Any other ACoA's (Adult Children of Alcoholics) here?

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Another one checking in. I have an alcoholic father. I can't say that it's played part in who I am today, Dad's more of the come home from work and drink quietly in the study until he passes out , wake up go to work and repeat the process type.

So yep, another one.

Carry on

here.
father drunk all my life.
he's better off dead.

I am convinced one of my parents is still an alcoholic, but they are an alcoholic in denial.

How many times does a person need to get their licence taken away (having failed a breathaliser test) for them to get a wake-up call?

And how many times is it going to take for all of their friends to believe me, when I say that this parent has a problem with drink and needs to stop lying to themself?

The parent in question hides it well, and is a respectable, middle-class sort of person, so everybody thinks I'm just being mean and making up nasty allegations for no reason. They had a serious drinking problem when I was still living at home and, based on subsequent drink-driving incidents, they still have an occasional drinking problem now. But, if they don't want to admit that to themself, there's nothing I can do.

I'm also an ACA. I've always remembered my dad drinking every night that he didn't work or drinking beer from 10 in the morning, until it was time for him to go to work at 3 in the afternoon. It got to the point where I would stay in my bedroom on the weekend evenings to avoid getting into arguments over small, trivial things. Things that he would turn into a big deal when it wasn't like me hugging Chico on the floor, yelling at me to let him be a dog. I'm glad I'm living on my own. I couldn't live with that, every night.

I go to therapy. I used to go to Al-anon, but I have multiple addictions, and going to a bunch of different 12-Step Fellowships is too much. I just do NA now. Al-anon has a lot of literature that is helpful in dealing with relationships. It's crazy how many books they have. I have a partial library at home that is for adult children. In some areas they have adult children meetings. There are a lot of self-help books published by hazelden and others about co-dependency overcoming an abusive childhood. I have read a lot of self-help books. I also checked out ACoA. There's not any meetings where I live, so that's not an option. The benefit of Al-Anon/ACoA, any literature on the subject is that it helps you figure out how the alcoholism/addiction has affected you. You realize that you are not alone and not at fault. It take more than identifying the problem to get over it though.

In order to heal, the main thing is to remember the past, greive it, and move on. That's a lot easier than it sounds. I have a lot of emotional blocks that have come up when looking at my past. I have been in recovery for almost seven years and every time I tried to look at my childhood in depth, with the abuse, it brought up some VERY uncomfortable feelings, unbearable. I do it a little at a time, so that it's not overwhelming. The older I get, the more times I look at my past, the more resolved things get. I'm about to do another 4th Step (where you do a detailed inventory of your life). This time I am looking forward to more freedom from my childhood. I see that I am not over it yet. I've dealt with the alcoholism, but not the profound rejection and alienation I feel and felt, probably from having Aspergers and not knowing it.

The Al-anon has a 4th Step Guide that is very in-depth and can help with healing. I suggest getting a therapist or sponsor to talk to about what you discover in your inventory. Feelings will emerge.

I'm not an ACoA but I have spent more than my share of time online with such groups. My father had serious anger problems. Some would call him a rageaholic, but I don't like that term, because it sounds too flippant. It is not easy to find groups to support people who come from that sort of background, so I ended up with people whose parents were alcohol and drug abusers. The similarities are striking. It seems like all dysfunctional families have a lot in common. The cycle of blame, shame, and denial is universal.

I had an alcoholic father. For him, I think it was situational rather than a family disposition since there were no known alcoholics in his family that anyone remembered. He finally got into and adhered to the 12 steps but they never really helped him heal the hurt that got him into that position in the first place. He was still lousy at managing his anger. He was still emotionally stunted. And he was fairly vindictive and narcissitic. The alcohol just made it all worse.

Since I was a teenager, I dabbled in ACA. It definitely wasn't for me. I'm a realist about my personal issues - I don't need group therapy to discern the issues and work through them. I can and have done that on my own with laser guided self introspection. The last lingering issue for me - the one that has always held me back - has been a profound lack of self esteem. I can logically reach positive conclusions. I can argue with myself that my ultra nagative inner voice is just flat out wrong. I logically know why I shouldn't have esteem issues yet they persist. I'm at the point where I'm wondering if they are permanently imbedded in my psyche since they were programmed from the time I was small.

The folks at ACA don't seem to handle the real deep stuff very well. They tend to dig around at the surface then recommend individual councelling when you get into the deep stuff. Doing the group thing has never been good from me.

I think you hit on one powerful therapy tool though. The writing. If you've reached an impass - let yourself skirt around it. Don't worry about writing in linear fashion. If something has you stumped swing past it, on to something else... as you write and get it all out, there's a good chance those blocks will present the answers after you've downloaded the other emotional baggage. Your head really won't let you handle issues that it knows you're not ready for. I'd suggest diving into the issues you can handle - and make a pact with yourself to be brutally honest. Clear out the old to free up resources to deal with the 'BIG' stuff.

i wonder how many other people out there [and here on WP] are not sure which is the greater driver of their personal issues, being on the spectrum or being of an alcoholic upbringing? or a synergy of the two?

I have a feeling that it's a lot of people, auntblabby.