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What You Can Do!
Alcohol taken in moderation can be an enjoyable and harmless activity. Having a tiny amount of drink every two days can have a protective effect against heart disease for men over 35 and women past menopause.
However, alcohol can also be abused. An addiction to alcohol has the potential to cause a person to ruin his/her own life, risk giving birth to an abnormal baby, break up families, and destroy careers.
If you do not want to hurt yourself and the people you care about anymore, you must decide to change. It is your choice!
Life without alcohol can start by taking the following 2 steps.
- Acknowledge the Alcohol Problem.
If the following warning signs sound like you, you may have a drinking problem.
Warning Signs of Alcohol Dependence:
- You need increasing amounts of alcohol to feel good or get drunk. (Increasing Tolerance)
- When not intoxicated, you will go through withdrawal symptoms, i.e., nervousness, tremors (Shakes), anxiety, sweating, sleeping problems, and/or vomiting. (Withdrawal Symptoms)
- 1) you cannot stop after one drink, and/or 2) you want to cut down or stop drinking and have tried numerous times before, but failed. (Lost Control)
- you neglect important familial , social, occupational, or recreational activities as a direct or indirect result of drinking. (Neglects Responsibilities)
- you are not able to judge the dangerousness of certain behaviours, e.g., having unprotected sex, drinking and driving, becoming violent, and/or drinking lethal amounts. (Risky Behaviour)
- you cannot engage in an activity without first drinking to calm yourself down. (Psychological Dependence)
- Seek Help in Overcoming Your Alcohol Problem.
If you are worried you have a drinking problem or you already acknowledge that you do, CFSO can help.
Counselling services will involve:
- Helping the problem drinker set up an appointment with a detoxification centre, if required.
- Collaborative assessment and treatment planning.
- Identify the strengths and weaknesses of the person with an alcohol problem.
- Counsellor/social worker and client work together to explore and build upon what motivates the client to change and to utilize these inner resources to get through the often difficult process of recovery.
- Exploring the precipitated courses which lead to drug abuse.
- Getting the family (or significant others) to participate in the recovery process.
- Explore and implement strategies for relapse prevention.
CONFIDENTIALITY IS ENSURED!
The following are a list of pamphlets on addiction that are available at Chinese Family Services of Ontario:
- What Is An Addiction?
- Choosing Life Without Alcohol: What you can do!
- Choosing Life Without Drugs: What you can do!
- Alcoholism and Family Members.
- Drug Abuse and Family Members.
- Alcoholism and Youth.
- Drug Abuse and Youth.
Note: All pamphlets are written in both Chinese and English. For additional information or direct services, please contact our office at (416) 979-8299
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