Adult Children of Alcoholics - ACOAs

Adult children of alcoholics or the ACOAs often face most of the problems faced by the children and more. ACOAs normally do not realize the root cause for the various physiological, psychological and social problems that they are facing.

ACOAs are often afflicted with various kinds of mental disturbances. They tend to be more aggressive than necessary even in unwarranted situations. They also tend to be impulsive in their actions and decisions. Adult children of alcoholics are prone to mental depressions and are generally unstable in their behaviour.

ACOAs may go in for abuse of a different kind of psychoactive substances. They are unable to handle relationship of any kind and usually tend to shy away from forming a healthy relationship with anyone. They fail miserably in their lives and careers making wrong decisions and choices at every stage in their lives misguided by their parents.

The feeling of failure makes them feel low in self esteem. Adult children of alcoholics often are irresponsible towards their family. They follow the example of their alcoholic parent who themselves have been irresponsible towards their family and children.

ACOAs shy away from people in general and therefore have a lot of problems with their spouses. They generally try to avoid getting intimate as they are unable to trust anyone due to their past experiences. This is due to the fear factor that if they get close to someone they may get hurt just as their parents have hurt them throughout.

Studies in fact show that ACOAs tend to get intimate with people who are alcoholics or who are abusers. This way they are sure and on familiar grounds. They know how to deal with them as they are experienced.

Adult children of alcoholics tend to get into the habit of drinking more than adults who are not from families suffering from alcohol abuse. Genes thus play a major role in the development of the condition of alcoholism.

Adult children of alcoholics are not mentally equipped to deal with stressful situations effectively. Adults from such families tend to be unhealthy and visit their physicians more frequently as compared to people who have grown up in normal families.

Women who have been brought up in families with alcoholics usually have problems with their reproductive systems. They tend to visit gynaecologists more often than the women from normal families.

The spouse of the alcoholic is usually the person who suffers the most. They suffer from a feeling of hatred towards themselves and towards others which results from jealousy, self pity, etc. They also tend to get tired of their lives and start avoiding social contacts. They usually cannot tolerate other families which are very happy and openly start showing contempt and jealousy.

The family burden is more on them as they have to take on the responsibilities of both parents. They tend to be irritated all the time due to this and show their irritation on the alcoholic spouse and on the children. This creates a lot of stress and strain on their relationship with all the members of their family.

Financial problems faced by them are another factor which results from a huge chunk of the earning spent on alcohol. Families of alcoholics have to sacrifice on a lot of privileges and sometimes even basic necessities and this result in further stress. A lot of divorce cases are a result of the influence of alcoholism.