October 1989 © 1989 Related articles: When drinking
"It's a progressive, sneaky disease. In every case of alcoholism, there was a point in that person's life when drinking had not taken on addictive proportions." Mike Alexander
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Look around you. About one person out of every 10 you see – working the case register at the grocery store, managing you bank, driving the car behind you, sitting at the next desk – has a drinking problem. About one out of every five has an alcoholic family member – and is emotionally and often physically scarred as a result. Some of the earliest literature, including the Bible, recognized the difference between people who drank occasionally and people who had no control over their drinking. In the U.S., more than 18 million adults are alcoholics or alcohol abusers, plus at least 4.6 million teenagers under 18 who are in trouble because of drinking to excess. As Nan Robertson notes in her recent history of Alcoholics Anonymous, "As Godawful as these statistics are, alcoholism is treatable. Perfectly treatable. There is still no cure, no 'magic bullet; but it can be arrested permanently. The treatment starts with a breathtakingly simple notion: a person can not take the next drink. Alcoholics Anonymous has grown and flourished on an even more breathtakingly simple idea: A person can not take a drink one day at a time." Mike Alexander, Southeastern region vice president of Human Affairs Inc., which operates Georgia Power's Employee Assistance Program (EAP), says, "The best way to determine if you have a problem is to sit down with the people you care about and trust, and ask them, 'Of all the problems I've created, in my marriage, for myself or my job, how many occurred as a result of my drinking or drug use?'" Someone who suspects he has a problem with alcohol needs to assess the degree of the problem with a professional, Alexander says. Too often, he says, people read "Are you an alcoholic?" check lists and say, "I'm okay. I don't have blackouts',' or "I'm okay. I don't drink in the morning." It proves nothing. Alcoholics go to heroic efforts to show there is no problem. They'll often go a month without a drink, to prove they don't have a problem – then start drinking again. In fact, one of the main indicators of alcoholism is not that someone can't go months without a drink – it's that once the person has a drink, he or she has no control over how many more will follow. Indeed, some alcoholics are binge drinkers, who go months without drinking, then drink steadily for weeks. "What happens is that they have intervals of consumption characterized by a loss of control over alcohol and other sedatives. They'll have an unpredictable pattern of consumption. On Friday, they may have two or three drinks, then on Saturday, they may plan to do the same thing, but end up closing the place down. They may have one drink one night and drink a tremendous amount the next night, and not know the difference between the two nights',' says Alexander. One of the big problems in identifying alcoholism is that "it's a progressive, sneaky disease',' Alexander says. "In every case of alcoholism, there was a point in that person's life when drinking had not taken on addictive proportions'.' Often people don't think alcoholism is a problem in a work setting unless the person actually drinks at work. In the early stages of the illness, most don't. "They say, 'I only drink on weekends. I put in 110 percent Monday through Friday. If I want to do some hard drinking on the weekends, I've earned that,’" Alexander says. "Supervisors often tell me, 'I have someone who has a problem, but I can't say anything to him because he's doing the job.’ I ask them, 'If you were to replace this person, would you want someone who performs at this person's level?' They always say no. But over time, managers and supervisors scale down their expectations of performance from the alcoholic. They gradually allow for the Monday absenteeism and jagged patterns of productivity. "The cumulative effect is a person who on a good day puts in 75 to 80 percent of what you expect from that position, because you or a series of managers have compromised on expectations." The best way to deal with alcoholics in a work situation is to hold them to performance standards. "It's not an earth-shattering idea, but it's important. And this isn't going to come as a big shock to them. They already know their performance is not what it should be. You're not about to spring something that hasn't run through the person's mind hundreds of times." As he trains supervisors with various companies about dealing with alcoholic employees, Alexander tells them alcoholics can, indeed, only be helped after they admit they have a problem. However, he says, by holding employees to standards of performance and confronting them with problems caused by their drinking, they can help the individuals to start recognizing their programs. "Although it’s true that 'You can lead a horse to water, but can't make him drink;’ you can make him thirsty.’" he says. Employee assistance programs like Georgia Power's, which have multiplied into the thousands in the last 10 years, have apparently increased the number of people who seek help, experts say. Robert O'Brien and Dr. Sidney Cohen, writing in The Encyclopedia of Drug Abuse, point out, "Perhaps EAPs have greater leverage because while problem drinkers are generally not intimidated by threats of losing family, possessions, reputations or pride, they are usually deeply concerned about losing their jobs." It is worthwhile to try to convince the alcoholic to seek help. As James Kemper, founder of the Kemper Group of insurance companies, and a recovering alcoholic, says, "The most expensive way to handle alcoholics is to fire or ignore them. The most profitable and effective way is to help them recover."
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