Enduring the booze and blows of alcoholic parents

Where only first names appear, names have been changed to protect the identities of the sources.

Every day between the ages of seven and 12, Catherine, a sophomore, was welcomed home by a familiar sight: bottles of liquor strewn over the carpet, accompanied by her father's drunken shouts ringing through the house.

It was a difficult time for her; her grades were slipping and her friendships were deteriorating, but all she could think about was how she would endure another night of her father's painful insults. For Catherine, home was a danger zone, a place where, almost nightly, she would find herself locked in her closet — her sole refuge from her father's intoxicated wrath and sudden outbursts. Her father was, after all, an abusive alcoholic.

As the alcohol industry continues to boom — with annual sales of $185 billion, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism — the National Association for Children of Alcoholics (NACoA) estimates that more than 28 million Americans are children of alcoholics, and nearly 11 million of these children are under 18. For Blazers like Catherine, the struggle to cope with an alcoholic parent has been a long and strenuous journey to escape the cycle of abuse.

"He made me feel worthless"

Catherine's early childhood was like that of any other child. Her father was an outgoing and friendly man, eager to take her out to the neighborhood park to race across the monkey bars, she remembers. Although her father drank alcohol from time to time, he was by no means addicted.

But when Catherine turned seven, her father began drinking several bottles of hard liquor and beer each night. Catherine remembers him coming home from bars and stumbling through the front door in the middle of the night, sometimes as late as 6 a.m. He was always enraged, she says, and often slapped her brother and screamed at her mother for no reason. When he was sober, he promised to stop drinking but never followed through.

Feeling helpless, Catherine slowly isolated herself from her family and friends. "I didn't have many friends at school, but I hated to go home. Every time I walked through my front door, my dad would start calling me names, like `stupid' and `dumb-[expletive],'" she says. "He made me feel worthless."

Catherine's isolation is typical of a child with an alcoholic parent. According to child and adolescent psychologist D'Arcy Lyness, teenagers who live with alcoholic adults usually refrain from speaking out or showing any emotion because they fear they will trigger a parent's drinking binge. Because they restrain themselves, these teens erode their own self-esteem.

But one night, when Catherine was 10, she decided to fight back. She secretly emptied 24 bottles of her father's beer and filled them with water. When her father found out, he was so furious that he broke mirrors around the house and slammed doors into walls. He yelled at her for hours, leaving her in tears. Although her father never hit her, Catherine emphasizes that the years of verbal abuse have permanently scarred her.

According to the NACoA, more than 1 million children of alcoholics are confirmed each year as victims of abuse and neglect because of alcohol. In addition, children of alcoholics have a higher incidence of psychopathology, including anxiety and depression.

But for Michael, a sophomore, his relationship with his father went far beyond verbal abuse. When Michael was five, his father received a promotion and started attending social parties regularly. Michael's father would usually have a few cocktails every weekend, but within a few months, he became addicted to alcohol. Going to bars at night and coming home the next morning became a regular routine for him.

The outgoing and loving man Michael once knew — the man who taught him how to swing a bat and pitch the perfect ball — became bitter and reclusive. "If anyone tried to talk to him, he'd say, `Go the [expletive] away,'" Michael remembers. When drunk, Michael's father took his anger out on him, often throwing him into walls and slapping him around. Michael's mother fell prey to depression for four years, and his younger brother grew up witnessing his father's spontaneous outbursts of rage.

Michael feels his father was never satisfied with his achievements, even when Michael received perfect grades or made the top-ranked baseball team in the community. Michael tried harder each time to impress his father, but nothing seemed to work, and the abuse continued. "Once he said I screwed up my baseball game, and he put a cigar on my arm," Michael says, pointing to an area of discolored skin on his left arm. "Nothing was ever good enough for him."

One day, Michael's father missed his son's best baseball game of the season. As he was driving drunk to pick Michael up from the game, he was involved in a car accident. Michael waited for four hours, but his father never showed up. Eventually, he called his coach on a pay phone and asked for a ride home. "I pitched a no-hitter that day, too," he adds.

Road to recovery

Michael had no one to turn to - he was too embarrassed to let his friends come over to his house, let alone confide in them about his father's drinking problem. Eventually, Michael's mother, aware of her son's misery, took him to see a psychiatrist, who helped him open up about his father's alcohol problem.

Still, Michael found little solace until his father was admitted to the emergency room for alcohol poisoning after downing half a gallon of rum. As a result of the traumatic experience, Michael's father began to realize the extent of the damage he was causing himself and his family. At around the same time, Michael's mother was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. The news had a profound impact on Michael's father, who promised to stop drinking and joined Alcoholics Anonymous, a support group devoted to helping alcoholics quit.

According to Lyness, enrolling in an organization designed to help alcoholics and friends of alcoholics is the first step to recovery. Teenagers often suppress their emotions and are ashamed to talk about their issues at home, she says, but seeking help from a school counselor or any other trusted adult is important to let teenagers know that they are not alone. "Keeping the secret is part of the disease of alcoholism and it allows the problem to get worse," she says.

Aside from a few relapses, Michael's father has been sober for two years. Michael is proud of his father's efforts to stop drinking and insists his father is a "good person," despite his alcoholism.

Catherine's father has been recovering from his addiction as well. Eventually, Catherine's father realized that he was spending well over $2,000 a night at bars and restaurants, and after his family was nearly evicted from its house due to late payments, he forced himself to quit drinking. He has been sober for three years, but as a result of his heavy drinking, he now suffers from severe liver problems.

Although Catherine's traumatic childhood was dominated by her intoxicated father's abuse and insults, she believes that her experiences have strengthened her own values. She discourages her friends from drinking, hoping to prevent her father's experiences from repeating in her own life or someone else's. "I've seen what alcohol can do to people," she says, "and I'm never going to risk going through that."