Happy September, friends! My favorite month. I love how you can start to feel the cool air, pumpkin flavored everything starts popping up, flannels, tall boots, leaves changing colors on the trees, AND it's National Recovery Month. I absolutely love to celebrate recovery because it obviously gave me my life back. It's a whole month dedicated to increasing awareness and understanding mental and substance use disorders. It's also to celebrate those who have made the courageous decision to choose recovery and who live their lives day by day in a society that glamorizes alcohol, a society that has a major opioid crisis, and one that loves to over prescribe patients.
Something I wanted to touch on in this blog was the advertising that I see geared towards women, specifically moms. Ever hear of "Mommy's Time Out" or "Mom Juice"? Anything along those lines? Of course you have. It's everywhere. It's a problem. And it's a targeting a fragile group in society. Mom's who are overworked, run down, stressed out, balancing and managing literally everything in their lives, their spouses, and their kids. Trying to get the kids ready for school, taking them to school, toting kids to all their after school activities and sports, making dinner, doing the laundry, bath time, maybe mom works too? Trying to fit in family and even friend time?! Is that possible at this point? Mom's do it all! So they're told that they need to "chill out" or "relax" with a glass (or 10) of wine. Jokes like "I need a bigger glass today!" or laughing that they need one of those wine glasses that can actually hold an entire bottle of wine in them. I'm telling you now it's problematic and it's incredibly dangerous.
We all know how we feel when that first sip goes down. "Aaahhh.." Sigh of relief. You made it. Time to relax. You DESERVE this. Put your feet up. Feel the stress and the tension from the day start to drift away. Take another sip. Even better. Eventually you'll start to feel little tingles throughout your body, you might crack a smile or start to giggle at little things. You're unwinding, loosening up. It feels good! So you drink more. It's numbing you out. You are forgetting about the hectic day you had and maybe start to look forward to 5pm everyday. Eyeing the clock. Maybe eventually it will start to get sooner that you are eyeing at the clock. 3pm. 4pm. Is this too soon to pour a glass? I mean it's 5 o'clock somewhere.
Now this doesn't happen overnight, right? But this is gradual. For some it can pick up quicker than others. Everything with drinking/addiction should end with "yet". But I haven't over slept at all having to get my kids up and ready for the day....yet. But I haven't finished an entire bottle of wine in a sitting by myself....yet. But I haven't drank wine by myself at all, my husband is always with me.....yet. But I have never, ever blacked out or not remembered my evening.....yet. I promise you this disease is progressive.
Which leads me to my main point. I was so upset when I saw this stupid picture that was floating around on the internet at SOME Trader Joe's in the US. Not sure where but I can confidently say it was not at the Downtown Minneapolis Trader Joe's, because I shop there and checked. :)
Some of you immediately might understand why this could be a problem. Others, who are sadly desensitized towards this type of advertising, probably think I'm overreacting.
So what IS the problem here?
1. Imagine your child seeing this and thinking "Mom, why do we need wine for my back to school supplies?" Are you honestly going to respond with "Oh sweetie, after my stressful day trying to homeschool you and your siblings, this is what I need to indulge on to forget it all and to relax." Ouch. Poor kids.
2. Self Medicating. We went over how good it feels when you get that first sip down, the tingling and the numbing start to occur. Okay, so you are going to become USED to that. You will CRAVE that. You will want MORE of it. It felt so good right?! More! It is turning into self medicating. Alcohol has truly never solved anyone's problems ever in the history of time. We forget about the problems. Put them aside, save them for the next day, "I'll deal with it later" mentality. They start to pile up. They get bigger. You're becoming more stressed because the pile is bigger. You medicate more. Nothing is getting better. You want to explode. I will tell you too, avoidance was my main issue with addiction. Yes, I wanted to avoid reality, but I wanted to avoid every single thing in life. All I wanted to do was drink all day. Did that start out initially? No, it PROGRESSIVELY (there's that progressive word again) got worse.
You also may feel like your anxiety/depression is "better" after drinking. You are more relaxed right?! Those with social anxiety....hello! How fun to not feel nervous in new crowds, right?! This is temporary. Alcohol is a depressant and one day you will wake up with major depression and you will wonder where the hell this came from. Once again, it's progressive. Keep numbing with a depressant and it will show up over time.
3. It gives the message that you are not able to cope with the stress of now home schooling your child and dealing with literally everything else 2020 has thrown at you! I will tell you this now....Yes. You. Can. Sometimes when I think I can't do something, I think of all of the trillions of people in this world and how each day all of these people are accomplishing something (likely the same thing). If they can all do it, I sure as hell can. (Side note, that is what got me through labor and delivering a baby! 😅)
4. Some moms or dads might ACTUALLY need help already. Maybe the depression is severe enough. Maybe they're suicidal. Maybe they just lost a loved one. Prescribing this "quick fix" to folks because it made YOU feel better, doesn't mean it's going to make your co worker/friend/neighbor/loved one feel better. Quick tip: We likely NEVER know all that is going on behind closed doors for folks. Please do not prescribe a damn depressant to someone. Thank you.
5. It makes light of addiction and alcoholism! A MEN!
My first chemical use assessment I scored "high, off the charts" per my probation officer. I was totally honest, let me tell you. I knew I needed help and I wanted to get back on the right track and see if what I had was truly alcoholism (I have to laugh now, it definitely was.)
The questions you are asked on a lot of the assessments and paperwork are exactly the things that the marketing and advertising are pressuring you all to do.
For example:
-Drinking in the morning.
-Drinking to the point of blackouts
-Drinking alone.
-Give up/cut back on activities to drink
-Continuing to drink despite consequences/worsening mental health.
-Spending a lot of time consuming, thinking about, recovering from, or obtaining the next drink.
-Craving/Urges to drink.
-Increased tolerance. Eventually your 1 glass of wine you started at won't continue to do the trick for you....
-and on and on.
Alcoholism is not funny. Alcoholism isn't cute. Alcoholism can happen to anyone. It doesn't have to run in the family. If it's the right moment for alcohol to take over your life and it works for you and numbs you the right way, there you go! Hooked. For me, I come from a family of big drinkers on one side. It was definitely waiting there for me. What sealed the deal was after the passing of my grandma and the self medicating. I truly didn't want to feel anything because I hurt so bad and alcohol was the one thing that made me feel "good." It was only 2 years later when things really started to spiral (daily drinking, morning drinking, DUI, breathalyzer I had to blow into 3x a day, jail, treatments, ETC.)
I encourage you to start notice the advertisings and the marketing. Notice how it pushes towards women/mothers/shit, anyone. It's everywhere. You don't NEED alcohol to have fun or laugh or be social. I promise, if someone truly loves you and is your friend, they just want you and to spend time with YOU. Not drunk you. :)
Have a good week, loves!
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