# Daughter is an Alcoholic



## MarriedWifeInLove

My 24-year old daughter is an Alcoholic with chronic pancreatitis and was just diagnosed with cirrohsis of the liver at 24 years of age!

It's heartbreaking and I believe I will be burying my only daughter before too long.

I cannot, her Dad cannot and her husband and friends cannot get her to stop. She's already been forced into rehab and the day she got out, she stopped by the liquor store on her way home.

She is suffering from seizures (has knocked teeth out that had to be replaced) and broken bones, and spends at least 1-2 weeks in the hospital each and every month due to her pancreas shutting down or issues with her liver.

She has been told that she WILL DIE very young if she does not stop drinking. She knows it, but says that she can't help it. While she has cut down on her drinking that's not going to cut it as she already has irreversible damage and she has to stop altogether.

She used to be such an independent, put-together young lady and then everything spiraled out of control. I finally got her to tell me what precipitated this drinking problem and she came clean.

Her doctor says she has PTSD from a date-rape during her teen years (we had her in counseling), and an assualt during a pizza delivery (she used to deliver pizzas) when she was 19. She is also BP and on medication for that too.

She has other medical problems that she was born with (birth defects) and this is just the icing on the cake.

I DO NOT WANT TO BURY MY DAUGHTER. I don't know what else to do. We've begged, pleaded, threatened, cried, you name it and we get nowhere. As I write this she is in the hospital for the 3rd time since the beginning of November. For a week for pancreatitis, then for a week and a half for liver functioning problems and now for the past three days for pancreatitis again (she just got out Sunday from the last one).

Her husband is active duty Air Force and they live up north. He is about at his wit's end and is deployed and has threatened her with divorce when he returns if she has not cleaned up her act.

She started AA, but quit going because she said she got tired of hearing everybody's whinning stories - we haven't been able to get her back to AA.

I know that she has to make the decision to stop drinking on her own and that none of us can force her, but is there anything else we can do that has not been done?

I've tried cutting off contact when she's drunk so she has to be sober to talk with me, that didn't work - I've tried just being her mother and supporting her - that didn't work - I've tried everything.

It will just about kill me if I have to bury her, but that's where its headed and headed fast at the rate she's drinking.

What else can I do?


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## Mom6547

Amazon.com: The Cure for Alcoholism: Drink Your Way Sober Without Willpower, Abstinence or Discomfort (9781933771557): Roy Eskapa PhD, David Sinclair PhD: Books

Read it.


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## Blanca

my brother thought AA was stupid too. i guess its not for everyone. He's on some medication that stops all the cravings for alcohol. so far it has really helped him. he's been sober a few months now. you could talk to a doctor about those options. but in the end not everyone wants to live. as i told my brother, he can choose to be here or choose to go and i support which ever he decides.


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## MarriedWifeInLove

vthomeschoolmom said:


> Amazon.com: The Cure for Alcoholism: Drink Your Way Sober Without Willpower, Abstinence or Discomfort (9781933771557): Roy Eskapa PhD, David Sinclair PhD: Books
> 
> Read it.


Will do. Will send a copy to her/husband also.

Thanks!


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## MarriedWifeInLove

Blanca said:


> my brother thought AA was stupid too. i guess its not for everyone. He's on some medication that stops all the cravings for alcohol. so far it has really helped him. he's been sober a few months now. you could talk to a doctor about those options. but in the end not everyone wants to live. as i told my brother, he can choose to be here or choose to go and i support which ever he decides.


It's hard when its your child though, and so young. I will definitely research the medication option - we haven't thought of that.


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## amucher

I'm sorry to hear that...my brother has the same problem. Thankfully, he's been sober for a few months. And i understand how you feel, my mom has the same feelings. It has taken many years away from her without her even knowing. It is true you can get them medication to stop the cravings. I think he began to take those once, just be careful she doesn't get addicted to them. He got addicted to them and he had to stop.


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## Mom6547

Married...I strongly suggest you read the book I suggested. If you get told about Naltrexone, the way it is used in the USA is useless. By itself it does exactly NOTHING to reduce or eliminate alcoholic cravings. The book I mention talks about what it DOES do. I still have to get a handle on the social and habitual elements of my alcoholism. But the physical is SOOOO much less as to make the other possible where before I really thought that I just could never ever stop drinking.


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## Mom6547

MarriedWifeInLove said:


> Will do. Will send a copy to her/husband also.
> 
> Thanks!


Sorry! I did not see this before my latter reply. Please feel free to email me privately if you have any questions.


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## MarriedWifeInLove

vthomeschoolmom said:


> Sorry! I did not see this before my latter reply. Please feel free to email me privately if you have any questions.


I will. This is a problem that has not only ruined her health at this point, but just about destroyed her marriage too - it might be too late for that...but I'm more concerned about her health at this point. It's reached a matter of life or death (literally) for her.

Don't understand it either - wasn't raised in a drinking family.


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## Mom6547

Yes a matter of life and death. I am so nowhere near there. For me I could still hide if from almost everyone if I chose to.

In my opinion, most of what we think we know about alcoholism is wrong. Moral failing, Higher Power... Those things have helped many people white knuckle through what is basically physical nightmare. 

When you smoke cigarettes, you have a chemical dependency. Remove the dependency, and over time the cravings get less and less and less. As a former smoker I can attest to this. I cannot imagine ever going back to smoking. For alcoholics, when they drink, the receive a message to their endorphin (their survival) system. The message is pleasure, pleasure, go, go, go. This teaches the brain that alcohol is good and the more the better. The problem with this is it is not just a chemical dependency. If you remove the alcohol, studies show that *alcoholic craving increased over time.* 

What this guy Sinclair in Finland discovered is that you can re-train the brain. Like Pavlov's retraining the dog not to expect food at the ringing of a bell, you can retrain your brain not to get an endorphin response when drinking. A process called pharmacological (because drug is used) extinction. Basically you take a medication before you ever drink alcohol. It occupies the endorphin receptors so that they cannot respond to the alcohol. Over time (the book says three months, many people experience it takes longer) the desire for alcohol Just Goes Away. 

Your daughter is dealing with millions of years of survival evolution.

If you are not a drinking family, your daughter may not also have to deal with things like social situations. If she is self medicating (or was before it got so out of hand) then those issues will need to be dealth with. 

There is a story in the book of a man who literally was killing himself. Saved himself following the Sinclair Method.

I wish you luck.


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## major misfit

I just wanted to empathize with you. My 24yo daughter is an alcoholic. She is also ill with Borderline Personality Disorder. It's a nightmare. Like yourself, her whole family has done what we could to "help" her. I don't want to bury my daughter either. I am scared every day of my life for her. I had to recognize my enabling in the situation and BACK OFF. I had to turn her life back over to her, and let the consequences fall where they may. Her illness makes other methods virtually impossible to implement. This is truly the worst situation I've ever been in in my life. And I've been in some pretty tough ones. 

My prayer will be for your daughter to stop drinking. That your family will be restored and whole. That SHE will be restored and whole to you all. I'm so sorry that you're dealing with this. I know how frightening and painful it is. *hug*


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## Mom6547

Major Misfit (weird name since it seems to me you aren't) could you please get a copy of the book I reference above? Pretty please? With catsup on top?


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## major misfit

VHSM...my weird name suits me, lol. Maybe it's just how I see myself. I WILL check out the book you referenced, and MAYBE order it. (I already have a ton of books on order, that's why I say maybe..my debit card is smoking from xmas and everything else, lol). I've ordered a ton of books on dealing with the borderline. When I pass from this world, and they come in and clean out my crap I've accumulated over the years, they're (whoever "they're" is) going to think I was nuts. Ah well. Thank you for posting up the link. I will definitely check it out.


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## Mom6547

major misfit said:


> VHSM...my weird name suits me, lol. Maybe it's just how I see myself.


Oh goodness, I hope I did not offend!



> I WILL check out the book you referenced, and MAYBE order it. (I already have a ton of books on order, that's why I say maybe..my debit card is smoking from xmas and everything else, lol). I've ordered a ton of books on dealing with the borderline. When I pass from this world, and they come in and clean out my crap I've accumulated over the years, they're (whoever "they're" is) going to think I was nuts. Ah well. Thank you for posting up the link. I will definitely check it out.


I so here you. I can give you the 1,000 foot overview so you can tell if it is something you care about.

Historically alcoholism has been viewed as a psychological problem and a moral failure. That is the crux of the AA stuff. There is a lot of character examination. (No one is bashing AA here. I, personally, am very skeptical of any group that claims to be the ONLY route or solution or way. Also I found it hard to make up a higher power I did not really believe in in order for that power to help me. Anyway I digress. It is clear that AA and other 12 step programs have been more helpful than anything else that has come popularly along.) 

This author tells the story of a Finnish scientist who discovered some stuff. Without going into the details that the book goes into, basically when we drink, the alcohol triggers a response in the endorphin system, much the same way hunter gathers received a response from the endorphin system when they ate calorie and nutrient dense fruit. The endorphin system (pretty sure it is endorphin... the fight or flight/ way good way bad brain stem reaction) is telling the body FRUIT GOOD YUM YUM to that you will be interested in pursuing it in the future. Alcohol does this as well, and for those of us with genetically fine tuned systems, too well.

So basically as someone drinks, their brain is basically learning that this is a good behavior, that their survival instinct tells them to do it. As Pavolv's dogs were conditioned to salivate with the bell, so we have been conditioned to drink. 

As Pavlov then removed the salivation through extinction, so too Sinclair of Finland found that you can remove the need to drink through pharmacological extinction. You can reteach the brain that drinking is NOT good by removing the endorphin response to drinking. A medication is taken before any drinking. It occupies the endorphin receptors so that the alcohol cannot trigger them. Over time, the book says 3 months, online people I have been in contact with say closer to 6mo - 1 yr, the desire for alcohol just goes away.

AA has about a 2% success rate with sobriety without lapses. Kinda depressing that the MOST successful treatment has only a 2% success rate. But IF AA is fighting survival biology with 12 steps, one can see how one could not expect a high success rate. Don't get me wrong, I am VERY glad AA is available for people who can make use of it.

Apparently The Sinclair Method, as it is called, has an 80% success rate. 

The book goes into great detail about the science and the history leading up to this as well as why this science is not yet wide spread and there are nay sayers at all levels, from public officials to treatment providers to medical doctors. It doesn't take a rocket science to figure that self interest and money play a role.

I hope this info is helpful.

S


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## MarriedWifeInLove

Well, here's an update.

Daughter mixed too much booze with her medications (she has BPD also), and attacked her husband and choked, bit and hit him.

So - she is now in her own padded cell in a hospital.

I hate to say this but it's exactly where she needs to be at this time. She is a danger to herself and obviously her husband also.

I'm hoping she'll get the help she needs...will keep you updated, but at least she's safe where she is right now.


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## MarriedWifeInLove

And yet another update.

Things are looking up for my daughter! Yeah....

While in the hospital they looked at her meds and discovered she was on 3 anti-psycotic meds they didn't believe she needed. So they took her off 2 of them and put her on Lithium. What a difference! It's been a week and she is like herself again. Said she feels good, peppy, energetic, etc.

In addition, she hasn't had a drink since she was in the hospital. They got her through the DT's and she is faithfully taking the drug they put her on for the alcohol cravings.

They also convinced her to start journaling her feelings to help deal with them.

My daughter sounds like her old self again. I was amazed and she said she feels better and her husband says things are definitely different.

The only crappy thing is the husband took leave and came back to our state for the holidays and my daughter is alone with her cats because "his" dad said she couldn't come to their house and her husband didn't stand up for her! Grrrr...I know she's put him through hell, but he's 30 years old - time to stand up to mommy and daddy.

But, she's handling it well and says she feels fine and will be fine. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but I'm proud of her now and hope things are finally turning around.

Thanks for the support!


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## RandomDude

I'm 26 soon and I have pancreatitis too from over-drinking in the past and I'm married with a kid heh

Glad to know things are looking up


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## amigo1

have you watched the show intervention on a and e? I recommend it!


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## Mom6547

One day at a time MWIF. I am so glad to hear things are better than the last update.


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## MarriedWifeInLove

Thanks everyone - one day at a time - it's day #7 thus far.

Keeping my fingers crossed!


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