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Sunday, March 07, 2004
Plugged: Who becomes an alcoholic?
By MAYETTE Q. TABADA
Of Sun.Star Cebu
DR. John Gerald Valencia recalls how, at the age of seven years, he and his younger brother, Mike, enjoyed hiding behind the sofa during family parties in Masbate to sneak sips of beer.
When an aunt caught the pranksters, she was so amused, she played along and helped them secrete away their spirits.
But what was cute at seven became tragic in later years.
Now, at 42, John has been “clean and sober” for more than three years. He does not even eat fruitcake and butterscotch, which have liquor as an ingredient.
Mike, too, is a recovering alcoholic. It was Mike, Valencia says, who got him to undergo rehabilitation.
But they are the lucky ones. A brother of theirs is still addicted to illegal substances. An older brother is dead, from fourth-stage liver impairment and diabetes, basically due to alcoholism.
“Alcoholism is a disease that runs in family lines,” says John. He says that if one gives a cup of wine to about 10 kids, eight or nine of them will make faces and refuse to sip but there will be one or two who will dare to taste, like what he’s having and then beg to have what’s left in the cup.
“I’m that kid,” he shrugs. “I am constitutionally made that way.”
Born to a family of seven girls and seven boys, John, the 11th child, says that his father was an alcoholic until his death.
John, who did a two-year residency training program in psychiatry at the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center, has not renewed his yearly contract this year to focus on substance dependency renewal rehabilitation.
Lost years
While his father, a doctor, stayed in Masbate to run his own hospital, the rest of the family moved to Manila for their studies. John recalls that he was already a full-blown alcoholic and drug dependent when he was in high school.
Although he was set on studying law, the family offered him an unlimited allowance, new car and other perks to take up medicine. John says he opted for the bigger allowance for his drinking and drug-taking.
He was behind the wheel in three accidents that reduced his cars to total wrecks. After surviving the third accident, the medical student was asked by his distraught family to finally stop driving when he was drunk. He told his sisters that he would give up the driving, but not the drinking.
According to John, there are three types of alcoholics: the maintenance drinker (who keeps a daily consumption tally), the functional (those who cannot perform without alcohol, like doctors who can’t operate or musicians who can’t play, if sober), and the binger (episodic drinking sprees that can run for days or months). John says he did all three, especially the last.
From 1990 till 1999, he did not practice medicine, relying on the $500 allowance a US-based sister sent him every month. He spent the days at home, drinking usually the airline and duty-free liquor his wife, an international flight stewardess, brought back for him.
Excessive drinking can induce an alcoholic blackout, with the person still functioning normally but remembering nothing at all of his activities. After four years, his wife left him, unable to take his drinking and other alcohol-related problems.
When his family finally decided to bring him to a detoxication center, they hired bodyguards to “convince” him. Ironically, John was already 11 days sober although, he admits, the obsession to drink was just lying dormant.
Bigger danger
Some 3.4 million Filipinos are now addicted to illegal drugs.
This is according to the Philippine Population Report of the Dangerous Drugs Board and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency.
Hidden dangers
There are no reliable figures for alcoholics but John theorizes that the figures may be higher than those of drug addicts because “alcohol is everywhere.”
Drinking is an activity sanctioned by Filipino culture, which regards it as a ritual enhancing sociability and macho bonding.
Based on personal experience and work with alcoholics and narcotic dependents, John says that the threat of alcoholism is multiplied because of the phenomenon of co-dependency.
According to the latest studies in substance dependency treatment centers in the US, co-dependents have a “need to be needed” attitude.
While addicts may choose narcotics or alcohol as their drug of choice, John says that co-dependents regard the addict as their drug. Since their state of well-being is dependent on a diseased individual, the co-dependent is often as sick as the addict.
According to the National Council on Alcoholism in the US, there are four to six co-dependents for every alcoholic, estimated to be 10 million at present. Using these figures, there are 60 million co-dependents needing assistance in the US.
Though there are no figures for the Philippines, John is sure that the country also suffers from alcoholism’s hidden scourge.
(March 7, 2004 issue)
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