Lilyflower

OK most of my family are in strong denial there is anything wrong, so the ''confessed'' alcoholics are my paternal grandfather, all his brothers and sisters and his parents; the ''unconfessed'' - my maternal grandmother and my uncle (her son). Then I have at least two uncles on my mothers side who are addicts, they were taking pills, pot, coke, heaven knows what their DOC is these days! I haven't seen any of them (grandmother and uncles) for a long time.

The rest of my family - all my dad's sisters and brother, my mum's brothers, possibly my cousins, my mum, dad and sister, are all one or many of the following -
work-a-holics, over/under eaters, controllers, obssesives, martyrs, emotional abusers, verbal abusers, emotionally unavailable, victims, pessimists, agressives etc etc etc. In ONE word, they are all codependant, like me.

To date I believe I am the only person to find recovery and a 12 step programme.

Lily xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

BohemiMamaof3

My Mom was a functional, binge alcoholic throughout my teen years thru my 20s. Before that she was June Cleaver, really, a good Mom. My Dad was a classic enabler and in denial. Both my Mom's parents were binge alcoholics and abusive mentally, not sure if they were physically but I suspect. 2 of my Mom's 3 brothers struggled with alcohol at various times in their lives. My one Uncle has been in AA and active recovery for about 20 years now. My other Uncle struggled after his eldest dd died of a childhood disease, but I don't know if he got treatment or what, but it isn't a problem for him now. I think all of their children have had struggles with it. The 3rd uncle, the oldest, is a recluse and doesn't stay in touch with any of the others, and only one brother rearly checks up on him. The recluse was abusive toward them all, so you can see it is a dysfunctional family, that really keeps whatever secrets they had or have. He quit speaking to my Mom the day she got married. Mom is from that old school, "my parents weren't loving, but they did the best they could." Both my brother and I headed down a path of drug and alcohol abuse. I had a religious conversion when I was pregnant with my first child that caused me to reevaluate my life and habits, and I quit drinking and drugs then. My brother continued and his addiction proplems escalated. As my brother's problems escalated my mom seemed to quit drinking on her own, she lost my dad, went to al-anon, and drinking hasn't been the problem for her that it once was.

BohemiMamaof3

That would be me, and my mom somewhat.

good_luck

My Uncle was married to an alcoholic, who wasn't related by blood and chose to leave her family to focus more on her drinking, but aside from that I've got nothing.

lostnfound1961

Well...... I know on my moms side it goes back to her grand parents, on her moms side they were alcohoics and her grandfather beat her grandmonther and her mom. Her mom had mentel illness and was in and out of the hospital a lot. Her dads side were also alcoholics and grandpa sexualy abused and beat grandma. On her fathers side.... I don't know about his mom and dad but he was a major abusave drunk who beat his wife and molested the girls. Of the kids that made it to adulthood (5 girls and 3 boys) all became alcoholics and most sobered up at some point.

My dads side didn't drink but were cold and uncaring and that is what he learned. So in the end mom and dad were alcoholics and mom had mental issues and used to loos it all the time and beat my brother. I have two sisters and one brother. My oldest sister is still drinking and this shell with no real person inside. I am in recovory and have not drank in over two years, my other sister never realy had a problem and does not drink and my brother is ******** and so he never realy drank.

Oh and my dads brother was an alcoholic and he had a cousin who was raised as his brother and he was a major alcoholic and chailed molester.

So there you have it. My family tree. Im thinking we should chop that one down and plant a new one.
D

Redheadsusie

I was brought up by both parents being alcoholic. They still are active drinkers...My Dad has teminal liver cancer and my Mom advanced Emphysema and they are still drinking 8 gallons of crap wine a week. NICE. What do you say to dying people? It is horrible to watch.:wtf2

suzieq1972

My parents are not alcoholics, however:

* my grandmother (mother's side) was an alcoholic
* my great uncle (mother's side) i believe was an alcoholic

* my grandfather (father's side) was very distant emotionally with his wife and children

Knowing what I know now, I believe I learned my co-dependent tendencies from my mother who lived with an alcoholic parent. My need to "be needed" came from my emotionally distant father who was more interested in his work (just like his dad).

But hopefully all of that stops here with change in me!

JustMeInWI

My dad was/is an alcoholic. I haven't spoken to him in years because it was less painful for me to no longer allow the abuse, so I cut off all contact with him. As far as I know, both his parents were alcoholics, as were his dad's siblings to some degree or another. It's an ugly mess... sometimes I think maybe I should just get divorced and adopt from someone who has no history of alcoholism and spare myself the likely issues down the road...

cookconfay

Oh geez....mom, now sober 23 1/2 yrs.....her dad was an A, her uncle was an A (on her mother's side) and he died with 1/2 of his life in AA sober. He was 76 with 38 yrs of sobriety. My dad's brother and some of his kids, his brother committed suicide. One of my sisters has been to Federal Prison as a result of her addictions.....still chooses to drink and I'm sure still thinks she can handle it.....

Me....well I'll have 11 yrs clean & sober this month.

cinderellawkids

hmm, my grandparents aunts and uncles on my moms side are social drinkers. You know the type...never drunk, always drink in hand, cant be together without liquor. My grandfather was disabled young, and would bring a fixed mixed drink to my grandma everyday when picking her up from work. When my sister took my moms antidepresseants at 12 months and was in hospital having stomach pumped, grandparents snuck her in a mixed drink. So while they werent characteristically ever heavily intoxicated, everyone, everyday had a drank. I once thought all diet pepsi contained seagrams.

My father, pothead and script addict since he was 14.never drank. Grandparents dads side opposed to drinking but grandfather left grandma to rescue a woman and her kids from an alcoholic and lived double life until I was 5 with both woman...(codie????) ioronically his daughter, fathers sis cant "function" or sleep without a glass a wine idea.

No wonder I was with 2 alcoholics and thought drinking was normal until the couldnt keep jobs or licenses

isitme

Yeah, I've got this one too..
My Grandfather on my Dad's side died before I was born, but my mother told me he was an alcoholic.
My biological father is an Aalcoholic/Drug Addict/Bi-Polar. In an out of treatments, jail, 5 DUI's, Diabetic, Hep C.
My Mother is an A,also diabetic and depression. With a multitude of other health problems.
I think her sister and brother-in-law are both A's.
My stepdad and mom's brother are social drinkers but both can hold quite a few.
My last two relationships have been with A's and I'm starting to admit that I'm one too.

nowinsituation

Grandfather (my Mom's Dad) was an alcoholic. However, he and my Grandmother divorced when my Mom was a baby and she was raised by her grandparents until she was about 12 yrs old and her grandmother died. She then lived with her Mom (my Grandma) in some very disfunctional step-dad; and later single-parent households. I credit my great-grandmother for raising my Mom and modeling "functional" behaviour that - that carried through to how my Mom raised us. My Grandfather later remarried and eventually became sober; and we had a great relationship with him before he died.


My Dad is a high-functioning and "fun" alcoholic, as is his sister (my aunt).

I realize now that it was not a coincidence that my brother, my sister, and myself all married (and eventually divorced) alcoholics. It is amazing how your view of what is normal is so skewed when drinking is ALWAYS there. There is no occasion that doesn't happen when alcohol is not present; I didn't know that wasn't the way EVERYBODY does things!

LaTeeDa

On my mom's side, for as many generations back as I can tell, all the men were alcoholics and all their wives were codependents. Lots of misogyny, too. My mom and aunt (her sister) followed suit.

On my dad's side, all the adults in his life when he was growing up were alcoholics. Lot's of untimely/accidental/foul-play type deaths in that family, too. Including my dad's death at the age of 35. (I was 12) BTW, he was an alcoholic and my mom is still a codependent.

Most of my aunts and uncles are either alcoholic, or married to one. My brother has been in and out of jail on domestic violence charges, his children are being raised by my mom (God help them) and I, of course was married to an alcoholic for almost 20 years. My sister is the only one who has seemingly escaped the "predestined" life, but she has many phobias and dysfunctional beliefs about a lot of things.

My biggest hope is that I stopped the pattern early enough so that my kids will not repeat it.

L

LaTeeDa

When I was a kid, my dad purchased a thingy called KarBar. It was a contraption that mounted under the dashboard and then there were these tubes that ran to the trunk. In the trunk were four or five of those collapsible plastic containers, which you could fill with whatever you wanted. His were screwdrivers, bloody mary's, beer, etc. Then, you could push a button on the dash and dispense whatever you wanted while driving down the road! He just knew it was the greatest thing ever invented because at that time, it was illegal to have an "open container," not to drink and drive. He truly thought he had found a way to beat the system.

L

Freedom1990

Neither of my parents are alcoholics, don't drink at all. There is a long line of alkies on both sides of the family, including one alcoholic sibling per parent.

My father lost both of his parents to alcohol-related deaths while he was still in high school (they died within a year of each other) and left him with two younger brothers to raise.

lizw

Thanks for the posts everyone (and for the new ones to come??)
A few have got me chuckling.

I used to think one of my younger brothers wasn't affected by alcoholism, even though he grew up in the same house as me, because he was a chronic over achiver.

He was the only 1 of 5 of us who didn't leave school young, get shipped off to live elsewhere due to fighting with my dad etc...
But he started Al Anon about the same time as I did.

And while my perfectionism stops me from doing stuff, his perfectionism ensures he near works himself to death and that everything looks 'TV family' from the outside.

MsPINKAcres

As I have been reading this - I have tears in my eyes -

This is so very sad - so many lives battered and bruised, damaged and eventually lost to alcoholism or an indirect effect of alcoholism.

It breaks my heart to list all my family that suffer from alcoholism/addiction - I just can't today.
I can only list a prayer saying that some day in the future my grandchildren or great grandchildren hopefully will be able to say - We had that in our family a while back but thanks to recovery we don't have that in our family anymore.

loner1968

mother, father, sister, uncles and aunts on both sides, grandmother, grandfather, lots and lots of substance abuse and mental illness. Don't know how I got away without being an A of some sort. People commend me on it. It wasn't a choice. I just hate to do it.