Where do I begin with this subject?… I have so much to write. I begin with myself; to share how drinking alcohol – the true picture – affected my family and myself from childhood and throughout our lives. I want to show the true picture, the ripple effect alcohol had on all my family and relationships, even though I myself did not get addicted to alcohol.
As a child, I remember feeling a cold house with a cold atmosphere. We did have electricity in the house but no real warmth or love – for me as a child, this was the most damaging; and how my parents became unrecognisable with the abuse of alcohol, and how very unsafe I felt.
Through the eyes of a child, when my parents drank alcohol they started to change and behave differently; they no longer felt like my parents and this was a very scary experience as their faces started to distort. And as they drank more and more alcohol their voices changed, they became very loud and aggressive. It was like at any stage, depending on when they felt like drinking, I would no longer have my parents.
In complete contrast, the times when they were not drinking alcohol, when my parents were sober, they were really quiet and good people – gentle people, very gentle and simple in how they lived. They both worked very hard as they had six children to support. My father stopped working through stress and long hours, so then my mother went out to work to support us all. They were generous people, my parents, always helping relatives and neighbours in need.
The Effects of Alcohol
As a child, the effects of my parents drinking alcohol were still felt. I remember feeling so different, and that I did not fit in or belong in my family. How would I survive and cope?
It was then the anxiousness set in as I felt my environment to be unsafe. I had become so anxious that this feeling of being unsafe was present even on those occasions when my parents weren’t drinking.
Once the anxiousness set in, everything changed…
Feeling anxious in my body took me away from the innocence and stillness within me; like being in calm waters to then find yourself in turbulent waters, it did not feel good. As a consequence I developed a lack of commitment to life. I feel the depth of this now, and the effect my parents drinking alcohol had on me:
- I did not want to ‘be here’ and I could not ‘do’ life (this was very strong)
- Wherever I went, the anxiousness never left me
- I had huge trust issues – trusting no one
- I was deeply insecure
- My emotions controlled me
- I was becoming like my parents, except without the alcohol.
In other words, early on I had fallen into the habit of disconnecting from my body so as to not feel the effects my parents drinking alcohol and the drama and emotions had on me. That is how I lived for the next 40 or so years of my life.
As an adult I drank very little and very rarely, so I was not addicted to alcohol and felt I was doing better than my parents, which I now realise was not true. I left home at 17, but looking back it feels like I had never truly left my parents’ house because wherever I went my emotions followed me.
Addicted to the Side Effects of Alcohol… Emotions
I did not get addicted to alcohol but I did get addicted to the emotions and drama that play out with drinking alcohol. I came to this important revelation by having regular esoteric healing sessions. I saw that my emotions had always controlled me. So I did not escape, not at all.
I took on the same behaviour as my parents, but without actually drinking alcohol. Many times I was unable to restrain the uncontrollable anger I held inside. I held deep anger towards my mother for a long time: I blamed her for all my struggles, for not providing the love and warmth I needed as a child, for not seeing me for who I was, and for my always feeling unsafe and so on…
Anger is a destructive emotion. It feels to me, with anger, I opened the door to aggression, blame, hate (of myself), control, ugliness and much more, everything that is not love or light, everything that is the exact opposite of our true and natural essence: LOVE.
I had no addiction to alcohol, yet here I was with all these raging emotions controlling me and keeping me disconnected from my body. I was no different to my parents.
The side effects of alcohol didn’t stop at only ‘my’ emotions… my emotional behaviour also influenced my children – they too took on all of these emotions. Even my four-year old grandson often experiences uncontrollable emotional outbursts: four generations affected by alcohol.
True Healing from the Effects of Alcohol
My physical body did not escape the effects of alcohol and the consequences of years of running it with anxiousness, anger, deep self-loathing, lack of commitment to life and disconnection (checking out). In July 2011, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. This stopped me in my tracks.
At that time I was blessed to meet Serge Benhayon. By attending Universal Medicine presentations and courses, as well as consulting an esoteric practitioner trained by Serge, I have worked on my issues and received many insights and much healing.
Today I feel so much more in my body. When I took responsibility for my life and all my choices, everything changed. The anger I held for my mother left me when I stopped blaming her. It took a lot longer for me to ‘feel safe’, but when I did, my anxiousness started to subside and weakened; once more I swim in calm waters.
Healing my issues has healed my anxiousness. Being willing to heal my issues shows my True Commitment To Life, which is True Healing – true healing from alcohol.
A commitment to life and self can bring about true healing for those who choose it, so that we are not forever at the mercy of the damaging effects of alcohol and our past choices…
I came to realise the only way to stay safe is to stay in my body and to stay present with myself. Being present in my body means I can express that which I had felt I could not express as a child. I see now it has always been my choice, and that the anger towards my mother and my parents drinking alcohol, was perhaps more anger at myself for choosing to leave my innocence, my stillness, my knowingness; my beautiful, sweet divine self, the angelic child that I was.
Alcohol is an Evil and Poisonous Substance. Drinking alcohol has effects well beyond what we are often willing to consider or take responsibility for. By sharing the true picture and the true damage for my family and myself, my experience shows how it robs us of everything that is pure and innocent and divine. On some level we ALL know this to be true.
Deeply Inspired by the Presentations And Courses of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine.
By Jacqueline McFadden –Scotland
Related Reading:
My Mother – Beautiful Flower, Beautiful Angel
