Substances can change a person’s life in many different ways. It can cause major detriment to the actual individual struggling with addiction, as well as to their loved ones. Someone may not even have to be an addict for substances to cause some form of detriment. This can be seen within relationships between parents and children. A child is largely influenced by numerous behaviors and actions of their parents, and the extent of this is quite large. One area that parents may not realize they could be heavily influencing their children is with their drinking habits.
Realistically, many people around the nation consume alcohol, but it is not an addiction for everyone. Some may simply have a drink socially or when they get home from work as a way to wind down. While these can be seemingly harmless actions, parents may not realize how much these drinking habits could influence their children. A parent’s alcohol use can influence a child’s future use in a number of ways, including behaviors like drinking frequency and reasons for drinking.
A parent may simply come home after a rough day and say “What a rough day, I need a drink,” and this kind of behavior can influence a child over time. This message in itself is quite negative, as the child could pick up on this as a way to address rough days. If the child sees their parents repetitively using alcohol as a way of reprieve or stress relief, they could learn to do the same themselves. This could also be the case for handling emotional pain. If a child sees their parents having some drinks when they are angry or sad, it could display that drinking is a way to solve problems or feel better about these kinds of difficulties.
Are Drinking Habits or Alcoholism an Addiction?
Of course, there are also parents struggling with alcohol addiction who may frequently drink around their children. This could cause severe alcohol issues to manifest in their children later on in life. There has been research regarding the genetics of addiction and how it plays a role, but this is not exactly what is being discussed. Rather, it is about what parents are portraying to their children and how this influences them. One may wonder: Is alcoholism an addiction? The short answer is yes, just with a substance-specific title.
Some parents may feel that their children (especially teens) are not really watching or listening to them, but this is far from the case. Even when parents feel their children are ignoring them, they could easily be picking up on these various behaviors. This can occur all throughout the life of a child, especially when it has been a recurring occurrence during their upbringing. It may not manifest until later in their life, but it can be built up from an early age. For others, it may never be something that is a problem for them, but it is ideal to prevent it from influencing them regardless.
The next time you reach for a drink during a hard emotion or rough day, take a step back and pay attention to your child’s observance. Becoming more aware of this influence can allow you to prevent your child from seeing this occur, or maybe even help you find more constructive ways to handle hard days. What you do and say in front of your child matters, including drinking habits, so be sure to pay attention.
Article Source: bestdrugrehabilitation.com
