This article is my opinion – it is based on my years of work and my experience – as a doctor, psychiatrist, mother and grandmother. I am writing this article, about excessive levels of alcohol intake in an increasing number of teenagers.
I confess to being not only concerned but somewhat bemused.
Firstly I ask the question – ‘In the last 40yrs, has there been a major change to our bodies?’
In my work I kept up to date with new advances. Yet, now I fear that during that time I must have missed some major breakthrough in knowledge. If not, then I am left with the question ‘does anybody care?’ If so, who?
Let me explain.
For 35 years I always enjoyed my work – except for a period of six months during my training for the higher degree, MRCPsych (UK), when I was scheduled to work for six months at an alcohol unit. In my view, the mind is and always has been the most important organ in the body – a car whose steering wheel doesn’t work is not the best vehicle to drive on life’s complicated roads.
But I found this the most depressing time I ever encountered at work – for one reason. Most of the people I worked with were there as a result of their own deliberate actions. Some people e.g. those, who had unresolved grief, drank initially for a reason – but alcohol did not heal anything. It merely added the problem of depression. I witnessed the slow devastation of many lives.
Some people have an inherited tendency to alcohol addiction. This means that person must abstain from drinking alcohol or suffer the consequences of dependence. Allergy to nuts can kill – that person must never eat nuts or they will die. I am not unsympathetic – on the contrary I have great concern for young people.
However, let us be honest! The vast majority of young people who drink excessively do so because they choose and like to do so, their peers and friends do so, it is ‘what they do’. In typical teenage fashion, they are not, apparently, concerned about any consequences. But, it is surprising - considering the level of drinking of many o the adults around them? Who are they supposed to learn from?
I write, not as a critical observer telling people what to do, without knowing about difficulties myself. I lived my childhood and teenage years before medication for asthma – be assured, that is not an easy option. I have had a lot of ill health – unbidden and without self cause.
I did not tell people what to do in my work – I listened, treated, guided and gave them options for an alternative way of thinking/believing/acting. They had choice to listen and change – or not.
The experience of working in the alcohol unit has never left my memory. Most of the patients were young and potentially healthy, many were in their twenties and early thirties, but were gradually eroding their health, intelligence, family lives, marriages, and their careers. It was sad. An 8 yrs old girl came to visit her mother. Very soon after the daughter had left, her mother had no memory of having a daughter. Alcohol adversely affects the short term memory – without which life has little meaning.
It has been recognised for a long time in the medical world that women are much more easily damaged by alcohol than men, yet, young women are now reportedly drinking as much if not more than men. Add to which there are the possible damaging effect on babies born to mothers who drink.
The amounts that had been drunk by the patients in the ward, to get them to the state of needing the unit to help them, was on average much less than the young people drink in today’s alcohol liberal society, and it had taken only about 10yrs of fairly dedicated drinking to reach their damaged state. The other factor was that these men and women had started drinking in their late teens – not the much younger age groups who drink now. Nowadays – there is more volume of alcohol drunk, at a younger age and drinks are much higher in unit equivalence.
Now, this is where I came in.
Can anyone who knows much more and is cleverer than me tell me where I can find the article /book/research I must read to bring my knowledge up to date?
I want to see the evidence that tells me about the change which must, in all honesty and intelligence, have taken place in the human body in the past 30yrs to explain the unbelievable levels of alcohol intake that many young people are actually allowed to drink. It is no excuse for a parent to say ‘he/she goes out and I don’t know what they do’ about a teenage son or daughter. Parents, do you not care? You have to take responsibility by giving continued control and guidance – and by being good role models. Boundaries are necessary – but parental authority, control with mutual respect cannot start in the teenage years – it must start in early childhood and requires time, patience, boundaries and love.
( But that is another topic.)
Getting back to my question about further knowledge – let me be specific.
- Has the liver somehow become more resistant to alcohol damage? NO
- Has the stomach lining got thicker or stronger to prevent ulceration? NO
- Has the brain suddenly got an ability to generate more memory cells so that alcoholic dementia does not occur? NO
- Have adolescent brains suddenly matured early? NO
- Have miracles of evolution happened? NO
Cirrhosis of the liver was unheard of a few years ago in the younger age groups. Young people are now dying of cirrhosis of the liver. The problem with alcohol damage is that the end result is not immediate, but, as in lung cancer from smoking, it creeps up in the background like an evil stalker waiting to strike.
Another reason I ask this question, about possible new knowledge and ‘does anybody care’, is that the government in the UK has made drinking possible at all hours and alcohol is now allowed to be sold very cheaply, in prominent places in supermarkets and with much stronger equivalence of units/vol?
WHY – knowing the effects of alcohol, I cannot find a moral reason.
Finally, I ask ‘does anybody care’ because parents are actually allowing the drinking by paying for the alcohol – as most 11-15 yrs old or even older teenagers do not earn money. Some parents take the attitude ‘ they’ll grow out of it’ or ‘they are sensible’. Do not rely on that erroneous belief.
Alcohol damage – to liver and brain – is irreversible.
Teenage years are maturing years. The brain is not yet mature. If health is ruined at this stage, then all future adult life is spoilt. In my opinion, the parents are still responsible for the health and wellbeing of their teenagers. Who else has authority and responsibility? Oh – of course, the schools, teachers and the state! Sorry, I forgot – how silly of me.
Where is the big breakthrough that I cannot find? There isn’t one.
Those six months working in the alcohol unit showed me a side of human nature, which, when accessed, strengthened and fed by alcohol, did not value life, family, ability, friend, or child – a side which took the path to slow destruction via initial spurious and transient jollity and camaraderie, through depression to decline and oblivion.
That side is being allowed and, often, even encouraged to become stronger in teenagers – by denial of responsibility and control by parents, and by a government that allows alcohol to be freely available and more potent. The fabric of society will be eroded by antisocial behaviour fuelled by alcohol, and by damaging the very people who society will rely on in the future. In my opinion, whatever the government state or parents say – those who let teenagers drink excessively DO NOT CARE.
Teenagers may not experience hangovers, and direct instructional education may hold little sway against combined peer pressure and lack of confidence. Teenagers tend to want other teenagers to ‘do what I do’, or ‘I want to do what you do’ – feeling safer with a ‘solidarity’ with others of the same age. To be accepted and ‘part of the gang’ is more important to many than ‘what may happen’.
I have written ‘Choice for Teenagers’ poetry book specifically for teenagers – using metaphors and rhyming verse in an attempt to strengthen the teenage psyche to promote health and discussion – in a gentle, non- directive manner. Some poems are read by me on my secondary school website.
The books are deliberately inexpensive – only the cost of a few glasses of wine or beer – and can be purchased via the website shown in the resource box.
Parents, wake up, take action before it is too late – or your children will die before you. If you haven’t experienced grief in your lives yet, you surely will- if you let them drink excessively. As a psychiatrist I can tell you that loss of a child is the greatest grief anyone can face.
There will be no resurrection and no adult life for teenagers whose brain or liver is irreversibly damaged.
For those with younger children, build up your relationship NOW by spending time and effort with them and by setting a good example for them.
(Longer version of this article is on my website.)
Dr Audrey Coatesworth .
Article – Copyright A Coatesworth2009
