young-people

by

Getting Sober in Your 20s — Part 2


Alcoholism and addiction are the diseases that will tell you that you do not have them.  The irony of the problem is that recovery from the disease does not require any expensive medication.  Still, it is a doctor who will absolutely confirm the diagnosis but the treatment, abstinence, seems somehow unacceptable to the individual in its clutches.  The rationalization that cutting back or controlling is all that is needed comes to the forefront.  But that is the lie the disease whispers into the ear of the afflicted.

Our society, to this day, is uncomfortable with the idea of alcoholism and addiction.  The picture that gets painted is one of old men who are either one step away from homelessness or already there as being the hallmark of most alcoholics.  And while it is true that those nearing homelessness and in its grips so frequently do suffer from the disease, the reality is that they make up only a very small percentage of all alcoholics in society today.  There is no such thing as being too young to be an alcoholic or too smart.  Alcoholics are frequently high functioning fully employed individuals.  It crosses all races, religions, nationalities, educational and socio-economic states.  It is sneaky, insidious and deadly.

The following are the 20 questions developed by Johns Hopkins University to help the individual with the identification of alcoholism.  Take a minute to read through them and see how many apply to you.

1    Have you lost time from your work because of your drinking?
2    Is drinking making your home life unhappy?
3    Do you drink because you are shy with other people?
4    Is drinking affecting your reputation?
5    Have you ever felt remorse after drinking?
6    Have you gotten into financial difficulties as a result of drinking?
7    Do you turn to lower companions or environment when drinking?
8    Does your drinking make you careless of your family’s welfare?
9    Has your ambition decreased since drinking?
10    Do you want a drink the next morning?
11    Do you crave a drink at a definite time daily?
12    Does drinking cause you to have difficulty in sleeping?
13    Has your efficiency decreased since drinking?
14    Is drinking jeopardizing your job or business?
15    Do you drink to escape from worries or trouble?
16    Do you drink alone?
17    Have you ever had a complete loss of memory as a result of drinking?
18    Has your physician ever treated you for drinking?
19    Do you drink to build up your self-confidence?
20    Have you ever been to a hospital or institution on account of drinking?

And their conclusion is: If you have answered YES to any one of the questions, there is a definite warning that you may be an alcoholic.
If you have answered YES to any two, the chances are that you are an alcoholic.
If you have answered YES to three or more, you are definitely an alcoholic.

Please remember, the above is the conclusion of experts in the field of alcoholism and addiction.

Below are 5 video which were created by Alcoholics Anonymous.  In the videos you will hear from people under 30 who will tell you about their alcoholism, what it looked liked, what happened, and what they have done.

Young People’s Videos

1. On the Beach Flash Player
2. Alcoholics Anonymous Flash Player
3. Young People’s Animation VideoFlash Player
4. 25 and Under New Flash Player
5. A Group of People Just Like Me New Flash Player

If you have more questions about alcoholism and Alcoholics anonymous follow this link:

www.aa.org

You should also feel free to contact me.

by

Getting Sober In Your 20s


I have long thought about writing on this subject but have been reticent about “outing” myself.  But that has changed.  In January of this year, 2012, a young woman who I was friends with lost her battle with alcohol and prescription medication.   A little bit about her:  She was 31 years old at the time of her death.  I had known her for 3 years at that time and we had become close, closer than I even knew.  She came from a good family of substantial means.  She was a Yale graduate and a navy veteran.  She was tall, lean, well-liked, and by all outward appearances, in great health.  She was very athletic, able to run a marathon.  But in the end, all that was simply window dressing to a serious problem.

I have been a member of Alcoholics Anonymous for almost 14 years now.  I could easily have convinced myself that I did not have a problem with alcohol as I was never an everyday drinker, I had a job that I had held for a long time, and by all outward appearance, I was doing pretty well.  That just was not the case.  My inner turmoil was tremendous and had been that way since I was a teenager.  Whenever I felt an unpleasant emotion or unpleasant situation descending upon me, I would use alcohol at a means to blunt those feelings.  I also used the excuse of drinking to be “more socialable.”  And I really believed that was true!  But the truth was, I was failing to deal with my fears by covering them up which allowed me to do things that scared me.   That is, by any stretch of the imagination, not a healthy way to deal with problems.  In point of fact, it only serves to make the problems worse.

When I stopped drinking my only reason was to gain peace and sanity, neither of wich I had.  I did not believe I had an alcohol problem, but if the Alcoholics Anonymous program would help me with a legion of other problems I had, I would do it.  Fourteen years later I can say that regardless of what I believed all those years ago, my life today is fabulous because I made a commitment to stop drinking and to closely adhere to this 12-step program.   For as much as I hated life back then, I love it now.

My young friend who died early this year had a future as bright as anyone could want.  But I firmly believe she had some inner demons that kept dragging her down.  And within those demons was one in particular that told her that because she was so young and so healthy she could have another drink.  But that was the big lie.  For whatever reason, her last drink killed her.  And the truth is, it did not have to be that way.

I remember my 20s.  I was drinking hard and it never occurred to me that I either had a problem or that my drinking could have killed me.  It was not that I felt invincable, but that I refused to consider my actions as being all that dangerous to my own health and welfare.  Worse, it never occurred to me that it was having a hugely negative effect upon those people in my life, but it did.

I see young people coming into Alcoholics Anonymous all the time, as young as 17 I have seen.  It is extremely difficult for those people to believe that it would be best if they never took another drink.  Their concept of drinking is that it is something everyone does and that they are going to be just fine.  They cannot imagine being out with their friends who are drinking and not drinking themselves.  They are victims to peer pressure and their own faulty thinking.

Here is something to consider.  Have you ever made the statement, even to just yourself, that you need a drink or that you have to have a drink?  Most people would have to honestly answer that question with a “yes.”  The follow-up question necessarily has to be “why?”   Almost without exception, if a person is being entirely honest, the answer is going to come along the lines of having to deal with uncomfortable feelings or situations.  And then the honest person must ask themself how taking a drink is going to help that situation.  And the honest answer is, it will not!  The strong sober person deals with those feelings and situations head-on, without feeling it necessary to anaesthetizing themself.   They will actually view taking a drink as getting in the way of good progress.

Webster’s Dictionary defines sober as “straightforward: serious; plain or subdued; devoid of frivolity, exaggeration, or speculative imagination.”  I particularly like that last definition because it harkens unto “magical thinking.”  That is, the belief that if I take a drink I will somehow be better at something.   That, of course, is totally illogical, but that is also very common thinking.  Everyone does it but it is never right.

People in their 20s, the “Gen-Y” people, are prone to this magical thinking mostly because they lack the experience of life to tell them that the truth lies somewhere else.  It is not their fault.  It is just something every person must go through.  It is really easy for a person in their 20s to deny that they have any problem with alcohol because, as the thinking goes, they are too young to have such a problem.  That, of course, is pure b.s.  A problem drink is any drink that is taken in lieu of something else.

Anther thing, while people in their 20s and 30s may not believe they are immortal, they usually believe they have a lot of time in front of them and that they need not concern themselves with some of their immediate problems.  That somehow, those problems will work themselves out or that they will simply grow out of them or that they are just going through a phase.  All of this happens when anyone, regardless of age, is in denial about their root problems.

I feel certain my friend who died was in denial about her vulnerability to her problems with alcohol.  I think everyone uses denial at some time in their life, if not frequently, because a problem or situation feels overwhelming and that somehow, by denying the problem, it will eventually go away or fix itself.  From my own personal experience, I can tell you absolutely that this is just a big lie we tell ourselves. It is never ever true.

To those people who are in their 20s and 30s I ask that you consider if you have ever wondered if you have a drinking problem, or if it has ever been suggested that you might have one, that you take that extremely seriously.  Consider if a doctor suggested you might have skin cancer, would you ignore that in the hope that it would just go away?   Of course not!  Problem drinking is a medical problem in exactly the same way.  It is also, by definition, a spiritual problem.   I promise that those of you in your 20s and 30s, if you were to go to an alcoholics anonymous meeting you will not be in the presence of a bunch of old people who are one step removed from homelessness, although such people certainly attend such meetings.  In fact, you will find there is an entire portion of Alcoholics Anonymous devoted to young people that includes meetings that are mostly attended by young people.  There is a whole group of young people in Alcoholics Anonymous who refer to themselves as “never having had a legal drink,” and yet they have stayed away from alcohol for many years.

If you think you have a problem and want more information, feel free to contact me via email here, or, you can always find a central office of Alcoholics Anonymous listed in phone books and on the Internet regardless of where you live.

My hope in posting this it that it will give pause to young people to at least consider how they drink.  Even the slightest suspicion is worthy of attention.

by

A Young Person’s Guide to Future Success


When you are 18 years old and thrust out into the world having graduated from high school, the world can seem a foreboding, scary, and intimidating place.  Most 18-year-olds have only the vaguest idea of what they want to do with themselves for the rest of their lives.  And half of those who think they do are wrong.  The question becomes, how does one successfully navigate those years and do what is best for themself?  I have a few simple suggestions that do not guarantee success, but do guard against failure.

Figure out what thrills you.  This concept, while simple in form, can be most difficult to follow through.  For at least a year prior to graduating from high school, young people are bombarded with how to get into college but with little guidance of where to go and what to study.  The most successful people of all time have always done something that thrills them, something that wholly and complete draws them in and makes them thirst to know all they can in that field and be the best they can be.  It is always a mistake to allow making a substantial income to be crucial.  It is always better to have a job you love and live on a modest income than a job you hate to satisfy the desire for a large income.

It is not unusual for an 18-year-old to claim he does not know what he wants to do.  That being the case, he should avoid college until he does know.  Get out into the world and earn a living for a while, and figure out what you want.  But if for any reason you do find yourself in college, take a course of study, preferably liberal arts, that will serve you well regardless of what direction you eventually move in.  And do not let taking 5, 6, or even 7 years of study to graduate be an impediment to getting a degree in a field you love.  I can assure you, employers never look at how long it took you to graduate, only what you studied and what your GPA was.  And if you cannot maintain at least a 3.0 GPA you might consider two things, first, you are in the wrong field of study, or second, you are not committing yourself to do whatever it takes to get good grades, in which case dropping out until you can commit is not only cost-effective but sensible.

Have a plan!  Once you decide what you want to do, decide where you want to be in that career field when you are 45-years old.  It is all right if it is a “pie in the sky” scenario.  Even that gives you a place to start.  Once you know what your 45th year should look like, you can research what it is going to take to make that come true.  The first question is, what schools are best suited to giving you respectable degree in your chosen field.  Then, after undergraduate education is a graduate degree desirable or necessary.  If so, make a plan to include schools that will fill that need.  Now at this point many of you will point out that you will probably already be carrying a huge student loan debt.  Not to fear.  Your plan will include a job search, upon college graduation, that will land you a position in a company that will pay for in part, if not entirely, your education in graduate school.  Some companies will pay, at least in part, for education unrelated to your job.

Gain and maintain a health mind and a healthy body.  One of the unfortunate idea young people have about college is that it is a time to party hard.  The problem with this should be obvious, if you are focused on partying how can you expect to succeed in academics?  A few can but most cannot.  And even those who can, do so at their own peril.  Those four or five years are your first chance to teach yourself things outside of the home you grew up in and its influences, parents and others.  I am not saying that the occasional party should be avoided, no.  But feeling the need to party every weekend, or even nearly every weekend, is quite unhealthy and inevitably leads to unhealthy habits.

Equally important during this time, and in life in general, is dealing with your fears.  The person has not be born who does not have a fear of something.  Most common is a fear of failure.  But also is the fear of rejection, fear of success, and any other fear that gets between you and success.  Most fears are actually fairly easily dealt with once they are brought to the light of day, once you share them with someone who can help.  It is not unusual, for example, for college students to have problems with retaining the material.  This problem can be overcome by simply bringing it to the professor and requesting help.  All people need help.  Successful people get help as quickly as possibly once they realize their dilemma.  There is no disgrace in saying you do not understand something and need help.

Always have a “Plan B”.  This is actually a very simple concept.  The successful person recognizes that failure is unavoidable but it is what you do when faced with failure that influences future success.  Today’s failure may simply be a signal that your plan needs altering, possibly only slightly.  But it may also be a sign that your planned in too flawed to ever be successful, and this is when Plan B comes to fore.  For example, my plan was to become a family doctor but along the way I discovered I really am not good at dealing with people’s problems.  But along the way I discovered also that I was a fabulous researcher and my energies needed only redirection.  Or, I was on my way to becoming a world-famous computer engineer, but along the way I discovered I hated learning micro-electronics and all that goes with it.  But I also discover I was particularly good at math, and since I really love math, maybe my future lies in that direction.

Having a “Plan C” is not a bad idea either.

Do not allow yourself to be sidetracked.  Life is fraught with distractions, many of which have the ability to take us off our desired course.  Chief among these, I believe, are romantic relationships.  While in college our job is to learn.  But where we are social creatures, it is only natural that we form bonds with others.  If we are committed to our college career then we recognize when a relationship is distracting us too much from our stated goal.  This means the intensity of the relationship must be lessened or the relationship ended entirely.  Neither is easy but they are necessary for our future success.  Suffering a failed relationship is a small price to pay for a successful life.

Never compromise on morals and ethics.  Cheating in college is not unusual, and some might even say, epidemic.  One of the most common forms is the purchasing of term papers.  It is an immoral act that speaks to the character of the person.  It is better to fail while doing your own work than pass with someone else’s.  If you never cheat, never lie, you need never explain yourself for your actions will remain above reproach, even when such attempts on your character are made.  Decide on your moral and ethical character and then never give an inch on them.