Alcoholism has long been a problem for seniors and, when combined with many of the prescription medications that are often necessary in this age group, it can become a deadly issue. There are a number of stressors in this transitional stage and many seniors end up struggling with depression as well – a problem that often triggers alcoholic behavior. Unfortunately, heavy drinking makes depression worse, which can only exacerbate physical and emotional health. It’s a problem that is expected to get worse over the next 10 years.

Tampa Bay Online reports that about 3 million seniors in the United States struggle with alcohol and drug addiction – a number that is expected to triple over the next decade.

The problems that result from alcohol abuse and addiction among seniors are not much different than those that plague younger drinkers, but because the body becomes more fragile with age, more physical health problems tend to pile up more quickly. TBO reports that about 14 percent of hip fractures among seniors are due to mixing alcohol and prescription medications.

Alcohol abuse is the primary substance of abuse among seniors according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Unfortunately, the same survey shows that the rate of illicit drug abuse has grown by 3 percent over the past 10 years, too. This includes prescription drugs and other substances, like marijuana. The combination of the two substances can be lethal, robbing patients of their quality of life as well as their memories and physical health. Marijuana is far more potent than it was when many aging baby boomers first experimented with the drug 30 years ago, and combining it with prescriptions and alcohol can completely obliterate the patient’s ability to function.

One substance abuse treatment specialist told the Daily Tribune: “Baby-boomer parents who still think marijuana is a harmless substance need to look at the facts. Marijuana potency has grown steeply over the past decade, with serious implications in particular for young people, who may not only be at increased risk for various psychological conditions, cognitive deficits and respiratory problems, but are at significantly higher risk for developing dependency on other drugs, such as cocaine and heroin, than are nonsmokers.”

The hard part is first recognizing the signs of addiction among seniors who are going through so many different changes and then helping them to understand the risks that are inherent to abusing alcohol and drugs. Treatment is available, however, and seniors who are ready to make the changes necessary to live a fuller life without addiction can seek treatment. Call us at The Orchid to learn more about options in senior women’s addiction treatment.

Sobriety and addiction recovery may seem like the same thing on paper. But in practice, they can be quite different. Sobriety means someone isn’t using drugs or alcohol. Addiction recovery is about an entire lifestyle change. As a woman with an addiction, you need to know where you stand. Are you in addiction recovery, or are you just sober?

Who Are You As A Woman

What kind of woman are you now? What kind of woman do you want to be? If you have been addicted to drugs or alcohol, you may have been dodging these questions for a long time.

When you don’t quite know who you are, you have two choices - keep running away or face the situation and dig deeper for more answers. A woman who is not ready to embrace recovery will constantly avoid these questions. She could be stone sober and still not really be in recovery.

You don’t need to have perfect answers to these questions. They are part of every woman’s lifelong identity process. You just need to be willing to face the questions throughout your life. That takes an act of courage, and that’s what moves you in recovery mode.

Listen To Your Mental Chatter

What’s your mental chatter saying to you? Does it take notice of your strengths and gifts, or does it scold and belittle you? Does it lift you up or make negative comparisons between you and others?

You’re a bad mother. You’ll never amount to anything like your sister. You’re a lousy daughter (or wife, or friend).

If you are just sober, you may not know what to do with these thoughts. They may trigger all kinds of emotions, sending you on a roller coaster every day. You might find other things to obsess about so your mind can’t focus on those awful words.

Face The Discomfort Of Your Emotions

When you are in recovery, you’ll still hear those things. But instead of ignoring them, you pay attention like you were a detective. How do those words affect me? Where do those phrases come from? Do I have to believe them every time I hear them? What else could I be saying to myself instead?

What’s the difference here? With sobriety, you just react in the moment. It hurts, so you turn away. In addiction recovery, you stay with the hurt for a while so you can change the process. You acknowledge the presence of these thoughts, but you refuse to accept the negativity. Then you do something positive to change your mood. Those thoughts may be there, but they don’t control you.

Stay well-supported when you deal with negative self-talk. Facing these feelings can be tough for a while. With practice, this gradually becomes easier and less stressful.

Sobriety and Addiction Recovery

When you go to drug rehab, the first task is to get you sober. You need the chemicals out of your body so you can start fresh. Sobriety can come fairly quickly, but true recovery can take a lifetime. Take a look at yourself today and make sure you are in recovery mode.

Most people don’t realize when an addiction starts to take over. They ignore the signs and pretend it isn’t changing their life. Don’t let this happen during your addiction recovery. Stay on top of it by developing and using good coping skills. As a woman, you have unique recovery needs. Use the following tips to help you throughout your recovery.

Avoid Situations With High Risk

It’s a lot easier to prevent a bad situation than to get yourself out of one. Recognize high risk when you see it, and you can keep your sobriety intact more easily. Hanging around the wrong friends, being around a lot of stress, or trying to squeeze too much into your schedule can overload your mind and emotions.

You can only take so much before you start looking for ways to escape. Avoiding high-risk situations is a lot easier when you spend time around people with a healthy lifestyle. You have fewer opportunities to get yourself into trouble and your mindset will be focused on positive living.

Find Healthy Ways To Manage Your Emotions

Everyone needs to cope with difficult emotions when they come up. Most women are a more emotionally expressive than men. Women also tend to be more sensitive to emotional fluctuations and lack of harmony in a group. Before your recovery days, you would have used drugs and alcohol to cope with intense feelings before your recovery.

You’ll have a big gap in your life when you stop using drugs and alcohol. Fill that empty spot with better positive habits. Go for a walk, talk to a good friend, do some practical physical activities to quiet your mind, or listen to music. If you can distract yourself in a healthy way, your emotions will calm down sooner and you’ll lower your relapse risk.

Give Yourself Regular Reality Checks

You did a lot to avoid reality when you were actively using drugs. To shake this habit, you need to keep in touch with the truth every day. Spend time around people who will be real with you. Take notice of your own improvements, write those down, and make sure you read those daily. Learn to accept genuine compliments from others who see your progress.

Own up to the negative realities as well. Instead of making an excuse, acknowledge where you went wrong and do your best to make it right. Learn how to accept difficult things you can’t change. You can learn a lot more about yourself when you stay honest every day.

More Coping Skills For Women In Recovery

We have more coping skills for you to learn about. Come back for the next post on this topic to read about more essential ways to prevent relapse.

Too often, alcohol and sex go hand in hand, whether you’re a college student on spring break or a professional woman having wine on a dinner date. Unfortunately, when alcohol addiction or alcoholism is in the equation, sex can take a morbid turn for both men and women. Diseases, unwanted pregnancies, planned pregnancies that end in miscarriage and the inability to get pregnant if you are trying are among the issues that women face when they struggle with alcoholism without treatment at an alcohol rehab facility.

Alcohol Addiction, Sex and Disease

You first heard it in grade school and afterschool specials: women who drink are more likely to have sex and regret it later than those who remain sober. Women who are addicted to alcohol are more likely than others to contract sexually transmitted diseases like Chlamydia, HPV, Hepatitis C, gonorrhea, and HIV. They are also more likely to experience unplanned pregnancies and those pregnancies, even if planned, can go dangerously awry if active alcoholism continues without treatment.

All of the sexually transmitted diseases listed above cannot only be life changing, they can all be passed to another partner before you even know you have it. Some of them are deadly; there is no cure for Hepatitis C or HIV at this time. Though it may seem easy enough to use protection, the fact is that when alcohol is a part of the equation, preventative measures are too often forgotten.

Alcoholism and Fertility

Unlike men, women don’t suffer as many reproductive issues while under the influence or actively an alcoholic. Women who are naturally reproductively challenged may have difficulties implanting a healthy pregnancy if they drink heavily and many have miscarriages early on if they drink a substantial amount on a daily basis, but in general, men will find that they are the ones who suffer from the greatest fertility issues due to alcoholism: reduced sperm count, reduced circulating testosterone, lower motility of remaining sperm and the chance of irreversible damage without abstinence attained through an evidence-based alcohol rehab program.

However, alcoholic women are more likely to be unhealthy in general and therefore may find their fertility challenged as a result.

Alcoholism, Alcohol Rehab and Pregnancy

A woman’s pregnancy is greatly affected by the amount of alcohol she drinks, especially if she is physically addicted and regularly abusing the drug. Miscarriage is the first risk: women in their first two trimesters who continue to drink heavily will experience a greater risk of losing the baby. Children who survive the pregnancy of an alcoholic mother will have a low birth weight and may have Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and be developmentally disabled both physically and mentally. Mothers who continue to drink heavily after their children’s birth and are unable to care for them as a result may have their children taken away from them.

Alcohol rehab is the only way to safely abstain from drinking, especially during a critical period like a pregnancy. At an alcohol addiction treatment center focused on women and their needs, you will find the resources necessary to not only stop drinking but remain clean and sober after you return home. Get more information about alcohol rehab for women today at The Orchid.

When you drink, the liver is the organ most involved in processing the substance. As a result, women who suffer from alcoholism or alcohol abuse tend to have liver problems in addition to addiction issues when they head to alcohol rehab. In some cases, liver disease is the wake-up call that lets alcoholic women know that their problem is serious enough to warrant alcohol addiction treatment.

Alcoholism and the Woman’s Liver

Physiologically, women tend to suffer the physical effects of alcoholism more quickly than do men. Even drinking less alcohol per pound of body weight than their male counterparts, women also more quickly develop alcoholism or alcohol addiction and the related health disorders like liver inflammation and liver disease.

Alcoholic Hepatitis

If you drink eight servings of beer (about 12 ounces) or the equivalent number of servings of wine and/ or liquor every day for eight months to a year, you will develop alcoholic hepatitis. Alcoholic hepatitis is an inflammation of the liver. Should you stop drinking immediately, you have a chance of reversing the condition or “clearing it” so that you no longer suffer the effects. Continue drinking at the same rate and you will develop cirrhosis of the liver.

Cirrhosis of the Liver

Cirrhosis of the liver is the second stage of liver problems for an alcoholic. When this issue develops, liver tissue is replaced with scar tissue, inhibiting the organ from processing anything effectively, including alcohol. Since alcohol is a toxin, this means that these toxins are not completely filtered out of the body and instead remain in the system, causing more damage.

Cirrhosis of the liver is deadly. It is one of the most common causes of death in the United States. The only way to survive it is to stop drinking completely and immediately and even then, a sustained recovery is not guaranteed: only about 67 percent of those with a diagnosis of cirrhosis of the liver will survive if they stop drinking. The rest develop liver disease and die as a result of the condition or a complication.

Diagnosing Alcohol Related Liver Inflammation, Cirrhosis of the Liver and Liver Disease

There are a few tests that doctor’s provide in order to give you a definitive diagnosis of liver related health problems. It starts with a basic examination and blood work followed by a needle biopsy of the liver. In general, though, it’s a clear path: alcoholism leads to liver failure and women, especially, should be concerned about the developments of liver inflammation and cirrhosis sooner rather than later.

Alcohol Treatment for Women

If you are a woman and you drink half a dozen alcoholic beverages or more per day, see your physician immediately for more information about liver disease and prevention. The best way to ensure that you don’t develop a full blown liver condition is to stop drinking, and the only effective way to do that is to enroll in an alcohol rehab like the program provided for women and by women at The Orchid. Call today for more information.