ALCOHOL PROBLEMS? Speeding Up Your Worry Train
If you are worried, afraid, stressed to the max, and thinking you are an inferior person who can’t lead a normal like, you don’t feel happy. You might even think that you need to self medicate with alcohol to deal with your terrors. A little nip here, a little nip there and it settles your nerves and gives you the Dutch courage you need to face the world again. I had so many clients who could come in to see me with their breaths smelling like alcohol, even though they used breath mints like they were going out of style. They would say they didn’t like coming into ‘this type of office’ where ‘people can see you are nuts’.
You may have tried having a little booze to get you through a situation and thought, ‘Hey, this settles me down quite a bit.’ And so you accept using this on occasion as a crutch which is not a problem for you, you say. But if there is a stress buildup and things start piling up on you, you may find that having that little drinky is interfering with your family, your job, and your self esteem. Alcohol is like many other drugs that act on the brain. If you drink it regularly, you find that it has less effect on you. You need to drink more and more to get the effect you want. This is called ‘tolerance’ and is a powerful part of the problem you can develop using alcohol to deal with anxiety. Alcohol is such a part of modern living that people don’t think a bit of taking a swig now and then to ward off the wolf. You don’t need to talk to a doctor or get a prescription. You just trot off to the local liquor store or grocery store and get your wine or beer or booze and have that first sip to ease the pain. The problem is, alcohol can really make your worries worse. It definitely interferes with your ability to deal with the problems which caused your anxiety in the first place.
Drinking makes you feel relaxed and more able to talk to and be around people if you are shy or lack confidence. It helps take that scared feeling away and numbs you to feelings of inferiority and anxiety. It always seems to take more and more to get you to where you need to be because your tolerance for the brown bag grows with time. Taking small amounts of alcohol, especially red wine is supposed to be good for our hearts. But there is a big difference between drinking a glass of wine and downing a six pack to back off the pressure. I have know countless number of people who have developed huge drinking problems simply because they did not know any better way to stop the worry, the panic, the stress, and the bald fear.
Even a few drinks can be scary for you to take. Some of the effects are:
Impaired judgement and decision making which could cause a car accident
Vision disturbance, especially peripheral vision which affects driving
Less coordination ability
Problems with depth perception
Slower reaction time
Sleepiness
Impaired judgment often causes an individual to drive faster than normally, thereby increasing the risk of automobile and other accidents.
At moderate-to-high doses, alcohol also causes:
Feelings of sadness and despair
Very impaired coordination.
Very impaired perception
Impaired reaction time
Sleepiness to the point of dropping off
And here are health problems you stir up with alcohol abuse:
It can lead to obesity and overweight which makes you feel inferior.
It can cause kidney and liver problems.
It is involved in one half of suicides.
It plays a role in many auto accidents.
It is often a part of domestic violence.
It is often a part of assaults and homicides.
It can allow unacceptable behavior.
It can become an addiction.
It can ruin relationships and families.
It can cost your job.
As a Charter Member of Worrywarts Inc., you should give strong consideration to avoiding the pitfall of using alcohol as a protector from anxiety.
As you can see, I am really suggesting to you that alcohol is not the way to deal with your worry. Alcohol is cheap and easy to get and you don’t have to talk over your problems with someone to get it. But it can and will cause you to have more problems in the most important areas of your life and in the end you will end up feeling more inferior. You will have no confidence, feel you can only function with a crutch in a glass, and doubt yourself as a strong person.
You are a person who hates to admit being a failure and so it is very hard for you to admit it if you have a drinking problem. It really hurts the image and makes you look a lot less than perfect. But you cannot confront the wolf until you agree that you have brought him to the door. He won’t stop howling until you take the first step to drive him down the road. It is really important for you to get whatever help you need to fight this particular demon because any overuse of alcohol can make you look foolish, incompetent, unattractive, and an object of ridicule- all the worst fears you could have ever imagined.
I will help you chase the Worry Wolf away without the bottle so hold on tight. More in blogs to come.
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