One morning not so long ago, I got a call from a good friend of mine. I was a little surprised to hear from him so early in the day, but he sounded calm and composed.
“Chuck, I’m sure you have wondered about me,” he began. “I’ve been a little hard to reach. I want to apologize to you for my uneven behavior. I’ve been having trouble with alcohol, and I finally realized I had to get some help.”
I was stunned. From my perspective, he was leading a storybook life. I’ve always enjoyed his great sense of humor, and he and his wife are great fun to be around. She’s attractive, they have wonderful kids, and they’re well off. I had little indication that his life was in danger of falling apart. Not long before, I’d served on an advisory board with him, and though he seemed a little removed, everything he said made a great deal of sense.
In his call, my friend said he had enrolled in Hazelden, an alcoholism treatment program, and it was helping him tremendously. “I simply wanted you to know what is going on with me, and to apologize for my erratic behavior,” he said.
I told him it was wonderful he was taking charge of his life, and I promised I would be there for him. I know very well it’s going to be a tough struggle, because I’ve seen it happen before. But I also know my friend, and I have great faith he can do it.
I’m also reminded that alcoholism is a disease that could happen to anyone. There but for the grace of God go I. Depending on our genes, any of us might fall victim to it.
Having to pull yourself up from the bottom
Throughout my life, there have been people all around me who’ve struggled with alcohol. While in the Army during the Korean War, I counseled soldiers with psychological problems — typically involving alcohol. And during the rest of my life, a large number of friends have had problems with alcoholism.
Some of these friends did not choose to seek help, and I can tell you it screwed up their lives forever. It’s very painful to watch the fallout of heavy drinking — including destruction of careers and marriages. However, a number of friends have managed to overcome their problems. It has reinvigorated my faith in people’s ability to pull themselves up from the bottom.
Many years ago, I found myself right in the middle of a very desperate situation. I got a call from the wife of buddy of mine who was a prominent executive. She told me he’d left home and had been drinking all weekend in a hotel room in the city, and she asked me to go down there and bring him back home. Of course, I agreed.
I arrived at the hotel, located the room and knocked on the door. I had to knock several times and talk to him through the door before he finally opened up. He looked awful. His skin was pale, his eyes were bloodshot and he reeked of alcohol. He had a woman with him and he had a bullet wound, but that is a whole other story that I won’t be telling you.
The woman left and I spent some time there, getting him ready to meet his family again. I called his home and warned his wife and family that he wouldn’t be a pretty sight when he got back to them.
I will always remember the look on their faces when he walked through the front door. His children were trembling and in tears. It was an unbelievably sad situation that I hope I’ll never see again. But there was a happy ending. My friend entered Alcoholics Anonymous and got himself straightened out. As long as I knew him, he never went back on booze, and both his family and his career stayed intact. But it could have been a disaster.
Alcholism is a growing problem
We all know people who drink too much and make fools of themselves in public. It’s not uncommon to witness their behavior at cocktail parties, cookouts and even at concerts. Their speech gets slurred, they start stumbling and they say some things they later come to regret.
In the last year alone, more than 30 million Americans — nearly one in seven adults — have struggled with a serious alcohol problem, according to a study published in June in JAMA Psychiatry. In fact, this problem, referred to as alcohol use disorder, is becoming more common and more intense, the study found.
People with AUD indulge in binge drinking, which is defined as drinking five or more drinks for men — or four or more drinks for women — on a single occasion. The typical binge drinker is well educated and is not poor, according to a 2014 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC study found that binge drinking is most common among non-Hispanic whites, people with at least some college education and those who earn more than $75,000 a year. Twice as many men than women are binge drinkers, and it is most common among young men ages 18 to 24.
People with AUD can screw up their lives in many ways – lashing out at their families, ruining their businesses and even getting behind the wheel of car and killing people. There are nearly 88,000 deaths each year with alcoholic related causes, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
People with AUD are often called alcoholics, but the vast majority of them are not technically dependent to alcohol. The CDC study, which examined responses from 138,100 Americans in the National Survey on Drug Use and Health from 2009 to 2011, found that nine out of 10 binge drinkers are not dependent on alcohol.
According to the study’s definition of alcohol dependency, a person must meet three or more of the seven criteria for alcohol dependency, which are tolerance, withdrawal, impaired control (the inability to stop drinking once you start), unsuccessful attempts to cut down or stop drinking, continued use despite problems, neglect of activities, and time spent in alcohol related activity (having a large portion of your life revolve around drinking).
But even heavy drinkers that aren’t actually dependent on alcohol can ruin their lives, and if they choose to stop this, it can still be a real struggle to turn their lives around.
The difficult path to recovery
There’s no doubt in my mind that alcoholism is a disease that is complicated and filled with tragic behavior.
“An alcoholic, a real alcoholic, is not the same man at all,” Raymond Chandler wrote in The Long Goodbye. “You can’t predict anything about him for sure, except that he will be someone you never met before.” Chandler knew first-hand, because he had his own problems with drinking. When he drank, it’s said, he would black out and at times threaten suicide.
We spend a lot of time worrying about the dangers of controlled drugs, and rightly so. But we tend to overlook alcohol, which is a very potent drug in itself. And unlike other drugs, there is no way of stopping adults from taking it.
Alcohol is easy to get hold of, and many people never learn how to use it properly. All too often, it ends up destroying people’s lives, and the lives of many others. Think of all the innocent people killed by drivers under the influence, and in addition, the sons and daughters of alcoholics who follow the same course as their parents.
Viewing all this tragedy, it’s surprising how few alcoholics seek help. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism reports that 16.6 million adults suffer from AUD, but only 1.3 million, or 8 percent, receive treatment at a specialized facility.
It takes courage and downright determination and humility to conquer the complicated disease of alcoholism. There are many resources that have been amazingly successful, including Alcoholics Anonymous.
In their darkest hours, recovering alcoholics can turn to the AA Big Book for some advice and inspiration. “When I stopped living in the problem and began living in the answer,” the Big Book says, “the problem went away.”
And when I see friends who battle with alcoholism, I think, “There but for the grace of God go I – or any one of us.”
More articles on leadership and management:
Senate Republicans divided over ACA repeal
4 management truths from CEOs of companies old and new
Closing healthcare’s leadership diversity gap is a slow-moving objective: 4 key findings
