Alcoholism is a family disease that affects not only the alcoholic but also every member of the family living with him. It affects the children with the same intensity and affects the spouse even more. Adults can choose their spouses; so they can leave them. Children have neither the choice nor the mobility to enter into or exit from the parent-child relationship. While the spouse feels trapped, the child is trapped. The spouse is emotionally helpless, whereas the child is emotionally and situationally helpless.

When does a child lose his childhood?  When he lives with an alcoholic parent. To others, he looks like any other child, dresses like any other child, and walks about like any other child until they get close enough to notice that edge of sadness in his eyes, or the worried look on his brow.
 

He behaves like a child but he is not really enjoying; he just carries on. He does not have the same spontaneity that other kids have. But nobody notices it. Even if they do, they probably do not understand it.

The fact remains that he never feels like a child. He has never known what a child feels like. Any normal child is an innocent, beautiful, delicate being bubbling with energy, offering and receiving love easily; mischievous, playful, doing work for approval or reward, but always doing as little as necessary. The most important fact is that he is always carefree.

In contrast, the child of an alcoholic is not a carefree little one he is often a withdrawn child who never gives trouble to anybody. He hides himself in a corner. Though he does not want to be hiding, he always instinctively hides in a shell, hoping to be noticed sometime or the other. But he is powerless to do anything about it.

Children in families with alcoholism syndrome are generally ignored because all the attention is directed either toward the alcoholic parent or toward his alcoholism. The self-centered, uncooperative, destructive behavior of the alcoholic collects in totality all that the child longs for attention. At the same time, the child learns not to rock the boat, not to develop any desires or needs, not to make demands.

These children lose their identity as a matter of fact, they never had an opportunity to form one. They are subject to situational reinforcement and are always trying to please people.

Children of alcoholics as a group, have a higher incidence of emotional problems like anxiety, stress, and depression. They also have lots of school problems difficulty in concentration, conduct problems, and truancy. They experience all sorts of adjustment problems.

In addition to emotional and adjustment problems, severe medical disorders have also been associated with the children of alcoholics Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, Hyper-active Child Syndrome, and a Predisposition to Alcoholism.

'Fetal Alcohol Syndrome' is a disorder that sometimes occurs in babies born to alcoholic mothers. It results in physical malformation and intellectual impairment of the baby.

'The Hyperactive Child Syndrome' becomes noticeable when the child is about three years old. It is characterized by inattentiveness, lack of concentration, impulsiveness, and hyperactive behavior. These children can easily be distracted and as a result, they experience problems at school.

Children of alcoholics show an increased predisposition to abuse of alcohol or other drugs when they enter adulthood.

Problems faced by the children of alcoholics

Lack of Role-Model

No child is born with standards for evaluating behavior, social skills, or moral values. They learn from what they see. In an alcoholic family, they see nothing but guilt, justification, denial, aggression, and repetitive negative behavior. The child has no other experience except possibly being scolded or getting beaten. There is no yardstick to define any situation.

The alcoholic father is sometimes very loving and warm. He is everything one expects a father to be caring, interested, promising all the things that the child wants. The child feels that he is being loved.

But at other times, the same father is entirely different. Those are the moments when he is drunk. He does not come home at all; the child waits and is worried. When he comes home, he picks up a quarrel and the child is scared. The child does not know what to do. He is uncertain of what is going to happen next, and he feels desperate. The father has forgotten all the promises he made. The child feels strange.

The behavior of the father teaches the child that anger means violence and that violence and love go together; the child has no opportunity to learn that only tenderness and love go together. If the child rejects violence as a coping mechanism, he is unable to find anything to replace it with. He has not learned any other method of handling anger and he has rejected the only means he has learnt. So there is a gap in the child's behavior. This gap inevitably gets filled by passivity and helplessness.

Lying

Children of alcoholics lie when it would be just as easy to tell the truth. Lying is basic to the family system affected by alcoholism. It starts as a denial of unpleasant realities, cover-ups, broken promises, and inconsistencies. Spouses of alcoholics live with lies and ultimately start telling them. They lie to cover up alcoholism and protect the dignity of the family. Their lying is goal-oriented and begins with a good intention. Lying becomes an adaptive response. The child hears lots of promises from his alcoholic father. All these turn out to be lies. Therefore the child learns that it is alright to tell lies. It will make his life much more comfortable.

The value of truth loses all meaning. If they are confronted with the truth, they become genuinely confused, both by the disapproval and by the concept of truth. Their lying does not lead to any guilt because they really see nothing wrong with lies. They are more likely to feel guilty telling the truth if that truth affects someone important to them. The paradoxical message creates only confusion and not a desire for honesty.

Denial

Denial takes various forms - denial of problems leads to denial of the feelings produced by those problems. Honesty, when applied in traumatic situations, will often cause discomfort. Therefore these children learn to minimize, discount, and rationalize for fear of the consequences that are likely to follow if they tell the truth. Often when the child tells the truth, He is told that what he sees and reports is not accurate. "Your father is not drunk. Your father is only depressed. He is sick due to viral fever." Parental rationalizing and discounting serve as a perfect role model for the child to begin his own rationalizing, discounting, and denial process.

The suppression of anger is used to avoid a fight; the suppression of hopes to avoid disappointment; the suppression of affection to avoid rejection.

Loss of self-esteem

This child does not feel worthy. He has a very low self-esteem. To measure self-esteem, one needs a sense of 'self. This child unfortunately does not even have one. He determines what he is by the input of the significant people around him. This feedback is normally negative and he internalizes these messages. Sometimes the child gets dual messages, one contradicting the other. He does not know which part is true; so sometimes he picks up one part and sometimes the other.

No matter what the child does, it is not good enough. There is always somebody to find fault with him. The child does not believe he is capable of doing anything right, no matter how hard he tries. In short, he feels incapable, unworthy, and low.

Depression

It is a depression arising out of 'deprivation'. Parental attention is never focused on the child. It is always focused elsewhere. There is nobody with whom the child can share his problems. Even the non-alcoholic mother is often not available or too exhausted and depressed to interact with him. The child suffers alone. He learns that when he has a need, there will be nobody for him. Not only is there the absence of someone to share his problems which is very vital to a healthy childhood development, but also there is extreme anxiety caused when he undertakes a task that requires skill, knowledge, and experience much beyond his ability. These children develop pseudo-maturity that covers the unmet but undiminished needs of childhood.

The enormity of both the task and its results, the inability to change things, and an unavoidable situation are the causes of chronic depression. This depression inevitably leads to feelings of helplessness, self-pity, self-hatred, isolation, and incompetence.

Fear

The children of alcoholics are often treated with the same cool formality and distance with which adults treat each other. There are no cuddles and hugs and the child learns to regard physical warmth with suspicion while simultaneously craving for it. Beneath the mask of self-control, is a lonely, frightened child, hungry for care, warmth, and love. Unable to cope with the enormous problems surrounding them and their family, they are forced to take up certain roles which are either thrust on them or voluntarily assumed by them.

Children raised in dysfunctional homes typically play one or more roles within the family structure. These roles may be identified as The Responsible Child, The Adjuster, The Placatory, and The Acting out Child, with the adoption of each role, there are invariably negative consequences. Most people easily recognize the strengths of the first three roles but fail to look at the deficits of each role. Let us analyze how these children are thrust into adult roles.

Responsible child

The responsible child generally takes over the responsibility of the parents. This child provides stability in the family and makes life easier for the parents by looking after the other siblings. This child is very organized and 'goal-oriented. He is adept at planning and manipulating others to get things accomplished. He always ensures that others allow him to be in a leadership position. He is often independent, self-reliant, and capable of achievements and accomplishments. But because these accomplishments are made not out of choice, but out of a necessity to survive, there is usually a price paid for this 'early maturity'. For example, the child acts as a parent, takes on household responsibilities and takes care of the younger children. This child cooks and feeds the younger ones in the family and even looks after the father when he comes back home drunk.

To an outsider, this child will seem to be a remarkable little child. But the truth of the matter is, they just do not see the whole picture. These children nurture and help the adults (the alcoholic father or the non-alcoholic mother) who are playing the roles of incapacitated children. Though these children are not treated with distance, they never come to know what emotional and physical dependence means. Their only source of physical contact with the parent may be picking up their drunken father, washing his vomit, changing his soiled clothing, or carrying
him to bed. Deprived of the nurturing, help, and guidance that they desperately need and legitimately deserve, they are denied their childhood and are given all sorts of impossible tasks. Being loved is confused with being desperately needed, warmth is confused with caretaking, spontaneity is confused with irrationality, and intimacy is confused with being smothered.

Adjusting child

The adjusting child learns to adjust and to handle any situation. This child does not think about the situation nor does it outwardly show any emotion as a result of it. The adjusting child finds it easier not to question, think about, or respond in any way to what is occurring in his life. Adjusters do not attempt to change, prevent, or alleviate any situation. They simply adjust that is, do what they are told. They dethatch themselves emotionally, physically, and socially as much as possible.

For example, the child would have been promised new clothes to celebrate her birthday. Later on, when the father finds an excuse for not purchasing new dresses, the child simply accepts the excuse and adjusts to the situation. The child has learned that the best way to maintain peace in the family is by responding to the instructions of others without any questions.

They learn that the expression of any feeling is wrong, and will be met with disapproval, hostility, or rejection. To avoid this sort of punishment, they learn to suppress their feelings.

They are often confused with being 'well-adjusted' in the real sense of the term or being unaffected by the family chaos. The adoption of artificial behavior is not conducive to full emotional development, no matter how good it looks.

Such children when they grow up, become the victims of manipulation of people around them. They cannot assert themselves even when aware of being manipulated. They, therefore, get victimized in many ways at home, in their place of work, and other social interactions.

The placating child

The 'placator' goes one step beyond the 'adjuster'. He anticipates the problems of others around him and tries to help them out, unmindful of getting hurt in the process.

This child is always busy taking care of everyone else's emotional needs. The child assists his brother in not feeling hurt or disappointed. This child intervenes and ensures that none of the children are too frightened after a 'screaming scene' at home. This is a warm, sensitive, listening, caring child who shows a tremendous capacity to help others. For the placatory, the essence of survival lies in taking away the fears, sadness, and guilt of others. Acting out child some children in alcoholic homes become very angry at a very early age. They are confused and sacred, and they act out their confusion in ways that get them a lot of negative attention. They normally get into trouble at home, school, and even with their neighbors. These kids keep shouting there is something wrong everywhere. These children end up as rebels, - show. Delinquent behavior, throwing temper tantrums, and dropping out of school.

The child instinctively learns that he cannot share his feelings with either his alcoholic father or his tired mother. The child also learns that an expression of feelings will be met with disapproval, hostility, or rejection. To avoid what can only be viewed as punishment, the child learns to suppress his feelings.

We must remember that the alcoholism syndrome produces only particular kinds of behaviors and not particular kinds of people. The children of alcoholics get so absorbed in other people's problems, that they do not have the time to identify or solve their own.

They care so deeply, and often so destructively. About the problems of people surrounding them that they always forget how to care about themselves.