Alcoholic Mother

[Lights18]

My mother has been an alcoholic for a long time now. She has a period of time that lasts a few months in which she does not drink, but now she is back to drinking. My father works in another city and only comes home on the weekends which is when my mother stops drinking. I love him very much and feel so sorry for him because he works so hard for us and my mother is drinking her life away.

What do I do? My mother had a psychologist and went to meetings for a while but it never worked. I'm leaving to another country this summer and she will be home all alone and my brother and his wife are moving out.. I'm afraid she will just drink so much that she will die. I'm afraid and I also don't think she will ever stop drinking, which will lead to a divorce and my father has already said he once wanted to committ suicide because he almost lost everything due to her drinking. I am very angry and afraid.. I'm a 16 year old with no where else to turn, please help me.

[turnera]

Go online and find the closest Al Anon meeting to you. Start going THIS WEEK! They will help you learn what you can and can't - and should or shouldn't - do.

[Lizzie60]

I agree .. you need to get into a support group.. you can't deal with this on your own.. this is too big for you.. and you're too young to be your mother's mother..

 

Good luck..

[turnera]

One thing you will learn at AlAnon is that children of alcoholics grow up thinking that THEY have to start being the parent. It's a sick, dysfunctional dynamic but it always happens, because the alcoholic gives up his responsibilities, so the kid takes up the slack. And thus creates an even sicker circular downturn of events. AlAnon will teach you how and when and IF you should get involved.

[rocket182]

I grew up with my mother constantly drinking and doing drugs and ended up leaving home at the age of 14 because I was going down a bad path. It's hard because you have to take care of her and you have nobody to take care of you. It robs you of your childhood and you can't let that continue. I agree you need to get help figuring out what to do and possibly get memebers of your family to have an intervention. Alcoholism doesn't just hurt you, it could end up killing her. My mother died suddenly two weeks ago at the age of 52 because she had done so much drinking it had ruined her esophagus and eventually it just ripped and caused internal bleeding. This is something very serious and it will be very hard to do alone. Make sure you have a good support system behind you.

[AVR1962]

Lights18.....I would like to suggest that you read a current book about alcoholism, just the little bit you have described here does not sound like alcoholism. Alcoholics don't stop on the weekends. I come from an alcoholic family and accepted it as normal life until I went to counseling for my husband's drinking. I was in the late 20's before I could identify that I had come from an alcoholic family and it was then thru reading and many group sessions with other adult children of alcoholics that I began to understand it all better. I wish you the best! Don't worry about your brother....unless he is very young and unable to care for himself and is being neglected because of your mother's drining habits, he will make it just like you have.