Sorry, but Functional Alcoholism is Still Alcoholism

Why do we have to hit rock bottom before society accepts that someone has a problem?

I always found those Health Class warnings about being peer pressured to take drugs very daunting. According to my health teachers, the moment that we stepped foot into a party or night club, shady characters would emerge from the shadows to peer pressure us into taking drugs. Sitting in a sweaty public school demountable, I pictured these antagonists like the bad guys in a video game, popping up cartoonishly at every turn. I would never give in to the Peer Pressure™!

As it turns out, such concerns were largely unfounded. Sure, drugs are around, but nobody I know is handing them out like candy. Maybe it’s just me, or the state of the world, but never once in my life have I been peer pressured to take drugs. (Free drugs? In this economy?)

I have, however, both felt and witnessed the pressure to binge-drink. Um, we’re at a party and your hands are empty, what’s up with that? I’ll get you a drink. Who wants to do a shot? Hey, you do a shot, you still seem sober. I want to see this person get really fucked up. I’ve never seen them drunk before! What do you mean, you’re still hungover from last night? You were fine. Didn’t even realise you’d had a few, I think you’re exaggerating a bit. No, don’t go home, just make yourself vomit, you’ll be right. You’re not drinking tonight? Aw, that’s no fun! Wait, he doesn’t drink anymore? Um. Okay. It’s his choice, I guess, but it’s not like he was, you know, a real alcoholic.

The normalcy of drinking to excess, or drinking to cope, permeates popular culture. It’s a punchline, a cultural pastime: He’s not an alcoholic, he’s an Australian! I’m not a regular Mum, I’m a Wine Mum! It’s normalised, and it’s so common that you might not even realise when you’re so enmeshed in it that you’re the one pressuring someone else to drink.

Years ago, my friend started dating a girl who wouldn’t come to parties with my other friends and I. We were fresh-faced youths whose highlight of the week was downing a 4-pack of alcopops before wobbling through the line-up at whichever pub in town seemed the least likely place to get prematurely shut down following a dancefloor brawl. But Sasha (not her real name) wouldn’t go out with us. She didn’t come to house parties, or Sunday Sesh, or even out for dinner.

We were miffed, mildly offended. What, does she not like us? Our friend explained that Sasha didn’t come because all our social activities revolved around drinking and Sasha didn’t drink. Not anymore. When she used to drink, she had been wild and reckless, on a first-name basis with the local police. The joke was that Sasha was done, tapped out, she’d already consumed her lifetime supply of alcohol by the age of 20. So no, she wasn’t going to come to Bottomless Margarita Night at the local Mexican.

I didn’t get it. I remember thinking that she could just come along and not drink alcohol. My ignorant ass had completely missed what was being said, but not said. My friend had tried to explain that Sasha had a problem with drinking. I did not make the connection until later that what my friend meant was: Sasha had a drinking problem. She was an alcoholic.

I had missed this detail, in part due to my own immaturity, and in part because Sasha did not fit the image I had in my mind of what an alcoholic was, which closely aligned with how the disease is portrayed in popular culture. I suspect many of us picture a Frank Gallagher-esque character, or someone straight off the set of Intervention when we think of alcoholism, and believe that therefore a person who doesn’t match these extreme depictions is fine, okay. In reality, I suspect the sad truth is that some who live with alcoholism simply exist in a sort of limbo, a liminal space between health and hell. They don’t fit the narrative of what an alcoholic is meant to be, so their addiction isn’t recognised: either not by themselves, or those around them, or both. They might never cross that line over to the kind of destructive, disruptive behaviour that demands a reaction from others and a resolution, but they’re never quite living their best life, either.

Addiction is a cancer, sneaky and insidious, burying its way deep into our psyche, our core, our collective identity. That’s Dan, he’s a fucken legend, loves a beer. Dan can drink a case in a day and you wouldn’t even know it! I’ve held conversations with him only to find out later he was blackout drunk! Crazy, hey. I mean, he might have problems, occasionally, that stem from his drinking… but he doesn’t have a drinking problem. Right? I mean, if I know Dan for years, if I regularly drink with Dan, if I see his behaviour as fine, and then Dan quits drinking and starts going to AA meetings… then what does that say about me? Nah, Dan doesn’t have a problem, he’s always been a bit dramatic. I don’t have a problem either, all good, nothing to see here.

I’m okay. I’m fine.

I think we shy away from recognising how normalised problematic drinking is because then we’d have to accept that this behaviour enables extreme alcoholism to develop. That all of us who drink to excess might just be playing Russian Roulette with addiction. Delving into that might be a little too close to comfort and it’s jarring to think that just because something is socially acceptable, or normalised, doesn’t mean that it necessarily should be. Instead, we tend to cling to the narrative of a distinction between addicts and the rest of society, as if alcohol addiction develops in a vacuum and those who experience it are to blame. The idea of ‘us versus them’ when considering those with addictions is largely unhelpful, but it is very comforting, to feel that it could never happen to you. So, we don’t acknowledge, don’t see our peers who begin to tumble down the slippery slope of alcoholism. Those who are functioning alcoholics seem to move through this world unseen until they cross the threshold and disrupt the norm, at which point their addiction is undeniable and it must be acknowledged.

Unfortunately, then the person seems to become the other, the addict, now bereft of their humanity and society’s sympathy.

What would happen if functioning alcoholics were more inclined to seek help without having to hit such a low point first? I understand for some people, having a rock bottom moment is necessary to comprehend they have an addiction, but what about the people who recognise their addiction in a culture that doesn’t want to recognise alcohol addiction in anyone but the most extreme examples?

I can’t help but wonder if we’re too attached to the narratives we hold dear to take early intervention against alcoholism seriously. We love a story of extremes, underdogs, redemption. We love to see a person fall right into the pit of despair that is addiction and then claw their way back out of hell against all odds. Although, God forbid they slip even a little lest they be labelled the problem and stripped entirely of their humanity.

But that could never happen to you, right?

We might have more empathy and understanding if we took a longer look at how a person is lost down the dark rabbit hole of addiction. Unfortunately, in doing so, we might just see a glimmer of ourselves blinking back up at us from the darkness.

Nope. Wait. That can’t be right, and if it is, actually, I don’t want to know about it. My head hurts and I’d much rather think about something else. I might just have a wine or two while half-listening to Netflix and scrolling mindlessly, endlessly on my phone, until I’m too tired to form thoughts anymore.

Don’t worry, don’t think about it. It’s fine. It’s okay.

It’s normal.