Alcohol
is one of the biggest problems society faces. It is a problem among
all age groups from college students to high school students and
adults. From experience I know drinking can be hard to stop. It is
considered a depressant, which is why many people become addicted to
it because they think it makes them forget about their problems. My
mom has alcoholism; I will never forget what she has done to me. But
I always have and always will forgive her when she makes mistakes
because no one is perfect.
There
are many dangerous effects on the body caused from drinking too much
alcohol such as anemia because it makes blood cell count low. Cancer
can be caused from drinking too much and is known to affect the
liver. One other dangerous long term effect is cirrhosis.
When this happens the liver cannot function; it can also cause
epilepsy which can trigger seizures. There is also a disease called
fatty liver disease, and that is currently what my mom has right now.
It
is more harmful to the body if drinking is started earlier in life. A
young person’s body cannot cope with alcohol the same way an
adult’s body can. Drinking is more harmful to teens than adults
because their brains are still developing throughout adolescence and
well into young adulthood. As long as I can remember, my mom has
drunk alcohol. She told me she started drinking whenever she was in
middle school. She has not stopped since then.
Binge
drinking is the most common pattern of excessive
alcohol use
in the United States. Whenever I used to see my mother drink, she
would start when she woke up and drink all day long. Sometimes she
would not be able to pick me up from school because she was so wasted
she would forget. So I had teachers or the principal take me home
every once in a while.
My
mother’s drinking has always caused issues in my life; some things
I remember well was the time the police had to come for me because
she was having sexual intercourse with other men that were not my dad
so I called the cops on her. After this happened the child protective
services were involved because my mom was drunk and on drugs whenever
the cops came. Another incident caused her to hit my dad in a hotel
because she was drunk and wanted to have sex, and I was lying in bed
with them. He ended up pulling the phone socket out of the wall and
throwing it across the room because he was angry. He did not want to
hurt her; he was bleeding from his nose where my mother’s wedding
ring took a chunk off of his nose. This all happened when I was about
five.
Alcoholism
is a chronic and often progressive disease that includes problems
controlling drinking, being preoccupied with alcohol, and continuing to
use alcohol even when it causes problems. After everything that
happened when I was a child and after multiple attempts to send her
to the best rehabilitation centers all over the country and having an
intervention, she still left me and my dad. She left us because she
was not allowed to drink anymore, or child protective services were
going to take me away.
Most
alcoholics are afraid to admit or see that they are addicted to
drinking so they never think they have a problem. My mother, still to
this day, says she never was an alcoholic, and it does not hurt her
to drink even though she is killing herself. People cannot change for
other people; they have to change for themselves, or they will never
become any better. I learned that my mom did not want to change for
herself. She wanted to change for my dad and me, and she tried over
and over but she kept failing over and over. I could not imagine
having a disease like alcoholism and not being able to fix it and
letting people down over and over.
Counseling
and therapy will not always work when people are alcoholics. It is
one of the worst addictions someone can have, and one of the hardest
to overcome. They might fail at it many times until it finally hits
them, and they change for themselves because they know it is what is
best for them. Sometimes it is easier for alcoholics to change if
they have something to motivate them, but even then it might not
help. Like my dad always told me, alcoholics have to hit rock bottom,
and once they hit that point they will want to change. Rock bottom to
me is where the person has nothing left; that person lost their loved
ones and are going nowhere in life anymore and that person finally
decides she wants to change for the better.
I
do not understand how people can put their loved ones through so much
pain and how they can handle watching their families go through
heartbreak. Sometimes people can really fuck up and ruin everything
they have going on. And after they mess up, it is really hard to
forgive them. And sometimes when you do not want to forgive them you
have to; someone has to be the bigger person. Especially if that someone
brought someone else into the world. I did not talk to my mom for
a few years until she brought my brother into this world, and once she
did, I slowly started to talk to her so I could see my brother.
I
have a beautiful five-year-old brother that I would do anything for in
this world. He means more to me than anyone; I think about him
all the time because I know he does not have a dad like I have. So
it must be really hard for him because he is at the same age I was
when I started realizing everything that was going on.
My
mom left me when I was in second grade; we did not talk for about a
year after I went to counseling and therapy because I was so upset.
And in therapy children draw pictures about how they feel, about
memories they remember, about what happened, and about what makes them upset.
They also say to forgive and try and move on from the past, but that
is the hardest thing in the world, especially when that person and
yourself were so close. Drinking can lead to many things. While my mom
was drunk, she overdosed once on some pills and ended up in the
hospital. It can make your mind do bad things especially when
blacking out and having no remembrance of what happened. But I do not
agree that blacking out is an excuse to mess up because knowing how
drunk you are could stop that, and you know your tolerance level; you
should never acquire to that point. And she did almost every day
before it was even twelve o' clock.
Alcohol
overall is not good in any way shape or form. Never can one win with it;
no good comes out of it. People use it as an escape from their
feelings or to have a good time, but people can have a good time
without drinking and can escape their feelings other ways like through
seeing a counselor and talking about your feelings. Instead people
drink to feel numb and to run away from their feelings, but when drunk
it makes people even more upset at first. It takes many times of
drinking to be able to block things out, and even when you do, they
can sometime slip through.
Because
of everything my mother put me through and still does now, I learned
a key quality to have that most people do not have, and that quality
is forgiveness. I would forgive almost anyone for anything. Because
holding something against someone will not do anything for you but
hold you back from happiness. When life becomes rough and people mess
up, there is a choice to forgive them and be happy, but still know that
they did wrong and not hold it against them. Or one may not forgive them, but
that will not help anything because undoing what that person has
done is not an option. You cannot unsing a song that is sung. They
cannot forgive themselves, and you will never forget, but can always
forgive.
By Tayler Resuriz
Tay, Wrestler, Texas > Illinois
Forgive, but never forget.
