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Here, four people who grew up with an alcoholic parent share their stories.
These stories have been collected by ‘Teens Affected by Addiction’, a Young Social Innovators project from Mount Mercy College in Cork, with the aim of raising awareness about how addiction impacts children.
“I will never get my childhood back”
“My life as a child of an alcoholic parent was frightening and lonely. My dad was a chronic alcoholic. I had a different childhood to all my friends: no birthday parties, couldn’t invite friends over to the house, and Christmas was a nightmare.
There was no one I could talk to and no one could help me, I just had to put up with it.
When I was 17 I had no choice but to leave home. I had to live my own life. My mother was heartbroken but she knew I had to go.
When I was 18, I was able to get counselling which was a great help to me. I was able to understand that alcoholism was an illness. A few months after leaving home my dad turned his life around and stopped drinking.
I will never get my childhood back but I now have a great relationship with my father and my mother now has the life she deserves. I hope this story can give other children some hope and let them know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.”
“Missing you”
The following is a short poem a woman sent to us about her father’s alcoholism.
I don’t miss the sense of invisibility to you,
I don’t miss listening constantly for the front door,
I don’t miss watching your face to decipher your mood,
I don’t miss dodging your verbal assaults,
I don’t miss the sense of being so small,
I don’t miss the enormity of you and your drink,
I don’t miss the deep shame,
I don’t miss everyone covering up for you,
I don’t miss everyone knowing but me,
I don’t miss the smell of drink,
I don’t miss the fear of drink,
I don’t miss my friends knowing,
I don’t miss no-one caring about me,
I don’t miss fear,
I don’t miss loving you,
I don’t miss hating you,
I don’t miss you.
“We had food in the house but it wasn’t for us – it was for the social worker to see.”
“My alcoholic parent was my mother. She always drank. She started when she was young. When she was a child her father abused her and her brothers. They were battered by their father constantly. They locked their doors every night to keep their father out. She was beaten badly and was always expected to act like a lady. She started drinking to forget the pain she had to go through. This doesn’t make what she did to her children any bit forgivable.
When I was a child my uncle and aunts tried to take me away from my home by taking me on day trips with my sister. Back then I thought my mother would heal. My sister and I used to beg my uncle and aunts to bring us home so we could mind our mother. We didn’t want to upset her by being away for too long. One of my uncles was like a father to me. His oldest daughter and I look like brother and sister. We are just as close too. They tried to help me and give me a better life but they couldn’t.
My mom had a lot of ‘boyfriends’. They never really stayed too long. A small few used to beat me. These men were constantly in our house so we never really questioned a strange man in our house. It was normal for us.
At 15 years old I would come home from school and meet up with my mother and grandmother in the pub. My mother would buy me beer and I would sit in the pub with my drunken mother and help her get home. My home was filthy. There used to be dogs running through the house constantly and the house was never cleaned. We had food but it wasn’t for us. The food was perfect but we were not allowed eat it as it was only for when the social workers called so it would look like she was feeding us. In reality we were starving.
I started hanging out with a very rough group where I lived. They were drinking constantly and doing drugs. Eventually, I got away from them and my mother. I ran from Ireland at 16 to the States to my father. My sister was so upset with me for leaving her with my mother back in Ireland.
Now I’m living in America with a beautiful wife and three amazing children. Sometimes what happened still affects me but I try to block it out and ignore it and carry on. I’m honestly not recommending running away. I am planning on coming back to Ireland soon to sort out a few things with my mother.
“I’ve never not know Mum to have her cans by her chair and her vodka stashed away under the bed”
Well to begin with there’s a common misconception that men are generally the alcoholics in a family but when it’s the mother, the nucleus of the family is destroyed and everything falling apart becomes an inevitable fate.I come from a small family with it just being my mum, dad and my brother and I. We’ve been battling with my mother’s alcoholism for as long as I remember, I’ve never not know her to have her cans by her chair and her vodka stashed away under the bed. It wasn’t that I always saw it as the norm but when you don’t know any different it does tend to be a bit more difficult to imagine the situation differently. I’m actually very happy to see the back of 2014 as from December 2013 my whole family spiralled out of control and I spent more times in hospital than anywhere else.My parents split in December 2013 after 21 years married (I am 20 years old) my mum’s alcoholism was at its peak. Having been in and out of hospital for the past six years due to liver failure, she was on a path to destruction. In those months, mum had fallen whilst drunk and tried to hit my father with a golf club and broke her femur. She had several serious operations and she nearly died as her blood is extremely thin due to medication and alcoholism.Mum came out of hospital and continued to drink and began running around saying that she was fine and could walk. She fell hundreds of times and it became so bad she now can’t walk properly.I live with my grandmother, having left school at 17 as I suffered from depression and I went back to do my Leaving Cert and moved out of my home. Within months a series of events led to both my father and brother leaving and moving into an apartment and my mum was left wallowing in her drunken states ringing and abusing everybody (she still does this).I contacted the HSE in January 2014 with several emails sent to all organisations that support victims of alcoholism, I got a lot of reaction. I was furious that I spent years sitting in my mothers doctor’s surgery with my dad begging for ways out. They would always look at us helplessly and say “move out”. I felt embarrassed and as if there were no light at the end of the tunnel. My grandmother who I live with and who’s been a mother to me all my life has had a nervous breakdown and right now I spend my days working eight hour shifts as a photographer in a studio and then I go home to this mess.My mum has been in hospital about eight times since February 2014 when a stomach ulcer burst and she was found in a pool of blood by my grandmother. I soon lost faith but I always tried to get help; my letter to the HSE got me six months with a councillor but I was so busy with my Leaving Cert and everything I just couldn’t find time to go.
Now I am still living with this situation but I try my very best to overcome it everyday and I refuse any kind of medication such as an “anti depressant” as I believe it’s just a easy way for doctors to dose people up and make money. I wish to study politics and history and possibly then business in university in the future and I hope that one day I can actually help people.
This story is shared by ‘Teens Affected by Addiction’, a Young Social Innovators project from Mount Mercy College in Cork. The students have recently received funding from the YSI Den to publish a book with the stories of adults who grew up with an addict in the home. Please see www.teensaffectedbyaddiction.com or email affectedbyaddictionysi@gmail.com if you would like to share your story.
Follow Teens Affected by Addiction on Twitter: @affbyaddiction
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I remember a small toy being given to me one morning. It was Donald Duck in a small car. It shouldn’t matter much any other day of the year but this was Christmas morning and my mother had gone through hell trying to get something for me and my brother and sister. My father had pissed away what money they had on drink that week. So she was left with buying me a small toy car,it fit in the palm of my hand. I don’t remember that day much, I wouldn’t even want to. But it’s the fear of someone coming home and knowing that something will happen that’s the one thing I’ll always remember from having an alcoholic parent. There was never any violence thank God but there was mental anguish. I was only 9 and I would beg him not to open the front door to go back to the pub for more after all the shouting. I stood in front of that door a good few times. Stopping one parent from getting more drunk while another threatening to walk out for good. That’s no way for a child to ever grow up. Ever.
An Observer, your post is just so heartbreakingly sad. I have a pain in my heart after reading it.
That last girl is going through hell though with her mother. I came through the other side, we all did I suppose. My father rarely drinks now as he has cancer and had a heart attack in the space of a year. He would help you out in any situation and I have good memories but when he was drunk,especially on whisky, it ruined our lives. And I will never put my family through that.
A friend of mine (who is in her mid forties) has to care for her mum who is rapidly declining due to Alzheimer’s, and her dad is a serious alcoholic.
Her mum refuses to leave the house as she becomes very afraid and confused even when my friend tries to bring her to her own house, she also has to go down the local and collect her drunken dad virtually on a daily basis. It has put her marriage under immense strain, she has had to live this life on a daily basis with little or no support from the HSE. I see the pain in her eyes and feel hopeless and helpless, all I can do is be there for her, even if it only means being at the other end of the phone.
We cannot and should not hide from this, alcoholism is very real and very destructive.
Go raibh maith agaibh as na scéalta tragóideacha uilig. Ná dearmad go bhfuil Al-anon (ní AA) ann do dhaoine atá faoi thionachar alcólach ach nach bhfuil faidhb ólacháin acu fhéin. Tá Al-anon saor in aisce agus tá cruinnithe rialta ar fud na tíre. Grá agus Ádh:)
Completely resonates with me, I gave up on my dad many years ago for destroying my childhood with his drinking, I have erased every childhood memory so I can’t remember anything before I was 18, erased everything as there’s nothing to remember except for pubs, drink and getting money for more drink. Worst moment was when he came home drunk from work with cans of dog food and nothing for me aged 11 , that was it for me. I’m 38 now and He’s 74 and still drinking every day, how he does it is beyond me. The only people he speaks to are his fellow drunks and his pet dog, neither of them criticise or question him so he doesn’t want to know about his family or me. We are done.
From the age of 5 ish all I can remember is the feeling in the pit of my stomach knowing it was nearly time for ” him” to fall home and trouble to start . Could be the slightest thing and my poor mam would get it . We were terrified and tried to protect her as well as a 4 and 5 year old could . My mam tried to get us to bed every weekend early to protect us but we wanted to mind her . We would be wrecked in school but I never told a single person . It went on until I was 19 although the violence calmed when my brother got old enough to stand up to my father. He never laid a hand on us , my mother would have killed him with her bare hands . She passed away 17 years ago on St Stephens day aged 46 . I speak to my father because he is my father but miss that woman more than I can say and wish she was here so that as an adult I could treat her to the life she truly truly deserved with my husband and daughter . I have had to have counselling and am on tablets which is all related to his alcoholism and my mans death and I don’t touch alcohol and still don’t like the smell of it and hate shouting . My father has not drank in 20 years but too much damage has been done for me to care .
This article brought many memories back,that I’ve beried for years, i have so much to say, but wont!
I was a referee between my Mam & Dad, my dad the alcoholic, physically abused all of us, never my mother, I always remember the fear, the fear of the unknown, what will the evening bring..so difficult to be brought up in an atmosphere like that. The damage is so invisible, on the outside, things can look perfect, the reality can be rotten to the core.
This should be talked about more, as teenagers need to know alcoholism is abnormal.
Before monkey see, monkey do.
Just shared this with someone that needs to consider it. My 12 year old came to me at Xmas & said my mam wont stop drinking & all her friends drink. After an approach to this now former partner she made my daughter’s confirmation a p#ss up that lasted 3 days. I have a devastated 12 year old. How do I stop this distruction of my childrens mother. Although no longer a partner (thankfully) I can only feel empathy for this woman as she is wrecking her own life & damaging her relationship with her children. I do not engage in bashing her to her/my children as this is damaging them. I dont know how to protect them from the above saga.
Hey Mjhint
I’m not a councillor and I’m probably stating the obvious but the one way you can protect them is by being for them. They know their mother is an alcoholic and there isn’t any shying away from that. If she really wants help then she will seek it. If she feels forced to,chances are she will only relapse anyway. Alcoholics will very rarely stop drinking for anyone or anything. If they don’t want to do it for their children’s sakes,then they aren’t going to at all. But be there for your kids like you are and they will always remember you for it.
Observer I agree. I know I cant stop it as I gave up years ago. The problem is I have a determined 12 year old who believes she can. I have a good relationship with my kids so im hoping that will be enough. As a normal insecure parent though I worry it isn’t.
This is the sad situation that lies with our children in Ireland and the justice that goes untold ! Fathers that have to see their children go through the pain of a ex partner that is an alcoholic is heartbreaking in this country. As the rights that fathers have are very very slim when it comes to custody of their children. Who can protect a child when the custody rights stand with a mother, and who can protect a child when the mother is an alcoholic? It’s a bad ass system in this country.
If you feel your ex partner is damaging your children you have to protect them. If they don’t live with you seek custody if she puts them at risk report to social workers. You don’t want to get into slagging her but you to need to limit her damage of them. It may also make her get the help she needs and give their mother back to your child. If no one listens keep a record and keep reporting good luck
I’m not talking of my children, my point is about couples that are separated and if the child’s mother is an alcoholic, the system does not go in favour of the father, as in seeking full custody. It’s a poor poor system that needs to be changed.
Mjhint
An Observers points are excellent.. Your “determined 12 yr old” is in for very frustrating teenage years if he/she thinks she can make her mother stop drinking. Would it help if ye spoke with Al Anon?
My brother was a very heavy drinker and I tried to be that one to make him stop. I never succeeded. He was great fun. A good guy. But drink made him nasty and loud.
Pick up the phone and get advice on how to handle this. Best of luck..
Floored with the emotions reading these stories, struck cords within me.
Needs to be talked about more.
Its the hidden Irish secret.
The destruction it causes is unreal.
This horrible “illness” can run in families for generations. My father was alcoholic and developed heart disease and then throat cancer before passing away at the relatively young age of 50, he was never violent but very quiet and to his great credit he was sober for a year before his untimely death. His illness impacted on me in that I was consumed with shame, had very low self esteem and despite hating alcohol because of all this I eventually became alcoholic myself which almost destroyed my own life. Now I’m sober, one day at a time, for the past two and a half years thanks to AA, and have reclaimed a lot of what I “lost” after hitting my own personal rock bottom. The best part of this is that I have broken the chain and my own beautiful children are still young and only “know” me as a normal sober Daddy. For this I am eternally grateful.
There is help out there but you have to want it and once you’ve made the decision to seek help you have climbed the biggest hurdle.
Fantastic article by the way !!!
Well done frank and from the bottom of my heart I wish you the best of luck . And may your kids enjoy and love their normal sober daddy
Thanks Gwen. There is always a solution to any problem. Luckily I found it. Cheers !
And I thought all children are better off with Mam and Dad, always, no exceptions, ever, no matter what….
Because there’s no such thing as a gay alcoholic. ….
Just making the point that good parenting is not always about who or what the parents are, but how they are. That’s all.
@An Observer, very sad post mate. It resonates with my own childhood. I used to be terrified walking through the village with my mates in case I saw my dad staggering up the village out of his bin mortifying me. I lived in constant fear of this.
This article has really effected me after reading it, it has had made me realize what i have been suppressing for years.
The anger towards my Dad & his alcoholism, & how this has rippled & affected me throughout my life.
My mother should have left him years ago, without subjecting, herself & her children through years of hell.
I am not blaming him for all my issues, but any childhood trauma effects how we are as adults.
I had a childhood stutter, my own alcoholism issues, self harm, suicide attempts, teenage pregnancies, abusive relationships, low self esteem, no confidence.
Its only recently, after years of searching in the wrong places I have found help through a professional therapist.
Hopefully throughout time this will all heal.
Through darkness theres light.
Bravely told stories, congratulations for that. The drinks industry should be made far more responsible for these tragedies. They should be forced into setting up recovery programmes and family help forums and advisers. Any money the government collects from minimum alcohol pricing or increased taxes on same should be channeled to this cause.
Violence on the streets, VD, unplanned pregnancies, car crashes, suicides, battered spouses and children just some of the social carnage for which they are responsible.
It’s time to make them pay.
Yes Robby there is some merit in your argument particularly the funding of supports for alcohol casualties. I do however believe that the most responsibility lies with society. I drink alcohol & I love it & the good times I have had consuming it. Im told im not a drinker because I might have 3 or 4 pints on a night out & I would only do this once every 2to 3 months. Its all of us that must take collective responsibility for alcohol abuse. Seeing someone f##ked up every weekend should not be a badge of honour & yes we can get drunk if we so choose but when it becomes a lifetime achievement award regularly we must be able to say that its the sign of a problem & not acceptable behaviour.
Mjhint, I’m in the same fortunate position as you in that I have a drink when I want, which lately, is hardly at all. The irish attitude to drink is warped and unacceptable in many other countries. The drink industry and government foster this attitude to suit their own needs and must take much of the responsibility. I agree with you that our attitude must change as a society. Equally, our leaders must lead and have failed to do so. Witness the shoving of a pint of porter into the hand of any foreign dignitary to suggest this somehow defines us. Diageo must be thrilled.
I really enjoyed reading that.A couple of my uncles are alcoholics and they couldn’t be fu*king bothered.Family left them.they need proper help.
No you will never get your childhood back.
BUT you can make sure your kids have a better childhood than you did.
In a way you get to re-live ‘a different’ childhood through your kids. Do all the things you never did when you were small, do them as an adult with your child.
You can erase the past. It has made you who you are today. Look to the future. Learn by your parents failures and mistakes. Don’t make the same ones..
That us so true. I too know what it’s like to live with an alcoholic parent. He was never violent but his whole life revolved around drink and still does to a certain extent. My mother passed away from cancer when I was ten and my brother was seven. We were left to our own devices a lot of the time. I remember being cold and hungry and missing a lot of school because there was no-one to get us up & ready in the morning. Having said that we had an amazing neighbour family who pretty much reared us with their own kids. Only for them I dread to think what could have come of us.
I am now happily married with teenage sons of my own. I do drink alcohol but not to excess, and it certainly would never ever impact on the kids lives. I am living my life now. Enjoying every proud moment of watching my boys grow up to be gentlemen. Encouraging them and nurturing them. Helping them become responsible human beings with a healthy attitude to life and a healthy respect for themselves and others.
My Mam was an alcoholic, she passed away 9yrs ago at 47yrs old. She had literally drunk herself to death. I remember being so embarrassed about it, that I told people for years that she’d died from a brain haemorrhage. It’s only the last year or so I’ve been able to talk about her & her illness with out getting really mad & upset. I have forgiven her but I don’t think I’ll ever forget….. I’ve found the more I talk about her the easier it is to begin to understand why she drank the way she did. She had a tough start in life & both her parents were alcoholics so although it’s no excuse it goes some way to explain things.
Alcohol is the magic potion that can turn a Saint into a Satan!!
How people read this stuff and then continue to cry “nanny state” whenever somebody tries to tackle problem-drinking, remains the ultimate question.
Yes Neil, and your spot-on comment is getting more red thumbs that green ones even at this early stage. Denial isn’t a river in Egypt.
It is great that people opened up on here today and spoke about what they went through as a child and I know it takes some courage to open up . I hope these stories will help even one person who might read them today . it is sad that what goes on behind closed doors , stays behind closed doors . his many of us was told that when we were growing up ? Sadly it’s still the case today .
I see an expression
So clear and so true
That changes the atmosphere
When you walk to the room
So I try to be like you
Try to feel it like you do
But without you it’s no use
I can’t see what you see
When I look at the world
I had an Alcoholic parent as did most Irish people from working class estates. I also had a fantastic childhood.
People really need to be made aware of this specific part of alcoholism.Great work being done!
my mum is a alcoholic to this day. i dont even know what to do, shes left her job, drinks throughout the day, wont do anything but moan about everything else. I moved away for university, 3 years later she’s still lying with them glazed eyes and high drunk voice. Funny what closed doors can hide. My dads left to fend for her. I dont know wither to hold her hand while nothing changes or hide as i do because I cant bare the rage. she has lost so much already…will she ever give up? I love my mum so much,
My name is Mr Cardenas,my wife was having affair with a senior secretary in her office. I love this woman so much that i would not want to share her with any body. i told her to retire from the job and i would take care of all her needs but she would take it because she is been embraced by everybody in her office, this normally leads to quarrel every-time. i tried all i can to please her and she will promise to be good , some days later she will turn back to her normal way.
i was nearly loosing out, i could not focus in my job, my whole life was full of sorrow and i was thinking i should kill the other man my self and put an end to all this until i saw a testimony from a blog on how DR EDIONWE could cast a love spell to bring lovers back no matter what is behind the disappointment. so i decided to write him via email. edionwesolutiontemple@yahoo.com and now all my wishes are exactly as i wanted. She told me everything that has happened secretly in the past and i forgave her as DR EDIONWE instructed me to and she loves me and care for me as i ever wanted. i know there are many spells that do not work but i want to assure all you out there no matter what you have been trough to have faith and believe that this is the final solution to your problem.
Even if my job is taking most of my time, the little free time i have , i will share the good news to everyone in the world because i know that with love brings happiness and hope for a long life.
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