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Show Solitary Drinking Sessions Mark of Alcoholic Problem The disease of alcoholism has been called the most neglected public health problem prob-lem facing the nation today. It is a killer illness that is attained in most cases through progression over a period of years. It is neglected neg-lected because of ignorance. Most victims fight againsl admitting ad-mitting they are alcoholics. Non - sufferers often do rot recognize identifying signs si-gns of the progression. Too many citizens do not knew that the alcoholic can be helped if aid is asked sooii enough. RECOGNIZE SIGNS In an effort to help victim or their friends, family or employers determine if a drinking prob lem exists, the Times - Independent In-dependent is publishing a S3r ies of articles, of which Ihia is the third. The most recent discussion pinpointed such warnings during the pre .alcoholism stage as blackouts, sneaking drinks, drinking before "wet" parties, gulping and avoidance avoid-ance of talk about drinking problems. Other signs, furnished furn-ished by the Alcohol Rehab. Center in Price, are easily recognizable, (for information informa-tion in Moab call 253-8741). Solitary drinking is a potent indicator and occurs when drinking no longer is a social soc-ial function for an individual. This does not cover the abuser ab-user of alcohol who frequents bars alone. It focuses on the person who goes into seclusion seclus-ion (hotel, flophouses or his own home) where he can remain re-main undisturbed in a state of intoxication for days or sometimes weeks. "Hiding out" to drink is the first drastic and dramatic dramat-ic example of the isolation urge. It will be repeated many times with rapidly increasing in-creasing frequency. SESSIONS FAIL These' lonely sessions fail always to provide the comfort and self-consolence self-consolence the drinker thought he would find. He comes back to family, friends and co-workers embarrassed and ashamed. Others now have guessed his secret and the solitary binge has settled no problems. He had expected to escape into a world of euphoria where life's problems cannot penetrate. Each attempt at findihg such "bliss" is futile and painfully unrewarding. Yet, he continues to go back in search of that something, his hopes always new and fresh. This is but another manifestation of the tightening tighten-ing grip which alcohol is ex-exerting ex-exerting upon him. LONG WAY TO GO But to the drinker in the pre-alcoh-olic stage he has a long way to go in the horrors of solitary soli-tary guzzling. As the song said, "you ain't seen nothing yet". By the acute stage this kind of boozing is insufferable. insuf-ferable. In the drinker's progression, progress-ion, the occasional blackout he used to shudder over now descends to 'haunt him. They. may happen three times in every ten drinking bouts Concern mounts in the man because lost days and weeks create all sorts of problems in the person's social, business bus-iness and domestic life. In fishing for clues to assure him that he did complete a task he has no recollection of even confronting, he always al-ways betrays his astonishing confusion. He is tabbed as unreliable. Realization oi this can send him to only one situation a lonely living grave in isolation. The pat-: tern of progression toward acute and chronic alcoholism usually includes the beginning begin-ning of daytime drinking. For a ereat manv weeks and years the heavy drinker refrains re-frains from starting before evening. COMMON BOAST He is determined de-termined to wait until he is through with his work usually us-ually so that he can eagerly eager-ly "get at his drinking" at a time when there will be no interference from the demands de-mands of conducting the details de-tails of his job. Drinking truly is a welcome release from the cares of a troubled existence. It is the common boast of practically every alcoholic' that drinking rarely, if ever, interfered with his work. He does shrug off the inefficiencies inefficien-cies resulting from brutal hangovers. They also may have made him sometimes late, but he always reported in. |