Home » Culture & Society » Social Issues » Other Social Issues

Sophisticated Alcoholic

Ranked #14,860 in Culture & Society, #301,177 overall | Donates to Squidoo Charity Fund

The Cool Drunk

We all have our crosses to bear so this Lens is not an attempt to disparage the individual who has a problem with alcohol consumption. In reality, it is a plea to help to understand and conquer the beast that is alcoholism. To simply say, "stop drinking" is no more effective than the "Just Say No" campaign.

The "cool drunk" is the guy that makes excessive drinking sound cool. "I fix me a nice glass of hennessy on the rocks, get my morning paper, and start my day." "I'm set for the big game, got my brandy, chasing it with some Icehouse, just waiting for game-time."

There's also the financially successful alcoholic. When I was a kid, our family would occasionally fly to Los Angeles and visit my Uncle Robert and Aunt Irene. They owned a home in Englewood, CA (back when Englewood was a really nice neighborhood, not sure what it's like now, that was at least 30 years ago). As a six-year-old, I remember the manicured lawn, the neat home inside, and it always smelled refreshingly nice.

My Uncle Robert was an architect who earned a decent living. He was also an alcoholic but as a kid I just thought he was ultra-cool. I was too young to realize that his "coolness" stemmed from the fact that he spoke intelligently, in that west coast manner of speaking, but often his speech was slurred. This was the case because from sun-up to sundown he had a drink in his hand.

Now that I've totally slammed my late uncle (and all the parties in this true story are deceased) here's the gist of my broaching this subject: Don't allow any substance to control you! You are the captain of your ship and it cannot be steered properly if you are constantly inebriated. When your particular drug of choice, be it alcohol, tobacco, narcotics, or prescribed medication, dictates what you do, it has taken control of your life and it will KILL YOU! Plain and simple. The effects: being cool, fun and laughter, or being able to "relax" is not worth the payoff because not only does excessive drinking destroy your life but it can be detrimental to those closest to you.

From 16 years of age to well into my 30's I had my own battles with alcohol. I could actually go a month or two without drinking, but when I did drink it would be pretty hard and heavy. I was a "binge drinker." In my early 20's I would often experience the state of being "blacked-out." In other words, I'd be walking, talking, and -- hate to admit -- sometimes driving but not really aware of what was going on around me. I'd eventually pass out and wake up the next morning not remembering how or when I arrived home the night before. I'd peep out the window and see my car sitting in the driveway. It never dawned on me that not only was I creating potentially a devastating problem in my life but for others as well. Fortunately, my guardian spirits kept me afloat long enough to realize the tremendous error of my ways and I was allowed to live through and learn from that phase of my life. Millions of people are not afforded that opportunity.
Loading

Acute Alcohol Intoxication

When the bloodstream is saturated with a high level of ethanol, "Alcohol Intoxication" occurs. This is a physiological state commonly known as drunkenness or inebriation.

The symptoms of alcohol intoxication include slurred speech, euphoria, impaired balance, loss of muscle coordination, vomiting, bloodshot eyes, flushed face, lack of inhibition, and erratic behavior. Acute alcohol intoxication, or an extremely high level of alcohol in the blood can result in the individual lapsing into a coma or death.

Makes you wonder, why in the world anyone would subject themselves to such a possibility. Obviously, this disease is a lot more complex and is not as cut and dry as you might anticipate. Sometimes heredity plays a role. However, if you are aware of the fact that your father was an alcoholic this should eliminate heredity as a potential cause because you know first hand how deadly it can be. You've witnessed the physical and emotional destruction of excessive drinking so why would you want to repeat the cycle. Don't allow it to control you, control alcoholism by abstaining.

Abstinence is about control. Are you in control of your mental and physical capacities, or have you handed over the reins to an addiction? An addiction that destroys; an addiction that manes; a generational curse if you will.
Loading

Facts about Alcohol

  • Consuming 4 or more drinks in one sitting qualifies as binge drinking.

  • Approximastely 1 in 12 adults abuse alcohol.

  • 100,000 people will die from alcohol related causes this year alone.

  • Aproximately 240,000 to 360,000 of the nation's current undergraduated will die from alcohol-related causes.

  • Sixty percent of college women diagnosed with a sexually transmitted disease were drunk at the time of infection.

  • Eight young people a day die in alcohol-related crashes.

  • Excess alcohol use can cause emotional problems

  • Have you ever felt you should cut down on your drinking?
    Have people criticized your drinking?
    Have you ever felt bad or guilty about your drinking?
    Do you drink first thing in the morning, for any reason?

    If you answered "yes" to any of the aforementioned question it suggest you have a problem with alcohol.

  • Lying about drinking problems or refusal to discuss it, are clues to a problem.

  • Problem drinkers drink on a regular basis and are a danger to themselves and others.

  • Problem drinking and alcohol abuse leads to Alcoholism.

  • Alcohol is a toxin that damages the transmission of nerve impulses to the brain.

  • Alcohol abuse damages the liver, known as cirrhosis, leading to liver failure, liver cancer and death.

  • Alcohol abuse causes infection and chronic inflammation of the stomach and digestive tract, leading to ulcers.

  • Alcohol abuse causes malnutrition which results in memory disorders.

  • Excessive drinking leads to high blood pressure and may damage your heart mucsles. This increases the risk of stroke and heart failure.

  • Excessive alcohol consumption can cause cancer of the esophagux, larynx, colon, kidneys, stomach and liver.

  • Alcoholism is linked to diabetes.

  • Alcohol abuse can cause siezures, tremors, and blackouts.

  • Alcohol poisoning is a condition in which a toxic amount of alcohol has been consumed in a short period of time. Nerves
    that control involuntary actions, such as breathin and the gag reflex are depressed.

  • Alcohol is an irritant to the stomach, which may cause vomitting and chocking becomes an issue.

  • Breathing can slow, become irregular, or stop.

  • Alcoholic hepatitis is hepatitis (inflamation of the liver) due to excessice intake of alcohol.

  • Untreated severe dehydration from vomiting can cause permanent brain damage.

  • Blood alcohol content continues to rise even after a person has stopped drinking.

  • Alcohol in the stomach and intestines continues to enter the bloodstream and circulate throughout the body.
Loading

Mickey Mantle

Mickey Mantle is included in this Lens, not because he was one of the greatest baseball players of all time. Mantle is added to this Lens because of the lesson his life provides regarding the dangers of drinking. Here's a brief excerpt about his life. As you read you will see how it unraveled rather rapidly, all because of his association with excessive drinking.

December 23, 1951, Mantle married Merlyn Johnson in Commerce, Oklahoma; they had four sons. Mantle's drinking became public knowledge during his lifetime, the press (per established practice at the time) kept quiet about his myriad marital infidelities. Mantle was not entirely discreet about them, and when he went to his retirement ceremony in 1969, he brought his mistress along with his wife.

In 1980, Mickey and Merlyn separated for 15 years, but neither filed for divorce. During this time, Mantle lived with his agent, Greer Johnson.

Mickey and Merlyn's four sons were:

- Mickey Jr. (1953-2000)
- David (1955- )
- Billy (1957-1994)
- Danny (1960- )

Like their dad, Merlyn and their sons all became alcoholics. Billy (named after Mickey's best friend on the Yankees - Billy Martin) developed Hodgkin's disease, as had several previous men in Mantle's family.

Mantle's off-field behavior is the subject of the book The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America's Childhood, written in 2010 by sports journalist Jane Leavy. The book was based on interviews she had with Mantle. Excerpts from the book have been published in Sports Illustrated.

Illness and death

Well before he finally sought treatment for alcoholism, Mantle admitted his hard living had hurt both his playing and his family. His rationale was that the men in his family had all died young, so he expected to die young as well. His father had died in 1952 of Hodgkin's disease, and his grandfather had also died young of the same disease. "I'm not gonna be cheated," he would say.

Unbeknownst to Mantle at the time, was the fact that most of the men in his family inhaled lead and zinc dust in the mines, which contributed to Hodgkins' and other cancers.

As years passed, and he had outlived all the men in his family by several years, he frequently used a line popularized by football legend Bobby Layne, a Dallas neighbor and friend of Mantle's who also died in part due to alcohol abuse: "If I'd known I was gonna live this long, I'd have taken a lot better care of myself."

Mantle's wife and sons all completed treatment for alcoholism, and told him he needed to do the same. He checked into the Betty Ford Clinic on January 7, 1994 after being told by a doctor that his liver "looked like a doorstop" and was so badly damaged that "your next drink could be your last."

Also helping Mantle to make the decision to go to the Betty Ford Clinic was sportscaster Pat Summerall, who had played for the New York Giants football team while they played at Yankee Stadium, by then a recovering alcoholic and a member of the same Dallas-area country club as Mantle; Summerall himself had been treated at the clinic in 1992.

Shortly after completing treatment, his son Billy died on March 12, 1994 at age 36 of heart problems brought on by years of substance abuse. Despite the fears of those who knew him that this tragedy would send him back to drinking, he remained sober. Mickey Jr. later died of liver cancer on December 20, 2000 at age 47. Danny later battled prostate cancer.

Mantle spoke with great remorse of his drinking in a 1994 Sports Illustrated cover story. He said that he was telling the same old stories, and realizing how many of them involved himself and others being drunk - including at least one drunk-driving accident - he decided they were not funny anymore. He admitted he had often been cruel and hurtful to family, friends, and fans because of his alcoholism, and sought to make amends. He became a born-again Christian because of his former teammate Bobby Richardson, an ordained Baptist minister who shared his faith with him. After the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995, he joined with fellow Oklahoman and Yankee Bobby Murcer to raise money for the victims.

Mantle received a liver transplant at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, on June 8, 1995. His liver was severely damaged by alcohol-induced cirrhosis, as well as hepatitis C. Prior to the operation doctors also discovered he had inoperable liver cancer known as an undifferentiated hepatocellular carcinoma, further facilitating the need for a transplant. In July, he had recovered enough to deliver a press conference at Baylor, and noted that many fans had looked to him as a role model. "This is a role model: Don't be like me," a frail Mantle said. He also established the Mickey Mantle Foundation to raise awareness for organ donations. Soon, he was back in the hospital, where it was found that his cancer was rapidly spreading throughout his body.

Mantle died on August 13, 1995 at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas with his wife at his side. In eulogizing Mantle, sportscaster Bob Costas described him as "a fragile hero to whom we had an emotional attachment so strong and lasting that it defied logic." Costas added: "In the last year of his life, Mickey Mantle, always so hard on himself, finally came to accept and appreciate the distinction between a role model and a hero. The first, he often was not. The second, he always will be.

So we look retrospectively at the life of Mickey Mantle. It was disclosed in an HBO documentary that Mickey Mantle took his first drink at 13 years of age. I took my first drink at about 15 years of age and for at least 12-15 years would be a serious binge drinker. I was a borderline alcoholic. I say 'borderline' because I could go a couple of months and not drink at all, but when I would drink, it would be fast, hard, and heavy.

Think about it, why allow a substance to have that much control over your life? Waking up the next morning after a night of heavy drinking, you feel like crap. The hangover consist of a headache, your stomach's not right, you're still a little tipsy, or in some cases still intoxicated, and you have to drag yourself to work. Then you turn around and do the exact same thing the next night or that very next weekend. When you seriously think about it you must ask yourself, is it worth it?

  • Christina Fernando- The Discovery Health Journal Aug 9, 2011 @ 8:58 am | delete
    Great information. Glad you included the daily limit for consumption. More than 4 drinks is alcohol abuse!
  • tiffany_willis Aug 9, 2011 @ 8:05 am | delete
    As I told an alcoholic who I loved once: "You don't remember the things you say and do when drunk. The rest of us have to live with it forever." I'm not very patient with alcoholics. I know it's a disease but the ones that I've known don't want a cure. They're selfish and drink until it starts to affect THEIR health.
  • vallain Aug 9, 2011 @ 6:30 am | delete
    This is a very insidious thing which creeps into people's lives as social drinking becomes more than just a drink with friends, then it is one drink after another, and the behavior gets more erratic. So sad.
Show All

by

taskeinc

Barry Shaw, founder of Work Home Union, over 25 years in Information Technology, web/graphics design, network marketing. WHU aka taskeinc has written... more »

Feeling creative? Create a Lens!

Explore related pages

Related Tags