I know I haven't posted for a week, and I am stll a relative newbie. I hope you friends can listen to my story.
My oldest son is 21 years and is totally brilliant. He is a Math major at a very good college and has just been given an extremely good offer from a major university for a doctoral program in theoretiical math. He's a really great kid, funny and totally charming. Now I am sounding like a bragging mother. Please forgive me. He has always been terrbly down to earth and responsible.
Last Saturday, at 7 AM I had just sat down to do some work and the phone rang. To make a long story short, he was under arrest for DWI. My husband and I had to drive for over 2 hours to spring him from jail ( he was in leg irons) and pick up his car and drive him back to his apartment. I drove him in his car back for an hour to his place and he was crying like a baby the whole time. He kept saying he could have killed someone (his BAL was 1.7!) I told him that was true and he should think about that for a long time. He said he didn't know what happened but that he drank too much and lost judgement. And this is a kid who is quite smart and normally has good judgement.
I told him I am an alcoholic ( he thought I just had a drinking "problem") and had been sober with a lot of work for two years (give or take some minor relapses). He said that he doesn't drink much, but when he does, he can't stop. I interpreted that as a warning sign.
We now have to spend several thousand dollars on lawyers to try to keep him out of jail. I don't think jail will do him much good - but I can't help thinking that he was a potential murdrer - and neither can he. That has to be and is in front of his mind.
Alcohol can be such a deadly thing. We all post here and think about what it does to us, but do we ever talk about what harm it can do to innocent people when we drive drunk? I am hoping my son has learned that, and I hoping that I have learned that also.
I see lots of post on this site that I totally agree with, but I don't see much talk about the innocent victims of drunk driving. Something for all of us to think about.
He'll probably be OK. He may have to have his driver's license suspended for 6 months or so, but I don't mind him having to pay the price. We all have to learn to live with this.
My problem is my guilt - I know I am an alcoholic and am terribly afraid that I have genetically passed this problem on to my son. I am a biologist and know that there are certain family traits in this direction. I just don't want to pass this fatal flaw down into future generations.
I'm really sorry.
Mags
My oldest son is 21 years and is totally brilliant. He is a Math major at a very good college and has just been given an extremely good offer from a major university for a doctoral program in theoretiical math. He's a really great kid, funny and totally charming. Now I am sounding like a bragging mother. Please forgive me. He has always been terrbly down to earth and responsible.
Last Saturday, at 7 AM I had just sat down to do some work and the phone rang. To make a long story short, he was under arrest for DWI. My husband and I had to drive for over 2 hours to spring him from jail ( he was in leg irons) and pick up his car and drive him back to his apartment. I drove him in his car back for an hour to his place and he was crying like a baby the whole time. He kept saying he could have killed someone (his BAL was 1.7!) I told him that was true and he should think about that for a long time. He said he didn't know what happened but that he drank too much and lost judgement. And this is a kid who is quite smart and normally has good judgement.
I told him I am an alcoholic ( he thought I just had a drinking "problem") and had been sober with a lot of work for two years (give or take some minor relapses). He said that he doesn't drink much, but when he does, he can't stop. I interpreted that as a warning sign.
We now have to spend several thousand dollars on lawyers to try to keep him out of jail. I don't think jail will do him much good - but I can't help thinking that he was a potential murdrer - and neither can he. That has to be and is in front of his mind.
Alcohol can be such a deadly thing. We all post here and think about what it does to us, but do we ever talk about what harm it can do to innocent people when we drive drunk? I am hoping my son has learned that, and I hoping that I have learned that also.
I see lots of post on this site that I totally agree with, but I don't see much talk about the innocent victims of drunk driving. Something for all of us to think about.
He'll probably be OK. He may have to have his driver's license suspended for 6 months or so, but I don't mind him having to pay the price. We all have to learn to live with this.
My problem is my guilt - I know I am an alcoholic and am terribly afraid that I have genetically passed this problem on to my son. I am a biologist and know that there are certain family traits in this direction. I just don't want to pass this fatal flaw down into future generations.
I'm really sorry.
Mags
It's hard not to feel guilty about the genetic predisposition to alcoholism I know - I have yet to face this issue with my girls as they have 2 parents with alcohol dependency issues, but there are things in life we have no choice over - by having been open and honest with your son now, you can hopefully arm him with the tools to prevent a continuation of the disease through the family - just as with cancer or heart disease - there are certain measures we can do to help prevent them. Your honesty is a huge gift to your son and your obvious closeness and bond with him will give him all the support he needs as he now continues through what will obviously be quite difficult times for him initially.
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