Saturday, March 06, 1999
True friends don't tolerate drunkenness
BY KRISTA RAMSEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
There are few people we feel entitled to despise. A drunken driver is one of them.
After a recent wave of alcohol-related car crashes, Greater Cincinnatians feel little ambivalence on this issue. We want stricter laws, harsher punishments and more consistent enforcement by courts and police.
The problem is we look for answers from everyone but ourselves.
The paradox is that few other serious crimes are more within our own powers of preventing.
While most of us do not know people who murder and maim, many of us do know people who drink too much. These people — our family and our friends — are one drink and one set of car keys away from becoming a criminal. Or a death notice.
Our polite silence
It is an ugly issue, and yet we surround it with such profound and polite silence. We leave people to deal with substance abuse privately. We deny what we see, what we hear, what we smell.
And then something awful happens, and we murmur, “I always knew he had a drinking problem.”
That “something awful” can be a fatal traffic accident. But it can also be a lost job, failed marriage, ruined friendship, abused child. People who drink too much try to hide their “issue,” but it keeps exploding all around them.
“You'll see them with their kids in the emergency room,” says Jim Heisel, a social worker who specializes in substance abuse treatment. “You'll see them in court, you'll see them in school because their kids are acting out. You'll see them getting a divorce.”
Alcohol claims a lot of lives, often without a drop of blood being shed.
Reluctant to intervene
Still, we watch the carnage with the most thoughtful and gutless patience. We will wait this out. We will wait for the right moment to act. We will wait for this person — this nice, good person — to come to his senses.
It doesn't happen that way.
“In 20 years of doing this work I have rarely ever heard anyone say, "I woke up this morning and decided I want to be sober,'” says Linda Seiter, associate executive director of Sojourner Women's Recovery Services. “When people seek help, it is precipitated by some kind of pressure.”
This is plain, hard truth that will save more lives than new laws or more Breathalyzers. Some people will stop drinking-and-driving only when they stop drinking. And many people will stop drinking only when some circumstance — or some person — forces their hand.
We can be that person.
We must.
“People have to stop thinking of alcohol as a personal problem and start thinking of it as a personal and public health concern,” says Nan Franks Richardson, chief executive officer of the Alcoholism Council.
Here is what the experts say we must do:
Be responsible as a host and friend. “Don't serve alcohol to someone you think has a drinking problem, or at least set a limit on how much you serve,” says Mr. Heisel. Do not allow guests to leave your house if you think they've had too much to drink.
Excessive drinking causes physical, emotional and social problems. Stop finding anything funny about being drunk.
Find the courage to voice your concerns. “You risk offending them, but you also plant a seed,” says Ms. Seiter. “If you say something, and someone else is saying the same thing to them, it will make them think.”
When you speak, be compassionate, calm and specific. “Tell them what you see that causes you pain,” says Mrs. Franks Richardson. “Share your feelings with them — let them know their drinking scares you.”
Be ready to suggest sources of counseling and treatment.
And then tell them the best news.
Substance abuse treatment works. It saves lives, souls, jobs, families and futures.
Krista Ramsey's column appears on Saturdays. Write her at 312 Elm St.Cincinnati 45202.
Krista Ramsey's column appears on Saturdays. Write her at the Enquirer, 312 Elm St. Cincinnati 45202.
RAMSEY ARCHIVE
