WOMEN AND ALCOHOLISM

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I went to the bathroom, held a cold washcloth to my face, and once again looked in the mirror. I tried to pull a comb through my hair. It was no use, I walked around the apartment looking at the mess. All the dirty clothes, the sticky kitchen floor, the food-stained furniture, and the spots on the wooden floors where David had wet through his diaper....I went to the bedroom and got the wine I had saved. I carried it to the kitchen and set it in the sink. I had not taken a drink and my body was one solid pain. I finally fell on the floor and writhed and cried. I looked up at the wine bottle and it looked directly back at me. I couldn't imagine what I was going to do next. 1

Who is She?

-Nancy Lee Hall

A True Story of a Drunken Mother

The woman alcoholic has best friends who have never seen her drunk. She may be your sister, mother, the teller who cashes your checks, the director of a community center, or your math professor. She is a member of every socioeconomic class, sexual preference, almost every race and nation. In the U.S. alone there are 9 million alcoholics; out of this total the woman alcoholic has 3 million sisters.

Since the mid-1960's, the number of women alcoholics has risen disproportionately. This is probably due in part to greater public awareness, but it also may be due to the rapid influx into the labor force of women who are unprepared for the stress and competition generated in the marketplace.

The "Double Standard"

In most social circles, a man is expected to drink to prove his manhood. If he drinks too much, people tend to be sympathetic or amused. Studies show that people try to understand why a man may drink more than he should. They excuse his habit because he may be the sole provider, a struggling medical student, or the assemblyline worker who is victimized and bored.

The reverse standard operates for the woman who drinks to excess. Society sees her as unfeminine and out of control. If a woman imbibes to the point where she falls on her behind, whoa! She's not funny, she's disgusting! If she consumes alcohol at other than permissible times, she breaks a social taboo. People generally judge her as indulgent and irresponsible, incapable of performing her roles as wife, mother and housekeeper. When those who are close to the female alcoholic discover her illness, they expect her to cut or stop her drinking. If she doesn't, she is to blame.

The female alcoholic bears a double burden: her illness and society's scorn. Because she is strongly stigmatized, she often internalizes society's attitude toward her and usually feels herself a disgrace. Consequently, she often hesitates to seek help and hides her drinking. Intimate friends and family reinforce this mode of secrecy. They may suspect a problem but protect her for as long as possible. At some level they also may blame her because they share society's attitude.

The Context

The American woman who steps over the line from social to compulsive drinking has characteristics which differ from those of male alcoholics. Thus far, research has offered only statistics and comparisons; the underlying reasons for them have not been determined. The female alcoholic begins drinking later than men do. Her addiction is more likely to be accompanied by pill dependency. She becomes addicted after several years of drinking, whereas the male alcoholic usually reaches this point only after 15-20 years of heavy drinking.

A higher proportion of female than male

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alcoholics in treatment are employed, with some college background. In the higher socioeconomic classes, women alcoholics are most likely to live with their spouses. Most women alcoholics in the lower classes are single, separated or divorced. Of those within the lower classes who are married, one-third to one-half have alcoholic spouses. Because the

Rachel Burger

female alcoholic conceals her illness more successfully, and tends to drink alone, she does not seek help until her alcoholism is in an advanced stage, making recovery more difficult. She is more likely to attribute her problem to family stress, while the male alcoholic relates it to employment difficulties. In most age groups male alcoholics outnumber females; in the over-65 category, the percentage of female alcoholism ranks significantly higher than the percentage for men,

The woman alcoholic is more specific about the triggering situation for her drinking, with depression most frequently cited. She usually follows her spouse into alcoholism and rarely leads the way. She has trouble expressing anger while sober and tends to abuse other mood-altering drugs in addition to and in combination with alcohol. Whereas the wife of an alcoholic tends to reach out for help for herself, family and spouse, the husband of an alcoholic, once he has stopped denying his wife's alcoholism, chooses divorce as a solution. However, the choices made by wives and husbands do not necessarily reflect so much on the psychological makeup of either gender as on the relative financial independence of the non-alcoholic spouse. The death rate from cirrhosis of the liver ranks higher among female than male alcoholics. A characteristic common to both female and male alcoholics, suicide, ranks higher than in the non-alcoholic population.

The Roots of Alcoholism

For decades researchers have tried to determine the causes of alcoholism. They have been able to arrive at proposed hypotheses and some associations between background factors and alcoholism. A survey of the literature makes clear that associations do not constitute causation, and that rigid generalizations about the woman alcoholic are impossible at this time. Vera Lindbeck of the Family Service of the

Cincinnati Area provides some important insights about why a woman may become trapped in this addiction.

Many adult women of today have never developed adequate ways of dealing with pressure, but not because the pressures are so great. Rather they were not encouraged to become independent while grow. ing up. Consequently, they remain fixed in a dependent orientation to the world. In fact, many alcoholism counselors find that a female alcoholic, once in treatment, develops a dual unhealthy dependency-on alcohol and on men--for their per sonal satisfaction.

Other women never had their normal dependency needs met adequately in childhood. As they grow older, they feel their frustrations intensify. Although such women may find vicarious satisfaction in paren ting, as middle age approaches they again feel un wanted and unneeded.

Also, Lindbeck suggests, "there is a painful inconsistency between [women's] educational and vocational goals as teenagers and their adult experience as wives and mothers." The social pressure to marry, suppress their ambitions, and immerse themselves in roles as wives and mothers leads to an extraordinary amount of fantasy about middle age, when a "new life" will begin. Yet these women have not taken steps to prepare themselves for such a renaissance, retaining only vague notions of what this new beginning will entail. Middle age eventually arrives. They miss the stimulation of mothering and become more vulnerable to depression.

Many major events can also undermine a woman's self-image and create a special vulnerability to depression. The possibilities and potential combinations seem endless; miscarriage, infertility, menopause, mastectomy, the birth of a physically, mentally or emotionally handicapped child, hysterectomy, infidelity, separation, divorce, desertion. Such a crisis, if unresolved, may precipitate a woman's cscalation from social to problem drinking.

For women in their mid-60's, losses are the rule. rather than the exception. Spouses die, friends move to retirement communities, health problems complicate activities of daily living, energy ebbs. Many couples at this time find it difficult to adjust to the daily presence of a spouse moving into retirement. Too much togetherness may prove abrasive. One of the normal problems of aging, the decreasing ability to metabolize alcohol, complicates the social life of an older person, who simply can't handle the amount of alcohol she used to consume in her middle years.

The woman who is beginning to drink excessively may exhibit many symptoms in spite of her desperate need to conceal them. She may become obviously intoxicated after one or two drinks. She may demonstrate memory lapses. You may notice her excessive use of mouthwash or some unexplained bruises and injuries. In spite of irregular eating, she may gain weight or appear slender with a distended abdomen. Her face may look puffy and bloated. Speech may slur. Her moods may be unpredictable and inconsistent. She may begin to avoid social occasions and complain of insomnia and nightmares. You may hear her say that she's not feeling well.

Personal loss, cither a particularly painful one or a series, plays a significant role in precipitating addiction. The female alcoholic often has lost a parent carly in life due to death or has experienced desertion, separation, divorce or mental illness.

Lesbian Alcoholism

Little research has been done on the incidence of alcoholism among lesbians except in the Los Angeles area. Those who investigated the prevalence of this illness in the L.A. gay community discovered a complete lack of previous scientific research on this subject in the files and materials of the following organizations: The National Clearinghouse for