Symptoms of Alcoholism 2.0

Alcohol use disorder has several symptoms associated with it. Some people might have alcohol use disorder but fail to recognize it. At times people are pushed into consuming alcohol for various reasons. Even though the alcohol companies warn that consuming alcohol irresponsibly is dangerous to personal health, people still choose to ignore the cautions. Professional health care workers can diagnose someone with an alcohol disorder, or the patient themselves can watch the signs and symptoms and determine their state.

Some of the behaviors of alcoholism include drinking alone. A person with alcohol use disorder does not worry about drinking with friends; they worry about drinking. Their main concern is to get drunk (Wang et al., 2020). Most times, such people have mental issues such as depression or stress, leading to them wanting to drown their sorrows and troubles in alcohol. Again they consume too much alcohol to feel the effect of the alcohol. Their alcohol tolerance is high, and thus consuming more to achieve the tolerance level.

Another behavior associated with alcoholism is getting furious when people ask or show concern about personal drinking patterns. Alcoholics feel attacked when people ask them about their drinking behavior. For that reason, they become defensive and angry (Dguzeh et al., 2018). At times they can be violent towards others. Again, alcoholism makes people neglect important aspects of their lives, such as hygiene. Their drinking makes them forget important life practices such as eating and staying clean. Alcohol use influences their thinking capabilities, making them look retarded.

Sometimes alcoholism makes people skip classes or work due to reasons related to alcohol. They might oversleep, overspend, forget they are employed or have classes, or even forget where they are and bring alcohol to the offices or classrooms (Dguzeh et al., 2018). These symptoms indicate clearly that someone has alcohol use disorder. They sometimes make excuses at work so they might drink (Wang et al., 2020). The work they do should be their priority since it is their source of income, but alcohol becomes their priority to them. There are points in life where they can give up their jobs or other valuable aspects for alcohol. For instance, a parent might miss his child's graduation to go drinking, or a student might miss exams to go drinking.

Another symptom of alcoholism is drinking even when the health and legal issues state otherwise. Some people have health complications such as ulcers, heart disease, cirrhosis, alcohol ketoacidosis, and many more but still consume alcohol, knowing that the outcomes can be severe (Axley et al., 2019). At this point, these types of patients have new medical interventions to help them control their lives.

Nevertheless, there are physical symptoms such as withdrawal symptoms due to lack of alcohol consumption. Alcohol use disorder can cause a person to start shaking, vomiting, or feeling nauseous if they do not consume alcohol. Again this patient might have blackouts or loss of memory after drinking. Sometimes patients have tremors when they wake up after they go drinking. All these symptoms do not need a professional health care provider to diagnose. Patients can diagnose themselves, or the people they surround themselves with can diagnose the disorder and help them.

Nevertheless, having close friends with this disorder or living in a family setting where everyone can drink alcohol the way they desire is a risk factor (Axley et al., 2019). Peer pressure and low-esteem can drive a person to alcoholism. People need to have control of their drinking to avoid being alcoholics.

Personal diagnosis requires an individual to ask themselves questions like does alcohol make them happy? Do they consume too much alcohol for them to feel the effect of it? Do they react well or get mad when asked about their drinking? Is their work or school affected by their drinking habits? Have they tried to stop drinking, and it did not work? All these questions will help an individual to understand their state of alcohol consumption. The best prevention to avoid alcoholism is to limit the alcohol intake that one consumes. Drinking one drink a day is a limited intake that can prevent one from alcoholism (Wang et al., 2020). The use of medications that reduce alcohol desire can be used as a prevention measure.

Read more about Alcoholism Symptoms here.

References
Axley, P. D., Richardson, C. T., & Singal, A. K. (2019). Epidemiology of alcohol consumption and societal burden of alcoholism and alcoholic liver disease. Clinics in liver disease, 23(1), 39-50. Dguzeh, U., Haddad, N. C., Smith, K. T., Johnson, J. O., Doye, A. A., Gwathmey, J. K., & Haddad, G. E. (2018). Alcoholism: a multi-systemic cellular insult to organs. International journal of environmental research and public health, 15(6), 1083. Wang, S. C., Chen, Y. C., Chen, S. J., Lee, C. H., & Cheng, C. M. (2020). Alcohol addiction, gut microbiota, and alcoholism treatment: A review. International journal of molecular sciences, 21(17), 6413.