Alcoholism and Its Effect on the Family - Essay Example

The alcohol that is carried from the mother into the placenta reaches the baby inside the womb thereby introducing the mother to the risk of giving birth to a baby with "Fetal Alcohol Syndrome or FAS" (Parsons). According to Parsons, babies born with FAS have "deformities in the brain and skull" and are "physically shorter and underweight compared to normal babies." Apart from this, they have "difficulties in learning, attention span, judgment, memory, problem-solving" (Parsons), and usually exhibit behavior problems.

These physical and behavioral limitations are carried over to adulthood leading to difficulties in relationship establishment and making these affected children socially impaired and incompetent to live a normal existence. In physically healthy children of alcoholics, "learning disorders, behavioral problems and emotional disturbance" (Burge & Schneider) are apparent. According to G. Berger, many of them have "low self-esteem" and carry feelings of "loneliness, guilt, helplessness, fears of abandonment and chronic depression" (qtd.

in Parsons). These children's ability to read and learn slows down as alcoholic parents neglect their important role in the family. Moreover, as the home becomes a venue for conflict due to constant arguments about the issue of excessive drinking, the home becomes no longer conducive to study and learning. According to Ferguson, as performance in the school gets adversely affected, children experience problems academically and have "difficulty establishing relationships with teachers and classmates" (Parsons) thereby resulting to feelings of inadequacy and isolation.

Other children manifest "behavioral problems [such as] lying, stealing, fighting, and truancy" (Parsons). This is mainly due to the "extremely unstable home environment" (Parsons) they live in. As children "can not predict the behaviour of the problem drinker" (Walker) in the family or know not what to expect from an alcoholic parent, they develop erratic behaviors and become unpredictable themselves (Parsons). On MarriageThe attitude of the problem drinker negatively alters as the dependence on alcohol increases.

According to Burge and Schneider, excessive alcohol use does not only lead to clinically significant physical impairment as the drinker's health deteriorates, it also leads to distress as the family gets exposed to common scenarios among alcoholic families such as car accidents due to intoxication or arrests for alcohol-related violations or misconducts (Burge & Schneider). These situations more often than not trigger arguments between spouses and other family members about the risk of intoxication that result to domestic tension.

As the alcoholic individual fails to fulfill major obligations at work, relationship between spouses gets affected. For instance, "repeated absences or poor work performance related to alcohol use" (Burge & Schneider) leads to inefficiency and eventual job loss. Unemployment then leads to "financial difficulties" (Parsons) which is another formidable domestic issue that couples deal with on a regular basis. Liquor addiction also makes the alcoholic parent neglectful of children or household.

Feelings of "hatred and self-pity" (Parsons) thrive as the nonalcoholic spouse feels