Am I an alcoholic?

The struggle with alcohol abuse, is that some people abuse alcohol and lead very productive lives. They own a home, have a great job, a 401k, a family. I would venture to say that this is the most dangerous type of alcohol abuse. The “functioning alcoholic”. It is easy to say that alcohol is not a problem when there are so many things going right.

The danger in the functioning alcoholic is that life crumbles from the inside. Little things start to add up and the rug can be pulled out from under you when you least expect it. From the outside looking in, everything is great – until it isn’t great.

It seems like everybody drinks. There are people who can have one glass of wine with dinner and there are people who have more. The people who can stop drinking after one serving, those are the “normies”, they have a switch that they can turn off. Some people just have more trouble controlling that switch.

It is possible to stop drinking, even if you are a Friday night happy hour kind of person. Actually, when you stop drinking you will start to notice there are more people around not drinking than you think. There are some good resources and groups to go to, even if you aren’t ready to stop drinking. The go-to is Alcoholics Anonymous, but that can be quite daunting, especially if you are not sure you want to stop drinking. SMART Recovery is another good option. Both of these support groups have websites where you can find meetings based on day, time, and location.

You don’t have to stop drinking now. If you want to talk about it, I am here to listen, offer a different perspective and some insight. I won’t tell you to stop drinking, that is something that you will have to decide on your own.