Introduction
Alcohol addiction impacts the human perception of the world and one of the most significant social units – a family institute. Oftentimes, parents cannot assess the effect of the addiction on their relatives and children. They tend to believe that their relationships with alcohol and relationships with family members are separated and controlled by them. However, the alcohol connections absorb more and more time taking the person away from family relations. Slowly and steadily, children that grew up with addicted parents strive to distinguish good and bad role models from each other. Such children also have trust issues, are more likely to develop low self-esteem, and get easily involved in various troubled social groups. Thus, parental alcohol abuse is a serious problem in the community that impacts not only one individual but spreads to different social units.
How the Issue Impacts the Family Experience on Different Levels
Depending on the addiction severity, a person gradually loses control over his emotions and behavior. Alcohol abuse leads to unpredictability, inconsistency, distorted thinking in decision-making, and emotional lability. The person meets obstacles whilst communicating with family members and becomes depressive, easily irritated, and annoyed. The family struggles to support the relationships with the addicted person on the previous level, faces misunderstandings, and starts building colder connections. On the family level, alcohol abuse impacts children, decreases parental nurturing, brings in harsh discipline from an abused individual, and makes him emotionally unavailable. Children in various stages of upbringing need attention, support, and a feeling of reliance on their parents. With addiction taking over the parent, youngsters lose connection with parents and receive a distorted picture of the external world, human interaction, and social norms (Mangiavacchi & Piccoli, 2018). Children feel more vulnerable and lonely and seek friends in different influence groups.
On the organizational level, the family suffers financially from the issue as an addicted parent cannot attend work, and loses qualification, efficiency, and working spirit. Mostly, the employer tries to avoid such workers or puts restrictions because of regime-breaking actions. As a result, the company struggles to have a professional employee, and the family of an addicted parent suffers from a decreased level of income. The financial side can also suffer if the parent chooses to spend more money on alcohol instead of purchasing items for the family. It happens because of deformed priorities developed by the addicted individual.
Community meets several barriers when faced with parental alcohol abuse, as children from these families oftentimes have low school attendance, attention levels, and additional mental or behavioral problems. Society tries to solve the issues by attracting psychologists, and social workers, and engaging children in various programs trying to teach children to cope with their parents and find solutions. The community spends extra resources to support and help children from families with parental abuse, but it might be hard to prevent young individuals from stepping on the path of developing addictions and getting involved in crime. As a result, the society meets increased poverty, unemployment, and crime levels.
Assessment of Family Experience If They Presented for Social Work Intervention
Social workers interacting with families with parental alcohol abuse use various early-stage assessments to understand the experience of the family in the framework of the issue. The social worker interconnects with both children and parents and collects information about their stories and profile. It can help highlight the most vulnerable sides, tackle them, and find specific solutions that will be most helpful to the clients. Children can have problems with health and developmental needs and already have a perception of or any knowledge about parental abuse. Regarding parents, the social practitioner has to identify the level of addiction or misuse, and its connection with parenting skills and arrangements. The parents’ attitude to children’s upbringing has to be understood by a community working toward disclosing parenting capacity, preoccupation, and motivation. Assessment involves previous cooperation of the family with professionals, their reviews, and reports on the problem status. Home visits help social workers understand the specifics of daily life and family interaction. The most significant question the social worker needs to answer is if the parent and the child are ready to work effectively with services to tackle the problem and enhance their life. The parent’s motivation and involvement in his child’s upbringing are central as if there are none; the family cannot proceed to be whole.
Possible Family Interventions
Currently, a wide variety of services are available for families with parental alcohol abuse. Social workers investigate the case of the client and find the most useful programs and interventions suitable for the family (Van Wormer, 2018). Some evidence-based data proves the effectiveness of programs and allows social workers to estimate their specialties and outcomes (Kourgiantakis et al., 2020). Evidence-supported parenting intervention (ESPI) programs educating parents on positive communication skills, emotional support, and better connections development showed promising outcomes (Garcia et al., 2018). After the program was finished, parents were easily involved in positive talk with their children, understood the negative parenting practices that they had as a habit before, and recognized prosocial child behaviors (Garcia et al., 2018). Focusing the attention of addicted parents on the child’s upbringing can reorient priorities and distract the adult from substance use.
Another family skill program aimed to change the behavior of abused parents by increasing protective factors and consequently reducing risk factors. Parents were engaged in a family skills training program, “Celebrating Families!” (Sparks & Tisch, 2018). The treatment plan includes active parental involvement, development of social skills, and responsibility levels among children uniting in family practice sessions, specifically addressing issues of substance abuse (Sparks & Tisch, 2018). The program “Celebrating Families!” involved separate parent and children’s sessions along with mutual meetings aiming to reunite the family, and improve the communication and interaction between the members (Sparks & Tisch, 2018). As a result, children and parents learned and practiced healthy living, anger management, the effects of addiction on the whole family, goal setting, healthy choices and boundaries, healthy decisions, and relationships (Sparks & Tisch, 2018). Family skill programs are in-depth practices that usually last longer than parent education programs and bring incremental but long-lasting changes into the family life. Education, cooperation, mutual sessions, and active involvement of both parents and children make the skill programs more effective and attractive.
Conclusion
The issue of parental alcohol abuse severely impacts their lives and the condition of all family members. The problem is connected with social and organizational stability and the future development of children from such families. Taking control of emotions, feelings, and addictions forms a human and brings positive changes to his life. That is why if you feel alcohol interferes with your decisions and deteriorates your relationship with your closest people, make sure to contact a social work professional to initiate changes and take control of life.
References
Garcia, A. R., DeNard, C., Ohene, S., Morones, S. M., & Connaughton, C. (2018). “I am more than my past”: Parents’ attitudes and perceptions of the Positive Parenting Program in Child Welfare. Children and Youth Services Review, 88, 286–297.
Kourgiantakis, T., Sewell, K. M., Lee, E., Adamson, K., McCormick, M., Kuehl, D., & Bogo, M. (2020). Teaching note—enhancing social work education in mental health, addictions, and suicide risk assessment. Journal of Social Work Education, 56(3), 587-594.
Mangiavacchi, L., & Piccoli, L. (2018). Parental alcohol consumption and adult children’s educational attainment. Economics & Human Biology, 28, 132–145.
Sparks, S. N., & Tisch, R. (2018). A family-centered program to break the cycle of addiction. Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services, 99(2), 100–109.
van Wormer, K. (2018). Alcohol problems: Practice interventions. Obo in Social Work.