Given the fact that both of them came from very conservative backgrounds, neither one of them drank very much beyond the casual drinking stage when they first began dating. As the time advanced, then again, they started to go to more happy hours, football bashes, sorority and fraternity parties, and keg parties. Consequently, they slowly but surely began to drink increasingly more the more they dated.
Their Social Life Usually Consisted of Going to Happy Hour With Their Friends, Going to Professional Sporting Events, Going to Parties With Their Friends, Going to Restaurants Three or Four Nights Per Week, and Going With Their Friends to the Local Watering Hole on the Weekends
After they graduated, they both got jobs in a large city that was located approximately eighty miles from their undergraduate college. Then they finally made up their mind to move into the same apartment together.
Given the fact that they were far removed from the college drinking scene, nonetheless, their social life commonly consisted of going to parties with their friends, going to restaurants three or four nights per week, going to happy hour with their friends, going to professional sporting events, and going to the local nightclub with their friends on the weekends. Stated simply, Augie and Merissa began drinking in an excessive and irresponsible manner.
Now that they were living in the same apartment together and beginning to get more committed to their relationship, nonetheless, they started thinking about buying a house, getting married, becoming more responsible, and having children.
With any pivotal adjustment in an individual’s life there is frequently something that prompts the particular transformation in question. For Merissa and Augie the thought of buying a new house and having children was this “method of change.” Stated more forcefully, for the first time in their lives, Merissa and Augie began to critically assess their abusive drinking and the long term alcohol effects on their health.
How Would Their Hazardous and Irresponsible Drinking Affect Their Relationship With One Another, Their Mental Health, Their Ability to Have Children, Their Finances, and Their Relationship With Their Parents?
Would their irresponsible and excessive drinking negatively affect their ability to have children? How would they be able to continue spending nearly all of their money on drinking if they were to begin saving for a new house? How responsible would they be if they had children and continued to drink in an abusive and excessive manner? How would they be able to face their parents and tell them about their long term hopes, dreams, and plans while they still drank in an abusive and irresponsible manner while having fun as they did when they were in college? What would their hazardous drinking do to their relationship? How would their abusive and excessive drinking affect their mental health?
From a different viewpoint, although neither one of them ever suffered from alcohol poisoning, received a DUI, or experienced alcohol withdrawals, they realized that their irresponsible and hazardous drinking was becoming a problem that they could not disregard any longer.
After Giving Their Circumstances Some Serious Thought, Augie and Merissa Concluded That Their Goals, Aspirations, and Dreams Would not be Accomplished if They Continued Their Heavy Drinking
All of these questions without a doubt led to the same conclusion: Augie and Merissa needed to realize that they couldn’t continue their heavy drinking if their hopes, aspirations, and dreams were to be brought to fruition.
Once they arrived at this conclusion, they informed their drinking friends about their plans to start a family, about their goal of buying or building a new house, and about their marital plans. They also told their drinking friends that they still wanted to pal around with them but that they would be drinking in strict moderation from this moment forward so that they could start to realize their future aspirations, goals, and dreams.
Shockingly, all of their pals expressed relief because they too had been reassessing their lives and concluded that their life-styles were much too often focused on drinking. They also felt that they would have to change radically if they were to become more responsible and show more care for their goals, their health, and for their careers in the next twenty or twenty-five years.
After their heart-to-heart discussion with their buddies about their dreams, aspirations, and goals, Augie and Merissa in reality started to have more meaningful relationships with all of their pals. The key reason for this was the fact that all of them had the same outlook regarding their irresponsible and excessive drinking and their relatively short and long-term aspirations, plans, and goals.
