Stress and depression lead to alcoholism

Teresa was a thirty-six-year-old physical therapist who realized that she had some problems with her drinking. As an illustration, within the past three months she has experienced the need to have more than a few drinks before going to work, seven weeks ago she tested positive for a breathalyzer test where she is employed, three months ago she got stopped by the state highway patrol for a DUI, and lastly, for the past seven months she has started to fail to remember what she does and says when she goes out drinking with her friends.

Not unlike multitudes of other drinkers, Teresa’s alcohol involvement started out at a “snail’s pace” and stayed at this pace for quite some time due to the fact once in a “blue moon” she engaged in intermittent social drinking. In point of fact, for roughly two years, every time she drank, she made sure to drink responsibly. Something about her drinking behavior, however, seemed to totally change when she divorced her husband.

In Order To Overcome the Loss of Her Husband In a Less Wearisome Manner, Teresa Determined That She Will Begin Going Out More Repeatedly With Some of Her Buddies Who Love to Get Down and Drink

Teresa got dreadfully disheartened about the breakup with her husband, and as a way to quit fixating on her discouraging feelings she decided to start hanging out more routinely with some of her buddies who love to drink.

Quite candidly, Teresa thought that having fun almost every day by drinking with her pals would help her rise above the breakup of her husband more rapidly.

Teresa’s Drinking Increases Substantially the More Habitually She Goes to Sporting Events, Private Parties, Family Get-Togethers, Dinner Dates, and Happy Hours With Her Friends

It didn’t take too long, however, before her drinking escalated to a significant extent the more often she went to and drank at family get-togethers, dinner dates, sporting events, happy hours, and private parties with her buddies. What is more, the fact that her drinking friends were all quite a bit younger than she was and therefore able to drink and party more carelessly was one of the reasons why she didn t focus more on her increased drinking. Simply put, she was having a ton of fun drinking just like everybody else in her group of pals without giving too much thought to the negative consequences of her hazardous and abusive drinking.

Yet someplace in her brain she knew that she most probably needed alcohol rehab but stayed away from the thought as much as possible.

Teresa Gets a Physical Examination, Admits Her Drinking to Her Doctor, and Owns Up to the Truth About Her Constant Negativity

One late afternoon during her yearly physical exam, her healthcare practitioner asked her if she drank alcohol. Not wanting to tell stories to her physician, Teresa came clean and said that she frequently drinks more than she should. If truth be told, she said that she commonly drinks in an abusive manner. Then Teresa told her physician about her constant negativity. More plainly, she mentioned that shattered relationships usually caused a discouraging sequence of events characterized by increased drinking which further resulted in more negative feelings that, in turn, resulted in more drinking. And this is specifically what took place when she and her husband got divorced four months ago.

When her healthcare practitioner heard this, he informed Teresa that according to various facts and statistics on alcoholism he has been examining, alcoholism and depression often happen in the same person. He then told Teresa that some of the alcohol statistics, facts, and research investigations he has been studying also stress the fact that individuals who drink in an excessive manner and who also go through depression need to get treatment for both medical situations.

Teresa’s Healthcare Professional Makes an Appointment for a Psychological Appraisal and For an Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Evaluation

Teresa’s physician then stated the following: I am not trying to make a spur-of-the-moment diagnosis, but with your medical situation we may be confronting two separate matters. As a result, I think we probably need to schedule an appointment for you to get an alcohol dependency and alcohol abuse assessment from my partner, Dr. Verlich, who is an alcohol abuse and alcoholism specialist. Whether your drinking problem is more related to alcohol abuse or alcoholism is not clear at this time, but I think that further evaluation is needed. Then I think we should schedule an appointment for you to get a psychological evaluation from another one of my partners, Dr. Myers, who is a psychologist. I want to get some additional information about your sadness and see how much your depression and drinking are intertwined. Teresa displayed her agreement with her physician s treatment strategy and thanked him for his time and concern. Now all she had to do was to try to reduce her drinking and get ready for her appointments.

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