will either reply to the op or will just post “zombie thread”. If you start a new post then people will be able to give you the advice you need (although I would imagine that a lot of the advice on this thread could help you anyway if you read it).