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For more than a few years alcohol addiction exploration has demonstrated the fact that there is strong linkage between alcoholism and dangerous health conditions and mental health issues such as depression.

As an illustration, in 2005, medical research and alcohol abuse and alcoholism statistics revealed that alcohol abuse and alcohol addiction cost the United States an estimated $220 billion annually. It can be emphasized that this substantial alcohol-related cash outlay was significantly more than the cost linked with cancer ($196 billion) or with obesity ($133 billion). While it is relevant to emphasize these facts, it is also important to point out that an interrelationship exists between all three of these health problems.

More correctly, chronic alcohol abuse and alcohol dependency are also highly associated with obesity and with cancer.

Definitely, substance abuse investigation has revealed that alcohol dependency can augment the risk for different kinds of cancer, particularly cancer of the colon, voice box (larynx), liver, rectum, throat, kidneys, and the esophagus. Heavy and recurring drinking can also lead to immune system problems and damage to the fetus during pregnancy.

Excessive and Heavy Drinking Weakens the Problem Drinker’s Systems and Organs

Furthermore, if alcoholism continues over a period of years, the person’s body organs will more likely than not be affected in an unhealthy manner. For instance, long-term, hazardous drinking is especially dangerous to the liver due to the fact that the liver does most of the work of processing the alcohol that has been ingested. Unwarranted amounts of alcohol kills liver cells and destroys the ability of liver cells to regenerate. This medical condition results in a progressive inflammatory disease of the liver that can ultimately lead to cirrhosis of the liver, a dangerous and possibly terminal medical problem. Excessive, long-term drinking not only can result in dangerous liver damage, but it can also lead to damage to the heart and to the brain. Physical damage this serious may be unalterable and may, in turn, lead to severe illness or an untimely death.

The Importance of Alcohol Therapy

It is essential, therefore, to know how to recognize the various alcoholism symptoms and the “alcohol signs” so that the alcoholic can be given the opportunity to seek the quality alcohol counseling he or she needs.

Alcohol Dependency and Sophisticated Brain Exploration

Fortunately, scientific exploration is relentlessly uncovering original and important information. Recent alcoholism research offers a first-rate example. More exactly, for roughly the past ten years, complex brain-imaging scanning devices have verified that repetitive and recurring excessive drinking alters the configuration of the brain to a great extent, thereby resulting in brain disease that can last months, years, or perchance as long as the person lives.

More explicitly, medical research has demonstrated that individuals who have been drinking excessively for an extensive length of time increase their risk for developing long-term and severe changes in the brain.

This type of damage may be indirectly associated with the drinker’s poor overall health or directly related to the alcohol’s effects on the brain or to severe liver disease.

Mental Disorders, Malnutrition, and Excessive Drinking

As a final illustration of assorted health problems that are substantially related to alcohol addiction, take into consideration the fact that in accordance with medical research, the abusive and repeated abuse of alcohol can lead to erosive gastritis, a condition that diminishes the absorption of nutrients, vitamins, and minerals.

This type of organ malfunctioning is linked to malnutrition and to a number of critical neurological and mental problems including sleep disturbances, memory loss, and psychosis such as Wernicke’s Encephalopathy and Korsakoff’s syndrome. This latter medical condition is a long lasting debilitating condition that is epitomized by incessant learning and memory complications.

Abusive Drinking Also Leads to Relationship and Friendship Difficulties and Conflicts

In addition to critical medical problems, irresponsible drinking also leads to relationship and friendship issues. As an illustration, people who involve themselves in excessive drinking typically experience sexuality problems, marital problems, divorce, and affairs.

Conclusion: The Significance of Education

It is obvious that repetitive, abusive drinking is directly or indirectly correlated with numerous serious medical problems that can and do lead to dangerous illness and premature death. Such information needs to be stressed and presented to everyone in our society, especially to all students, so that most individuals will be able to refrain from irresponsible drinking while other people who have a drinking problem will get the professional rehab they require.

Let us look at this with a common sense perspective. Yes, alcohol treatment is important, but alcohol therapy is something that is typically done AFTER the fact. Education, then again, is something that is done BEFORE the problem manifests itself. Stated a different way, whereas alcohol rehab is “reactive,” education is “proactive.” It is affirmed that both approaches are required when discussing alcoholism and alcohol abuse.

Around eight months ago I had lunch with a forty-nine-year-old man named Alexander who suffers from extreme depression, has marital issues, and who is drug and alcohol dependent. As articulated by Alexander, it is his drug and alcohol dependency and his acute depression that had the most to do with his recurring divorce difficulties.

I recollect hearing that a history of mental health concerns, drug abuse, and abusive and unhealthy drinking routinely take place in the same family. Not only this, but I remember hearing that in such situations, an individual needs to get counseling for both medical problems and that chemical dependency and mental health difficulties often occur in the same person.

As stated by Alexander, he is so overwhelmed by his divorce problems and by both of his medical conditions that he in effect has little or no driving force to accomplish much of anything. What is especially unfortunate about this is that earlier in his life, Alexander managed to complete one semester of graduate school in French history.

Alexander’s condition makes me question if he is an illustration of a person who can look in the mirror and perceive his drug abuse and alcohol drinking problems and do something healthy about these issues or if he is someone who has to hit the bottom of the barrel before he gets drug and alcohol addiction counseling that results in long lasting sobriety.

The Need For a Counseling Protocol He Can Believe In and a Physician He Can Trust

If it would be helpful I would assume that I could suggest quite a lot of blogs and websites that could possibly help him learn more about drug abuse symptoms, the stages of alcoholism, chemical dependency information, and relationship issues. From my perspective, nevertheless, Alexander needs to find a treatment program he can believe in and follow through over the long term and find a therapist he can trust.

I could be mistaken but it seems to me that Alexander more likely than not needs to look honestly at his life regarding his drug addiction signs and alcoholic symptoms and understand the fact that he cannot use drugs or drink at all if he wants to get sober, remain sober, and start on the path to lasting sobriety.

It may be asked how counseling would help his alcohol and drug addiction. For starters, there are quite a few recently created doctor-prescribed meds that can help Alexander through the alcohol and drug detoxification process, through his withdrawal symptoms, and help him avoid a drug or an alcohol relapse.

Second, Alexander would learn to concede the fact that there is absolutely nothing useful about chemical dependency and abusive and excessive drinking and that involving himself in one or both circumstances is the map to a premature death, shattered relationships, deteriorating health, legal problems, financial difficulties, and poor work and school performance.

Third, treatment for his depression and for his marital problems might help him cope with these psychological difficulties more successfully and help create less of a need for him to engage in addictive behavior.

The Relevance of Recovery Groups Like Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous

There are probably several family members, other individuals, and friends who would offer to help Alexander with his drug abuse and his abusive drinking. He more likely than not would experience greater understanding from a support group such as Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous, however, instead of getting guidance from people who do not drink or who have never abused drugs.

When Individuals Do Things They Love and About Which They Are Fervent

There’s a philosophical viewpoint that contends that individuals who accomplish things they love and something about which they are fervent reach a wonderful place in life. Stated more exactly, when people do what they love, they rarely if ever go through boredom or an uneventful life. If they get involved in something that is enjoyable, what is more, they become more complete and experience more gratification and joy in life, in their friendships, and in their relationships.

When this is thought about even for a few moments it becomes clear that this affirmative mindset is poles apart from a life that is rooted in chemical dependency because such a lifestyle removes the happiness and delight that life has to offer.

Due to the fact that Alexander doesn’t have the grit to carry out much of anything in his life, it is evident that he desperately needs a little hope for a healthier lifestyle. And the sad thing is that hope is almost everywhere around Alexander if he could only get to the place in life to get the therapy he requires for his acute depression and chemical dependency and stay with his treatment protocol.

Better Relationships, Constructive Change, Self Respect, and a Wonderful Life Are Possibilities

Alexander is simply too young to be beaten in life. He doesn’t realize this at this time in his life but if he can learn how to stay away from alcohol and drugs through alcohol and drug rehab and get the counseling he requires for his extreme depression, he can turn his life around and start living with self-respect, passion, and direction.

Enhanced relationships, constructive change, self respect, and a wonderful life are certainly a reality for Alexander if only he could get motivated to seek the professional rehab he needs, follow through with his therapy protocol, live his life in a healthy and drug and alcohol-free way, and learn how to acquire a more positive attitude about life.

For the past twenty-three years Jenny has been a nurse at a small rural hospital. In addition she has also been teaching Sunday school at the local Baptist Church. Although she lived in a small country town where it seemed like every person knew everyone’s business, very little was known about Jenny. For sure almost every person in town knew that she had worked numerous years as a nurse practitioner and that she taught Sunday school for as long as she was a resident of their town. Other than that, nonetheless, it almost appeared as if Jenny was simply a visitor in their town.

You can visualize the commotion that was created when it was revealed that one Sunday morning Jenny had lost consciousness because of excessive drinking. Indeed, the article in the neighborhood daily paper claimed that Jenny not only became unconscious, but that she also was arrested for driving while drunk due to the fact that her blood alcohol level was significantly higher than the legal limit for intoxication. This is obviously one of the alcohol effects on the body that no Sunday school teacher wants to have publicized by the entire town. But this is specifically what happened, much to the disappointment of Jenny.

Jenny Gets Very Distraught About Her DUI

Obviously, Jenny was extremely depressed about her arrest for driving while intoxicated. Not only should she have known better about driving while intoxicated because of her nursing profession, but she also should have held herself accountable to a more lofty benchmark because of the simple fact that she taught Sunday school.

After her DWI arrest, Jenny was tempted to move out of town so that she would not have to feel unhappy about her arrest and also so she wouldn’t have to go over her actions for the five hundred thousandth time to the people in town. After meeting with her reverend, then again, she made up her mind that she would get alcohol rehab at a local alcohol rehabilitation hospital. She did this for two precise reasons. First, it was relatively easy for her to drive to a local rehabilitation clinic. And second, she frankly wanted the word to get circulated among all the individuals in town that she was truly addressing her excessive and hazardous drinking.

Jenny Goes Through Detox and Gets an Extensive Exam

After Jenny went through detoxification, she was extensively checked by a doctor at the rehabilitation facility. She then underwent a couple of laboratory procedures where it was verified that she was not an alcoholic but rather was involving herself in abusive and irresponsible drinking. In a word Jenny was engaging in long term alcohol abuse.

Jenny was provided with the option of getting alcohol treatment as a residential patient or getting alcohol rehab as an outpatient. Jenny, nonetheless, believed that she could still work as a licensed practical nurse and continue with her Sunday school teaching job if she were to be registered as an out-patient and this is precisely what she did.

According to her rehab plan, Jenny went to two treatment sessions every two weeks, she learned quite a lot about alcohol info, she worked on her homework “projects,” she got treatment for her depression and other mental health issues, and she learned how to involve herself doing things in life that did not have anything to do with drinking.

After twenty weeks, Jenny thought that her abusive drinking was under control and so she got released from the drug and alcohol rehab center under the specification that she would return for follow up treatment once every three months for the next nine months. Jenny agreed and followed through on her “promise.”

Jenny Makes up Her Mind to Abstain From Any and All Drinking Situations and Discovers That Her Sense of Worth Increases

After she went through her rehab Jenny reasoned that she would be able to drink more responsibly and in moderation. After pondering her situation for a short while, then again, she concluded that she would absolutely abstain from any and all drinking circumstances.

When Jenny arrived at this determination, she learned that her positive attitude about herself became stronger the more she was in charge of her life. And as her self-respect grew more pronounced, it seemed like she became more gregarious and began attending more local events such as local high school basketball and football games, music festivals, carnivals, Christmas tree lighting ceremonies, flower festivals, rib roasts, and strawberry festivals. Jenny also began to develop longer lasting relationships and friendships for the first time since she was in high school.

Jenny Addresses Her Abusive and Hazardous Drinking, Makes up Her Mind To Do Something Constructive About It, and Rediscovers Her Faith

Over time, the individuals in the town exhibited more affection for Jenny because she was involving herself with them more routinely and also because she addressed her careless and abusive drinking and made up her mind to do something beneficial about it. It may have been her imagination, but it also seemed as if her Sunday school students showed more respect and admiration for her.

Jenny is a living illustration of someone who faced a serious issue and who did something positive about it. She is also a person who found out that her religious faith is not only something that is intrinsic, but that it is also something that affects the way in which an individual interrelates with other people.