Adult Children of Alcoholics

1
Adult Children of Alcoholics

• Identification and Recovery

2
How many adult children of alcoholics are there
in our society?

• In a survey by the Children of Alcoholics
  Foundation in 1985 it was estimated that there
  were approximately 6,600,000 children of
  alcoholics under the age of 18 years in the U.S.
  at that time and an estimated 22,000,000 children
  of alcoholics aged 18 and older.
• In a longitudinal study of COAs born on the
  island of Kauai, Werner reported that although 41
  percent of the children developed serious coping
  problems by 18 years of age, 59 percent did not
  develop problems. These resilient children
  shared several characteristics that contributed
  to their success include the ability to obtain
  positive attention from other people, adequate
  communication skills, average intelligence, a
  caring attitude, a desire to achieve and a belief
  in self-help.
• Even so, using these figures and applying them to
  the results of the 1985 survey, it would be
  estimated that 9,020,000 adults living in the
  U.S. developed serious coping problems by 18
  years of age due to being children of alcoholics.

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• While it is difficult to estimate the number of
  children of alcoholics, coming up with a figure
  for children of other substance abusers is even
  more difficult. This is due, in part, to the
  fact that other drug use is illicit both legally
  and socially, and therefore is not likely to be
  disclosed in surveys. Moreover, because many of
  those who have drinking problems also have other
  drug problems, epidemiologists would also need to
  sort out the COAs only from COSAs only to COA and
  COSA.

4

• Children of alcoholics exhibit symptoms of
  depression and anxiety more than children of
  non-alcoholics.
• In general, ACoAs appear to have lower
  self-esteem than non-ACoAs
• The results of several studies have shown that
  children from alcoholic families report higher
  levels of depression and anxiety and exhibit more
  symptoms of generalized stress (i.e. low
  self-esteem) than do children from non alcoholic
  families.
• ACoAs suffer a wide range of negative effects
  because of their family backgrounds, including
  Four times higher likelihood of becoming
  alcoholics. Higher rates of mental disorders,
  such as depression, rage, and fear of
  responsibility. Higher rates of marrying into
  alcoholic homes. Higher rates of becoming
  separated or divorced from their spouses.

5

• Being the child of an alcoholic is not a disease.
  It is a fact of your history. Because of the
  nature of this illness and the family response to
  it, certain things occur that influence your
  self-feelings, attitudes and behaviors in ways
  that cause you pain and concern. The object of
  ACoA recovery is to help the person understand
  and admit that family dysfunction occurred,
  realize the effects of the dysfunction and to
  develop willingness to accept help as the person
  begins the slow process of changing
  self-destructive behaviors such as drug
  addiction, sex addiction, emotional eating,
  spending, gambling, or another self-harming
  behavior.

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Recovery Issues for Adult Children of Alcoholics

• Three primary rules are described by Claudia
  Black, in her pioneering work with children of
  alcoholics. The rules she found over and over
  are, Dont talk, Dont trust, Dont feel.
  Children develop their own rules in reaction to
  the alcoholism which go something like, If I
  dont talk, nobody will know how I feel and I
  wont get hurt. If I dont ask, I cant get
  rejected. If Im invisible, Ill be okay. If
  Im careful, no one will get upset. If I stop
  feeling, I wont have any pain. The prime
  directive becomes, I must make things as safe as
  possible. But safety can exact a heavy price.

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• Research from the field of family therapy shows
  that family members adopt identifiable role
  behaviors when they are under stress and since
  all alcoholic families are under stress, the
  children of alcoholic develop one of four roles
  the responsible one, the adjuster, the placater
  and the mascot.

8
Control

• Control is the one word that most characterizes
  the interactions of ACoAs. A major source of
  anxiety, conflicts over control are pervasive.
  Denial, suppression, and repression are used in
  attempts to control the outward expression as
  well as inner awareness of thoughts, feelings and
  behaviors. The fear of being out of control is
  almost universal, and strong feelings are
  experienced as being out of control. Sometimes
  called hyper vigilant, ACoAs automatically
  scan the environment for cues, wanting to know
  what is in front, behind, to the left and to the
  right of them at all times.

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Trust or, more precisely, distrust

• distrust of others as well as of self. It is
  not difficult to understand how this distrust
  arises. Repeatedly told to ignore the obvious,
  children of alcoholics learn to distrust the
  wisdom of their own organism, to distrust what
  they own senses tell them. Father is asleep on
  the garage floor in his three-piece suit, or
  mothers head falls into a plate of spaghetti,
  and everyone who is important is saying, nothing
  is wrong. This leaves children misinformed,
  puzzled, and bewildered! Their stomachs may
  hurt, their hearts may race, and people on whom
  they are most dependent for survival are saying,
  Dont worry, no big deal, everything is all
  right.

10
Feelings

• AVOIDANCE of FEELINGS and the fundamental
  belief that feelings are wrong, bad, and scary.
  In the alcoholic family the childs expression of
  feelings is typically met with censure,
  disapproval, anger and rejection. Often the
  child is told explicitly, Dont you dare say
  that to me, dont even think it. In other
  words, children of alcoholics are taught very
  early that it is necessary to hide their
  feelings. They soon learn not to even have any
  feelings. They learn to repress, deny, or
  minimize them. What good are they? They just
  cause trouble.

11
Romance

• Trust and security, two necessities for
  successful long-term relationships, dont come
  easily for many ACoAs, who grew up in insecure
  homes and may choose to isolate themselves from
  others. In addition, because many alcoholic
  parents wereat least sometimesmore devoted to
  drinking than to affection for their children,
  ACoAs often have a strong need for affection,
  which can manifest itself as possessiveness,
  jealousy, and oversensitivity.

12
Parenthood

• Their strong desire to be loved can lead ACoAs to
  inspire dependency in their own children. They
  may also use intimidation to maintain control in
  the home.

13
Work

• Because of their powerful need for acceptance,
  ACoAs may not provide enough structure for
  employees, who can then capitalize on their
  employers weaknesses. Also, ACoAs may suffer
  from the impostor syndromeno matter how
  impressive their achievements, they never feel
  worthy.

14
MONEY MATTERS

• ACoAs need for approval can lead them to
  overspend, buy dinners they cannot afford, or
  otherwise pay beyond their means to please others.

15
OVER-RESPONSIBILITY

• Children come to believe they are responsible for
  what is happening in the family. After all, it
  is not uncommon for parents to say, If you
  hadnt talked back like that, or if you hadnt
  got in trouble at school today, then I wouldnt
  need a drink tonight. This feeds that normal
  capacity for self-centeredness. Because of these
  childhood experiences, adult children of
  alcoholics grow up believing they are responsible
  for others emotions and actions.

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IGNORING THEIR OWN NEEDS

• It is easy to see how that would happen to
  children raised in a family in which their needs
  are typically secondary to alcoholism. The
  family disease gets first billing. It has to be
  checked out before anything else in the family
  gets taken care of. The children continually
  wonder Is daddy drunk? IF daddy is drunk,
  then Id better not tell him what happened
  today. Adult children may find that
  acknowledging their personal needs leads them to
  feel guilty, because they have learned to regard
  their needs as an imposition on others. They
  also frequently have a sense that if they ask for
  something, the other person now knows something
  dangerously important about them. To have needs
  is to be vulnerable and in the past it certainly
  did not pay to be vulnerable. If they do not
  feel guilty or vulnerable, they may feel
  dependent, less capable, or obligated to the
  person who met their needs. These are all
  emotions contrary to feeling in control.
  Therefore, personal needs had best be avoided,
  ignored or denied

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ALL OR NOTHING FUNCTIONING

• is the tendency to think, feel and behave in an
  all-or-nothing way. Everything is either black
  or whitethere is no in-between. Things are
  either all right or all wrong, and since things
  are seldom all right, they are often all wrong.
• Like the need to have control, all-or-nothing
  functioning pervades other issues. For example,
  adult children of alcoholics approach the issue
  of trust from an all or nothing perspective.
  Lacking an appropriate role model for intimacy in
  childhood, they have difficulty establishing or
  maintaining personal relationships as adults.
  They will either trust a person totally and tell
  their entire life story, or they will distrust so
  fully that they will not share anything personal.

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• All or nothing functioning colors the way adult
  children deal with feelings. As we have already
  mentioned, adult children tend to associate
  feelings with behavior and are, therefore,
  reluctant to deal with emotions. If anger is
  expressed, for example, they are struck by fear
  or panic, convinced that violence may follow, or
  that a relationship will be severed.

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BOUNDARIES

• The all or nothing approach can also result in
  adult childrens difficulties in establishing
  adequate and useful boundaries between themselves
  and others. This is particularly true in regard
  to their parents, where they confuse love with
  need or caretaking. They frequently confuse
  others feelings, including intimacy with
  smothering, spontaneity with irrationality, and
  relaxation with depression. This confusion of
  feeling states further contributes to their
  difficulties with personal boundaries and
  relationships.
• Because of the all or none approach, they are not
  able to utilize information from their
  environment very well as experiences are forced
  to fit their black and white view of the world.
  This all or none characteristic also obstructs
  adult childrens ability to take things one step
  at a time, to break down a task into smaller and
  therefore more manageable steps or pieces.

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DISSOCIATION

• is the separation or split in the wholeness of an
  experiencenot unlike an emotional anesthesia.
  An example is a person who describes a scene of
  great pain from her childhood, crying as she
  talks yet, when asked what she is feeling, she
  will honestly reply, nothing. Asked why she is
  weeping, she will answer, I dont know. She
  does not connect the tears, the memory and the
  emotion. The outward manifestation of
  dissociation can be described as flattened
  affect, and functions as self-protection.
  Dissociation causes many adult children to look
  spaced-out" or tranced out. It is as though
  they are in some sort of fog

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ADRENALIN JUNKIES

• Another issue is the tendency for children raised
  in the chaotic environment of an alcoholic family
  to become adrenalin junkies. Accustomed to
  frequent crises and emergencies, adult children
  may find themselves depressed or anxious when
  life is stable and uneventful. It might take
  years before they recognize that every time life
  is calm and relationships with others seems good,
  they feel uncomfortable.

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LOW SELF ESTEEM

• These issues lead adult children to extremely low
  self-esteem. Their low self-esteem comes from
  not trusting themselves, from not knowing their
  own feelings. It comes from having an
  all-or-none way of looking at things, so they can
  rarely give themselves credit for what they have
  accomplished unless it is perfect. And it comes
  from living in a world of broken promises and the
  belief that they were somehow responsible for the
  problems in their family. Since adult children
  have a difficult time seeing themselves as
  valuable or worthwhile, they have a difficult
  time realizing their right to be treated well. To
  set limits on what they will and will not do, or
  what they will and will not tolerate. All this
  adds up to an adult who lacks a sense of personal
  rights.

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INTIMATE RELATIONSHIPS

• Which require give and take, surrender of
  control, an ability to see oneself as human, as
  changeable, as fallible, and to accept another
  person with similar qualitiesare difficult for
  children of alcoholics. Intimate relationships
  require trust, warmth, sharing, spontaneity, and
  flexibility.

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UNEXPECTED EVENTS

• With no time to anticipate a situation or prepare
  a response, adult children will automatically
  fall back into their old, habitual behavior
  patternspatterns which helped them survive as
  children but now interfere with their happiness
  as adults. They get anxious, shut down, enter a
  flurry of activity, or deny what is happening.
  Similarly, a visit with their family will often
  reactivate old responses.

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PERSONAL PERFORMANCE

• When there is a standard to be met, children of
  alcoholics worry about their ability to meet that
  standard. They re-experience their anxiety,
  their all-or-nothing thinking, their sense of
  inadequacy, their guilt, and their lack of
  self-esteem. Even if the situation involves a
  number of people, they might assume full
  responsibility. They believe, Things arent
  going right at work. Its my fault. If there
  is an important deadline ahead, they will tell
  themselves they are not organized enough even
  though their performance might be excellent. If
  everything is not in perfect order, they must be
  doing something wrong. Indeed, the anxiety to
  perform perfectly may outweigh the importance of
  the task. Even trivial tasks may be taken to
  represent a global statement on their competence.

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Recovery for Adult Children of Alcoholics

• Recovery means moving toward wholeness or
  integratingcoming to order.

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• What happens to children of alcoholics as they
  grow up? Children learn what they are taught.
  So children of alcoholics enter adulthood coping
  with life in the same ways which proved to be of
  value to them as children. They take their
  childhood roles, survival strategies, and rules
  with them into adulthood. Later, they discover
  that what worked in an alcoholic childhood home
  does not serve them well in adult life. But
  there is a curious thing about us human beings.
  We tend to do the same things over and over again
  even when our behavior no longer pays off. The
  roles and rules of childhood, which once brought
  a semblance of safety and sanity, now bring
  little of either. As with the alcoholism of the
  parents, the roles and rules of childhood are
  progressive and can encase the adult child in
  rigid, stereotypical behaviors.

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• Acquiring certain new attitudes toward yourself
  and toward others is crucial in this stage they
  pave the way for the changes that need to occur.
  First and foremost, cultivate the attitude that
  it is better to explore than to criticize. Be
  grateful when you discover a problem area. After
  all, it was there all the time! Be open to new
  ways of seeing things, to new meanings, new
  learning, new associations, with out being
  judgmental. Make few conclusions about yourself
  or others until you have had a chance to gather a
  lot of information. Know how deep the water is
  before you jump in. Here again, it is important
  to slow down, take your time, and develop
  patience.

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• Be gentle with yourself. When you make a
  mistake, recognize it as a sign you are growing.
  Success is getting up one more time than you fall
  down. Compliment yourself for starting a new
  path. Give to yourself. It is a time to learn.
  Start with small steps, scheduling activities and
  time with people who nourish you. Begin to
  surround yourself with people who understand and
  care about you. Another very important way to
  take care of yourself is to listen carefully to
  yourself. Listen to hear what you need and want.

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FEAR OF INTIMACY

• Intimacy is the ability to be yourselfwho you
  are, what you arewith another person. The more
  you are able to be yourself, the more intimate
  you are.
• Self-disclosure is the hallmark of intimacy. The
  more intimate the relationship, the more willing
  you are to reveal your innermost self. Because
  intimacy is the sharing of feelings, or values,
  of thoughts, of yourself, to the adult child this
  can spell danger. When you become intimate with
  someone feelings occur and control becomes an
  issue.
• Therefore when developing intimacy use the
  share-check-share technique. Share a little, see
  how the person responds and then share a little
  more. Let intimacy develop slowly.

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EXPRESSING FEELINGS

• Adult children often denied their feelings in
  order to survive their painful childhoods.
  Although as an adult you may still be denying
  your feelings, the terror and insecurity of the
  past are long gone, and it is now time to learn
  how to identify and express your feelings.
• Feelings can be summarized in four basic words
  glad, mad, sad and scared. Once you master
  naming the basic feelings, it is time to begin
  thinking in terms of shades of feelings

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• Sad Mad Glad Scared
• Ashamed angry blissful afraid
• Bored annoyed calm anxious
• Depressed disgusted cheerful concerned
• Discouraged distraught comfortable confused
• Embarrassed frustrated confident insecure
• Guilty irritated encouraged nervous
• Helpless jealous excited panicky
• Hurt offended happy shocked
• Lonely resentful passionate terrified

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• Another valuable way of approaching feelings is
  to identify the degree to which you experience a
  particular emotion. Are you somewhat pleased
  or very pleased? Are you a little worried or
  very worried? Making these distinctions may be
  difficult at first since you may not be used to
  registering any emotions at all.
• Once you have gotten in touch with your feelings
  and adept at naming them, the next step is to
  express them, beginning with the positive
  feelings.

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• Begin by making a deliberate search for things
  you like. Become a compliment detective. Once
  you become good at being a compliment detective,
  its time to share some of your feelings with
  others. The following three-step formula will
  make it easy (1) Be specific. (2) Say the
  persons name. (3) Follow up with a question.
• Steve, I liked the way you kept bringing him back
  to what could he do to not drink on the weekend.
  How did that work for you?

35

• Expressing Negative Feeling anger is the most
  difficult of all emotions for you to express. As
  a child, you saw your parents anger often led to
  violence and any expression of your own anger
  often led to punishment. As a result, you
  learned to deny or hold in your anger, even
  though you were filled with rage.
• Begin to express your anger to minor irritations.
  When you feel a surge of anger, pause and wait
  for it to diminish. If you have to, walk away.

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• Own your own feelings by using I statements
  since you statements indicate blame and places
  responsibility for how you feel at the feet of
  others. You are ultimately responsible for your
  feelings. Let your language reflect this reality
  by beginning your feeling statements with I
• I feel angry you arent ready.
• I feel furious you lied to me.
• Im upset you criticized me in front of my son.

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• Many adult children find relief by expressing
  their emotions in writing first. You can do it
  in a journal or in a letter you may or may not
  mail.

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• Identifying your feelings and knowing how to
  express them does not obligate you to do so.
  Since you dont have to take action, there is no
  risk in learning how to do so. You have nothing
  to be afraid of.

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• Before you express your feelings, you need to use
  dual perspective and ask yourself how you would
  respond if you were on the receiving end of those
  feelings and consider the possible consequences
  of expressing your feelings, and ask yourself if
  you are willing to live those consequences.
• For example, sharing intimate details of your
  past may overwhelm someone on a first date and
  cause them to back off. Your boss might not
  appreciate your reactions to his management style
  and may penalize you. You mother may be
  devastated by your angry letter and not speak to
  you. Consider the ninth step of AA, which
  encourages you to make amends, accept when to do
  so would harm yourself or others. Having the
  skills to identify and express your feelings
  gives you choices. How, when and in what way you
  exercise those choices leave you in control of
  your life.

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• When feelings are acknowledged, when you become
  aware of them, you can begin to move beyond them.
  The very act of expressing a feeling begins the
  process of transformation.
• A word of caution about expressing feeling. Just
  because you have a feeling, it does not mean you
  have to tell everyone. Be selective about when
  and with whom you share your feelings. When you
  share yourself selectively, you will increase
  your chances of receiving a supportive audience.
  If you carefully choose the right person and the
  right time and go slowly, you will discover
  sharing your feelings is a very empowering and
  rewarding experience. It can also be fun.

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ACTIVE LISTENING SKILLS

• Learn to use Active Listening Skills active
  listening is putting into words your
  understanding of what the other person has said.
• Asking for what you want the best way to get
  what you want is to assertively ask for it.
• Before you can ask for what you want, you have to
  know what you want.
• Once you know what you want, the next step is to
  ask for it. Use dual perspective, think not just
  in terms of what you want, but also in terms of
  those you ask. Starting small is a good
  strategy. Sound casual. When you ask for what
  you want, most of the time you will get a yes.
  When you are turned down, propose an alternative
  , taking into account any objections the other
  person may have raised. Should you once again be
  turned down, you may choose to conclude the other
  person isnt interested. If so, tell them,
  Sorry you cant make it or Well Ive enjoyed
  meeting you. On the other hand you might decide
  to persist. If you dont get what you want,
  congratulate yourself for speaking up and making
  the effort. Tell yourself you have the right to
  ask, and others have the right to decline. If
  you get a yes resist the temptation to ask
  others if they really want to do the activity.
  That may lead them to reconsider and may snatch
  defeat out of the jaws of victory. Instead,
  silently congratulate yourself for being
  assertive, smile and enjoy.

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BOUNDARIES

• a barrier between you and other people. A
  limitation beyond which you will not go and
  beyond which others are not welcome. Adult
  children often grew up in a family in which
  boundaries were blurred or nonexistent.
  Consequently you arent sure what boundaries are
  appropriate for you, how to establish those
  boundaries with other people, and how to defend
  those boundaries against attack.
• Boundaries can be decided upon before or during
  the time when they are needed. They can also be
  changed. The ideal time to decide upon
  boundaries is in advance of their being needed.
  There are physical, sexual and emotional
  boundaries.

43

• In negotiating a boundary with another use the
  following steps
• Define what is acceptable to you, what boundary
  you want.
• Express your thoughts and feelings about the
  problem and propose your boundary to the other
  person.
• Listen to the other person express their thoughts
  and feeling about the problem and let them
  propose the boundary they think best.
• Work out an accommodation.
• Remember that the thoughts, actions and feelings
  of others are not our own. They are separate
  from you.

44

• When your boundaries are challenged and youre
  not sure how to respond, call time out. This
  will give you plenty of time to calm down, to
  practice saying no and to prepare possible
  counteroffers.
• As an adult child, you have a near perfect record
  of saying yes. It may be difficult for you to
  say No, but if you are to defend your
  boundaries, it is important you learn. If you
  just say Im not sure or Id rather not, you
  are conveying a weak conviction, and others may
  well try to break through your boundaries. But
  the word No is definite. It lets others know
  you will not allow your boundaries to be
  breached. To deliver an assertive No stand up
  straight, look the other person in the eyes, and
  speak clearly and firmly. If necessary use the
  broken record technique, and calmly and
  respectively keep saying your No.

45
SMALL TALK

• Making contact with others the art of small
  talk. Adult children cringe at the thought of
  having to make small talk. Growing up in an
  alcoholic home means that social skills were not
  adequately developed. Small talk is the most
  non-threatening way people can begin to get to
  know one another. People respond as much to tone
  and energy as to content. Rushing into personal
  things creates a sense of intimacy before it
  really exists. Talking trivia can be fun.

46
CONTROL

• Before you can let go of control, ground work
  needs to be donenot only in terms of all or
  nothing functioning, but also in terms of
  building self-esteem. It takes self-confidence
  to overcome the feelings of vulnerability and
  insecurity that will initially accompany letting
  go of control, or acknowledging that in fact you
  do not have control.
• In issues of control, it is not all-or-nothing.
  It is not a question of being totally in control
  of yourself or others, and the environment that
  you can determine what will happen neither is it
  a matter of resigning yourself to passively
  going along with whatever happens. Rather it
  is acknowledging that there are some things you
  can control and many things you cannot control.
  A prayer often quoted in ACA sums this up well,
  God grant me the serenity to accept the things I
  cannot change, courage to change the things I
  can, and wisdom to know the difference. You can
  also learn to exercise your right to pick and
  choose which situations you want to deal with and
  which situations you prefer at this time not to
  deal with.

47

• Challenging all-or-nothing behavior, looking at
  the issue of control, beginning to re-establish a
  basis for trust and intimacy, caring for and
  paying attention to yourself. All lead the adult
  child closer and closer to feelings of
  self-worth, self-trust and self-esteem. Remember
  increased self esteem will be the natural outcome
  of your efforts to look at yourself and others in
  new ways.
• A way to fight all-or-nothing functioning is to
  begin making use of a behavior called chunking
  it down. Chunking it down means taking an issue
  or objectivesuch as trusting someone or
  accomplishing a particular taskand dividing it
  into its component parts, seeing it in smaller
  pieces (chunks) rather than as a whole. As each
  step is taken, it is essential for the child of
  an alcoholic to learn to say, Congratulations,
  self. Youve done another part of it.
• Recovering adult children of alcoholics look for
  opportunities to let go of control.

48
RELATIONSHIPS

• You might also want to re-evaluate your current
  relationships in terms of which people put you
  down and which offer you support. The
  relationships in which you seem to be getting
  nicked all the time are the ones that are keeping
  you in a state of low self-esteem. When you are
  exposed repeatedly to situations which diminish
  self-esteem, it is difficult to develop and
  maintain it. Flourishing in an atmosphere of
  criticism is like trying to get sober in a bar.
  It cannot be done.

49
SELF ESTEEM

• To enhance the possibility of increased
  self-esteem surround yourself with people who are
  going to be supportive. In this way you can
  treat yourself to opportunities to build
  self-esteem you never had as a child. In fact,
  you have the responsibility as well as the right
  to treat the child within you, your inner child,
  to advantages he or she never had in the past but
  can now have in the present.

50
TRUST

• Learning a strategy for the development of trust
  is surprisingly simple. First you take a small
  risk. Venture out and say something that is
  important to you. Stick your neck out a little.
  After you have done that, pause. Close your
  mouth open your eyes and open your ears. Watch
  and listen to the other person and observe your
  inner response.
• Chunking it down can also help you build trust.
  Go step-by-step, checking each time to see what
  happens after you trust a little and then a
  little more. As you chunk it down using this
  step-by-step method of trusting other people, you
  will need to trust yourself. When you get
  responses from someone else and try to evaluate
  them, honor the feelings you have inside. If you
  begin to feel good with someone or uncomfortable
  with someone, value that as important information.

51

• To allow more intimacy, you need to remain aware
  of your all-or-nothing tendencies and your need
  to control. Intimacy does not happen all at
  once. It is not an all-or-none phenomenon. It
  emerges in steps and is an outgrowth of a mutual,
  reciprocal process where two or more people learn
  not to relinquish control, but to share it.
• Intimacy is closely related to trust. In the
  same way that you might trust a little and then
  see what happens, you can share something
  intimate and see what happens. IF you like what
  is happening, if it feels good, you share a
  little more. If the results continue to be
  positive, you share more still. The basic
  strategy therefore becomes share-check-share.

52
RECOVERING THE INNER CHILD

• Many children of alcoholics are required to
  jettison childhood in order to take on the
  responsibilities of adult roles. This might be
  an excellent time to teach yourself how to be a
  child again and how to have fun. Borrow a kid
  for a day. Let him or her take you around. Be
  as silly and curious as you like.

53
DEVELOPING SELF CARE SKILLS

• Begin to include exercise and a healthy diet in
  your daily schedule. Exercise is an excellent
  antidote for depression. Exercise offers
  emotional and physiological benefits that add up
  to a new sense of well being.
• Another crucial component to self care is
  listening to yourself, trusting yourself. You
  are the one and ONLY expert on yourself. You can
  use others as consultants and books as guides.
  Nonetheless, you remain the ultimate authority on
  what you want and need.

54

• As adult children go through this transformation
  process a new kind of fear begins to enter the
  picture. While it is fear, it is quite different
  from the old fear. It is expressed in questions
  such as, When will the bubble burst? or When
  will the other shoe drop? the person asking
  this is looking for a crisis. Often this is a
  sign that a person is recovering. Life has been
  getting more sensible. Life has been getting
  more steady. If you find yourself with an
  increasing need to stir things up or to have a
  crisis, it may be because things have been
  getting better and you are not used to it.

55

• The ghosts of old habits lurk silently in the
  background, waiting to re-emerge when the adult
  child is overloaded, exhausted or stressed.
  While there may be moments of utter exhilaration
  and even ecstasy, the world of the recovering
  adult child is not a pain-free, conflict-free
  utopia. Pain, conflict and suffering are as much
  a part of life as pleasure, harmony and joy.
  There will always be occasions, no matter how
  well integrated we become, when life hurts when
  life is unfair and when it just seems
  overwhelming. That happens simply because we are
  human.

56

• Many adult children erroneously expect they
  should always be able to deal with everything
  once they start to recover. They assume they
  should now know exactly what to do with their
  lives and their relationships. Sometimes they
  fail to remember there is no cure for life. They
  believe they should be able to do anything.
• The greatest pitfall is making life something it
  is not, namely, the end of the effort. Recovery
  is an ongoing process, not a finished product.
  Remembering this gives us the freedom to make
  mistakes, allowing continued growth and learning.

57

• Finally, remember recovery is not something
  attained then forgotten. Additional investments
  will re required of you throughout the coming
  years in order to maintain your health and cope
  with lifes continuing challenges. The secret is
  to work at it, one day at a time. Sometimes
  adult children like everyone else, tend to get
  lazy, letting their thinking, feeling and
  behavior fall into the well worn grooves of their
  old survival stage patterns. When that happens,
  rouse yourself out of lethargy and put into
  action some of the tool you have gathered from
  books and other resources. Your well-being is
  much like an investment account. It grows when
  you make deposits of energy and effort. Good
  investments earn high interest, and you are your
  best investment.

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Reaching Genesis

• Genesis, in its most basic sense, is the
  expansion of the body, mind and spirit, and the
  developing awareness of a higher self. Genesis
  enlarges our vision to fully appreciate the
  positive, the creative, and the spiritual. The
  promise of genesis is we have the potential to
  reach higher levels of consciousness and
  well-being. We do not have to accept a limited
  reality we can actively promote our spiritual
  development. Through genesis a change in the
  overall quality of our subjective experience is
  possible, and a new and varied responsiveness to
  life can follow.
• Genesis is analogous to the spiritual awakening
  spoken of in Alcoholics Anonymous you begin to
  be aware of a spiritual connection which unites
  us all in the sense of being one with the
  universe.

59

• There is no perfection even in genesis. While
  genesis is certainly characterized by deep calm,
  serenity and even bliss, it is not an all-or-none
  phenomenon or a continual state of mind
  expansion. Groceries need to be bought,
  checkbooks must be balanced and family and
  friend die. We simply cannot control all that
  befalls us.
• As you move along the recovery path you can see
  there are no hard and fast lines between the
  recovery stages. Progress is not always steady
  and without setbacks. Wherever you are on the
  recovery path, you will continue to recover. You
  will do so at a pace and a style unique to you
  alone. There is no recipe or final resting place
  in human growth.

60
GETTING HELP

• While developing these attitudes, you may want to
  enlist the aid of a guide or consultant. One of
  the things adult children desperately need to
  learn is to reach out and ask for help. If you
  are isolated from others, let that be a signlike
  a red flagwhich indicates you are in trouble.
  There are other red flags during this stage that
  suggest this is the right time to get help 1)
  feeling overwhelmed with what you are learning,
  experiencing, or seeing 2) not having the
  foggiest idea about what to do next 3) not
  having any friends or family to talk to 4)
  excessive criticism of yourself or others 5)
  strong feelings of depression and anxiety or
  insecurity and fear 6) frequent bouts of
  insomnia and 7) the big one, namely excessive
  alcohol or other drug consumption. Remember,
  reaching out is a sign of recovery, not of
  weakness.

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Finding help

• the depth to which alcoholism affects ACoAs in
  daily lives depends on a wide range of variables,
  from their own personalities to the extent to
  which the disease dominated their developmental
  years. All ACoAs can benefit from learning
  strategies that will help them overcome negative
  behaviors and chart courses for their own healthy
  futures. No single methods works best for
  everyone. Options include
• READING Find the latest books and research,
  both in print and online, about alcohol abuse and
  the way it can affect family life.
• TALKING Confide in a close friend or family
  member who can understand your feelings and
  respect your privacy without judging you.
• COUNSELING meet with a licensed professional
  counselor who can help you focus on your future,
  not the pains of the past. Sometimes talking
  with a stranger can be more therapeutic than
  talking with a friend.
• JOINING become part of a support group that
  meets in person or in an online chartroom to find
  out how other ACoAs have overcome barriers to
  happiness. Twelve step programs, such as Adult
  Children of Alcoholics (ACA) can be particularly
  empowering.
• No matter what method or combination of methods
  an ACoA chooses, the focus should remain
  positive. Its important to know why we do what
  we do, but its more important to change what we
  do for the future.

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CHARACTERISTICS of ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS

• The American psychologist Janet G Woritz was one
  of the first who paid real attention to the
  situation of ACoAs. In this book she proposed
  various characteristics that she found in many of
  these adult children. A few of these can be that
  they
• Have to guess what normal behavior is in many
  situations.
• Have difficulties completing projects.
• Lie when it is equally simple to tell the truth.
• Are self-judgmental.
• Have difficulty having fun.
• Take themselves very seriously.
• Have problems in intimate relationships.
• Overreact to changes which they cannot control.
• Are always looking for approval and confirmation.
• Think they are different.
• Are either extremely responsible of extremely
  irresponsible.
• Are extremely loyal, also to people who do not
  deserve it.
• Are impulsive.

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A Hierarchy of Human Needs(Complied in part from
Maslow, 1962 Miller, 1981 Weil, 1973 Glasser,
1985

• Survival
• Safety
• Touching, skin contact
• Attention
• Mirroring and echoing
• Guidance
• Listening
• Being real
• Participating
• Acceptance others are aware of, take seriously
  and admire the Real You, Freedom to be the Real
  You Tolerance of your feelings validation
  respect belonging and love
• Opportunity to grieve losses and to grow
• Support
• Loyalty and trust
• Accomplishment mastery, power, control,
  creativity, having a sense of completion, making
  a contribution
• Altering ones state of consciousness,
  transcending the ordinary
• Sexuality
• Enjoyment of fun
• Freedom
• Nurturing

64
Some Terms for Mental, Emotional, and Spiritual
Trauma That May Be Experienced by Children and
Adults.

• Abandonment
• Neglect
• Abuse Physicalspanking, beating, torture,
  sexual, etc.
• Emotional
• Spiritual
• Shaming
• Humiliating Limiting
• Degrading Withdrawing/ Withholding love
• Inflicting guilt Not taking seriously
• Criticizing Discrediting
• Disgracing Invalidating
• Joking about Misleading
• Laughing at Disapproving
• Teasing Making light of or
• minimizing your feelings, wants or needs
• Manipulating Breaking promises
• Deceiving Raising hopes falsely
• Tricking Responding inconsistently or
  arbitrarily
• Betraying Making vague demands

65
Negative Rules and Negative Messages Commonly
Heard in Alcoholic Families

• Negative Rules Negative Messages
• Dont express your feelings Shame on you
• Dont get angry Youre not good enough
• Dont get upset I wish Id never had you
• Dont cry Your needs are not all right with me
• Do as I say, not as I do Hurry up and grow up
• Be good, nice or perfect Be dependent
• Avoid conflict Be a man
• Dont think or talk Big boys don't cry
• Just follow directions Act like a nice girl or
  lady
• Do well in school, no matter what
• Dont ask questions You dont feel that way
• Dont betray the family Dont be like that
• Keep the family secrets Youre so stupid
• Be seen and not heard You caused it
• No back talk You owe it to us
• Dont contradict me We wont love you if you
• Always look good Youre driving me crazy
• Im always right, and youre always wrong

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Personal Bill of Rights

• I have numerous choices in my life beyond mere
  survival.
• I have a right to discover and know my Child
  Within
• I have a right to grieve over what I didnt get
  that I needed or what I got that I didnt need or
  want.
• I have a right to follow my own values and
  standards.
• I have a right to say NO to anything when I feel
  I am not ready, it is unsafe or violates my
  values.
• I have a right to dignity and respect
• I have a right to make my own decisions.
• I have aright to determine and honor my own
  priorities.
• I have aright to have my needs and wants
  respected by others.
• I have the right to terminate conversations with
  people who make me feel put down and humiliated.
• I have the right NOT to be responsible for
  others behavior, actions, feelings or problems.
• I have a right to make mistakes and not have to
  be perfect.
• I have a right to ALL my feelings.
• I have a right to be angry at someone I love.
• I have a right to be uniquely me, without
  feelings Im not good enough.
• I have a right to feel scared and to say Im
  afraid.
• I have a right to experience and then let go of
  fear, guilt and shame.
• I have a right to make decisions based on my
  feelings, my judgment or any reason I choose.
• I have a right to change my mind at any time.

67
The Laundry List

• These are characteristics we seem to have in
  common due to being brought up in an alcoholic
  household.
• 1. We became isolated and afraid of people and
  authority figures.
• 2. We became approval seekers and lost our
  identity in the process.
• 3. We are frightened by angry people and any
  personal criticism
• 4. We become alcoholics, marry them, or both, or
  find another compulsive personality such as a
  workaholic to fulfill our sick abandonment needs.
• 5. We live life from the viewpoint of victims and
  are attracted by that weakness in our love and
  friendship relationships.
• 6. We have an overdeveloped sense of
  responsibility and it is easier for us to be
  concerned with others rather than ourselves. This
  enables us not to look too closely at our own
  faults.
• 7. We get guilt feelings when we stand up for
  ourselves instead of giving in to others.
• 8. We become addicted to excitement.
• 9. We confuse love with pity and tend to "love"
  people who we can pity" and "rescue".
• 10. We have stuffed our feelings from our
  traumatic childhoods and have lost the ability to
  feel or express our feelings because it hurts so
  much (denial).
• 11. We judge ourselves harshly and have a very
  low sense of self-esteem.
• 12. We are dependent personalities who are
  terrified of abandonment and will do anything to
  hold on to a relationship in order not to
  experience painful abandonment feelings which we
  received from living with sick people who were
  never there emotionally for us.
• 13. Alcoholism is a family disease and we became
  para-alcoholics and took on the characteristics
  of the disease even though we did not pick up the
  drink.
• 14. Para-alcoholics are reactors rather than
  actors.
• Tony A., 1977

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The Problem

• Many of us found that we had several
  characteristics in common as a result of being
  brought up in an alcoholic household.
• We had come to feel isolated, uneasy with other
  peopleespecially authority figures. To protect
  ourselves, we became people pleasers, even though
  we lost our own identities in the process. All
  the same, we would mistake any personal criticism
  as a threat.
• We either became alcoholics ourselves or married
  them or both. Failing that, we found another
  compulsive personality, such as a workaholic, to
  fulfill our unhealthy need for abandonment.
• We lived life from the standpoint of victims.
  Having an over-developed sense of responsibility,
  we preferred to be concerned with others rather
  than ourselves. We somehow got guilt feelings
  when we stood up for ourselves rather than giving
  into others. Thus, we became reactors, rather
  than actors, letting others take the initiative.
• We were dependent personalitiesterrified of
  abandonmentwilling to do almost anything to hold
  onto a relationship in order not to be abandoned
  emotionally. Yet we kept choosing insecure
  relationships because they matched our childhood
  relationship with alcoholic parents.
• These symptoms of the family disease of
  alcoholism made us co-victimsthose who take on
  the characteristics of the disease without
  necessarily ever taking a drink. We learned to
  keep our feelings down as children and kept them
  buried as adults. As a result of this
  conditioning, we confused love with pity, tending
  to love those we could rescue. Even more self
  defeating, we became addicted to excitement in
  all our affairs, preferring constant upset to
  workable relationships.
• This is a description, not an indictment.

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The Solution

• The solution is to become your own loving parent.
• As ACA becomes a safe place for you, you will
  find the freedom to express all the hurts and
  fears you have kept inside and to free yourself
  from the shame and blame that are carryovers from
  the past. You will become an adult who is
  imprisoned no longer by childhood reactions. You
  will recover the child within you, learning to
  accept and love yourself.
• The healing begins when we risk moving out of
  isolation. Feelings and buried memories will
  return. By gradually releasing the burden of
  unexpressed grief, we slowly move out of the
  past. We learn to re-parent ourselves with
  gentleness, humor, love and respect.
• This process allows us to see our biological
  parents as the instruments of our existence. Our
  actual parent is a Higher Power some of us
  choose to call God. Although we had alcoholic
  parents, our Higher Power gave us the Twelve
  Steps of Recovery.
• This is the action that heals us we use the
  Steps we use the meetings we use the telephone.
  We share our experience, strength and hope with
  each other. We learn to restructure our healthy
  thinking one day at a time. When we release our
  parents from responsibility for our actions
  today, we become free to make healthful decisions
  as actors, not reactors. We progress from
  hurting to healing to helping. We awaken to a
  sense of wholeness we never knew was possible.
• By attending these meetings on a regular basis,
  we will come to see parental alcoholism for what
  it is a disease that infected you as a child
  and continues to affect you as an adult. You
  will learn to keep the focus on the here and now.
  You will take responsibility for your own life
  and supply your own parenting.
• You will not do this alone. Look around you and
  you will see others who know how you feel. We
  will love and encourage you no matter what. We
  ask you to accept us just as we accept you.
• This is a spiritual program based on action
  coming from love. WE are sure that as the love
  grows inside you, you will see beautiful changes
  in all your relationships, especially with God,
  yourself and your parents.

70
Characteristics of Unrecovered Adult Children of
Alcoholics

• We guess at what normal iswe dont recognize
  normal when we see it.
• We have difficulty in following a project through
  from beginning to end. We have the idea of the
  steps necessary to carry the idea out. We
  learned it is the intentions that count, not the
  behavior.
• We lie when it would be just as easy to tell the
  truth.
• We judge ourselves without mercy.
• We have difficulty having fun. We never learned
  how to play.
• We take ourselves too seriously life is hard
  work.
• We have difficulty with intimate relationships
  the fears of abandonment are too great to allow
  us to ease into a relationship.
• We constantly seek approval and affirmation from
  others we cant give it to ourselves.
• We over-react to changes over which we have no
  control as a child we had no control over
  changes that threatened our safety, security,
  survival.
• We are either super responsible or super
  irresponsible we cant say no because of our
  need for approval. We set no limits. We are
  prime candidates for burn-out. We have to get
  sick to break the cycle.
• We have no sense of cooperation or working with
  others. We are used to doing things along and
  for ourselves. That is how we survived in a
  chaotic family. We appear to be cooperative,
  though.
• We are extremely loyal even in the face of
  evidence that the loyalty isnt deserved. We
  make great friends, employees, etc. We learned
  from practice with alcoholic parents.
• We are often impulsive We lock ourselves into a
  course of action without thought to the
  consequences.
• We tend to look for immediate rather than delayed
  gratification we learned as a child, if you
  wait for it, you dont get it.

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Definitions of Cognitive Thinking Distortions

• All or nothing thinking You see things in black
  or white categories. If your performance falls
  short of perfect, you see yourself as a total
  failure.
• Overgeneralization You see a single negative
  event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.
• Mental Filter you pick out a single negative
  detail and dwell on it exclusively so that your
  vision of all reality becomes darkened, like the
  drip of ink that discolors the entire beaker of
  water.
• Disqualifying the Positive you reject positive
  experiences by insisting they dont count for
  some reason or other.
• Jumping to Conclusions you make a negative
  interpretation even though there are no definite
  facts that convincingly support your conclusion.
• Magnification (Castastrophizing) or Minimization
  you exaggerate the importance of things (such as
  your goof up or someones elses achievement), or
  you inappropriately shrink things until they
  appear tiny (your own desirable qualities or the
  other fellows imperfections).
• Emotional Reasoning you assume that your
  negative emotions necessarily reflect the way
  things are I feel it, therefore it must be
  true.
• Should Statements You try to motivate yourself
  with shoulds and shouldnts as if you have to
  be whipped and punished before you could be
  expected to do anything. Musts and oughts
  are also offenders. The emotional consequence is
  guilt. When you direct should statements
  toward others, you feel anger, frustration and
  resentments.
• Labeling and Mislabeling this is an extreme
  form of over generalization. Instead of
  describing your error, you attach a negative
  label to yourself I am a loser. When someone
  elses behavior rubs you the wrong way, you
  attach a negative label to him Hes a god dam
  louse. Mislabeling involved describing an event
  with language that is highly colored and
  emotionally loaded.
• Personalization You see yourself as the cause
  of some negative external event which in fact you
  are not primarily responsible for.
• Excerpted from Chapter 3 Understanding Your
  Moods You Feel the Way You Think. Feeling
  Good The New Mood Therapy. By David D Burns,
  MD. A Signet Book, New American Library, 1980.

72
The Twelve Steps for Adult Children of
Alcoholics

• We admitted we were powerless over the effects of
  alcoholism or other family dysfunction, that our
  lives had become unmanageable.
• Came to believe that a power greater than
  ourselves could restore us to sanity.
• Made a decision to turn our will and our lives
  over to the care of God, as we understand God.
• Made a searching and moral inventory of our
  parents and realized what characteristics we
  assimilated into our own personalities from our
  childhood.
• Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another
  human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
• Were entirely ready to have God remove all these
  defects of character.
• Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.
• Made a list of all persons we had harmed and
  became willing to make amends to them all.
• Made direct amends to such people whenever
  possible, except when to do so would injure them
  or others.
• Continued to take daily personal inventory, and
  when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
• Sought through prayer and meditation to improve
  our conscious contact with God as we understand
  God, praying only for knowledge of Gods will for
  us and the power to carry it out.
• Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of
  these steps, we tried to carry this message to
  others and to practice these principles in all
  our affairs.

73
Recommended Reading

• ACA Fellowship Text (Steps and Traditions Book)
  ACA WSO, 2006
• Ackerman, R. J., Children of Alcoholics A
  Guidebook for Educators, Therapists and Parents,
  (2nd Ed.). Holmes Beach, FL Learning
  Publications, 1983.
• One of the first books on school-aged children of
  alcoholics. An early consciousness-raiser.
• Black, C., It Will Never Happen to Me, Denver CO
  Medical Administration Company, 1982.
• Brooks, C., The Secret Everyone Knows, San Diego,
  CA The Kroc Foundation, 1981.
• The simple heartfelt personal story of an adult
  child of an alcoholic.
• Farmer, S., Adult Children of Abusive Parents,
  New York, NY Ballantine Books, 1989.
• Friends in Recovery, The 12 Steps for Adult
  Children, Curtis, WA RPI Publishing, Inc..
  1996.
• Gravitz, H.L. and Bowden, J.D., A Guide for Adult
  Children of Alcoholics, New York, NY Simon
  Schuster, 1985.
• Greenleaf, J., co-AlcoholicPara-Alcoholic Whos
  Who and Whats The Difference? Los Angeles, CA
  1981.
• Wegschieder, S., Another Chance Hope and Health
  for the Alcoholic Family. Palo Alto, CA
  Science and Behavior Books, 1981.
• Written for both the professional and layperson,
  this is one of the clearest descriptions of the
  family plight. Must reading.
• Whitfield. C. L., Alcoholism, Other Drug
  Problems, and Spirituality Stress Management and
  Serenity During Recovery. Preprint publication
  available from P T Book Sellers,
  1-800-321-7912, Baltimore, MD, 1985.
• Whitfield, C.L., Healing the Child Within.
  Deerfield Beach, FL Health Communications, Inc.
  2006.
• Woititz, J.G., Adult Children of Alcoholics.
  Hollywood, FL Health Communications, Inc., 1983.
• An important book describing the problems of
  adult children of alcoholics.
• Woritiz, J. G. and Garner, A., Life-skills for
  Adult Children. Deerfield Beach, FL Health
  Communications, Inc. 1990.
• Woititz, J. G., Marriage on the Rocks. NY
  Delacorte Press, 1979.

74

• For additional information attend the ACA group
  held on Monday nights, 7-8 PM, at 7525 John T
  White, Fort Worth TX 76120
• Or call Josie Estes 817-429-4769