A Young Couple Reviews Their Hazardous and Excessive Drinking and Their Short and Long-Term Dreams, Aspirations, and Goals

September 21st, 2009 by admin

Augie and Merissa have been dating for six-and-a-half years. They met while taking the same visual and performing arts class at a medium size, rural, liberal arts college located in the Northern part of the U.S. While they were in essence good buddies at first, they at long last started dating when they were in their second year of college.

Since both of them came from very conventional backgrounds, neither one of them drank much beyond the casual drinking stage when they first started to date. As the time proceeded, however, they began to go to more sorority and fraternity parties, happy hours, keg parties, and football bashes. Consequently, they progressively began to drink more the more they interacted with one another.

Their Social Life Usually 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 With Their Friends to the Local Disco on the Weekends

After they graduated from college, they both got jobs in a large city that was located roughly eighty-five miles from their undergraduate college. Then they decided to move into the same apartment together.

Because they were far removed from the college drinking scene, then again, their social life as a rule consisted of going to professional sporting events, going to restaurants three or four nights per week, going to happy hour with their friends, going to parties with their friends, and going to the local saloon with their friends on the weekends. Stated more precisely, Merissa and Augie began drinking in an abusive manner.

Now that they were living with each other and beginning to get more unwavering about their relationship, nevertheless, they started to think about becoming more responsible, having children, buying a house, and getting married.

With any significant alteration in an individual’s life there is regularly something that elicits the particular change in question. For Augie and Merissa the notion of having children and buying a new house was this “vehicle for change.” In short, for the first time in their lives, Augie and Merissa began to reflect on their excessive and abusive drinking and the long term effects of alcohol on their health.

How Would Their Hazardous and Excessive Drinking Affect Their Relationship With One Another, Their Ability to Have Children, Their Finances, Their Mental Health, and Their Relationship With Their Parents?

Would their abusive and irresponsible drinking unfavorably affect their ability to have children? How would they be able to continue spending so much money on drinking if they were to start saving for a new house? How adult-like would they be if they had children and continued to drink in a hazardous and excessive manner? How would they be able to face their parents and tell them about their long term goals, aspirations, and dreams while they still drank in an excessive manner while having fun as they did when they were in college? What would their excessive and hazardous drinking do to their relationship? How would their hazardous 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 withdrawal symptoms, they realized that their hazardous and excessive drinking was becoming a reality that they could not ”sweep under the rug” any longer.

After Giving Their Circumstances Some Serious Thought, Merissa and Augie Finally Understood That Their Plans, Hopes, and Dreams Would not be Brought to Fruition if They Continued Their Irresponsible and Excessive Drinking

All of these queries undoubtedly resulted in the same conclusion: Merissa and Augie needed to discover that they couldn’t continue their excessive and heavy drinking if their dreams, hopes, and aspirations were to be completed.

Once they came to this conclusion, they notified their drinking buddies about their goal of buying or building a new house, about their marital plans, and about their plans to start a family. They also told their drinking friends that they still wanted to hang around with them but that they would be drinking responsibly from this point forward so that they could start to realize their future dreams, goals, and aspirations.

Much to their amazement, all of their buddies expressed relief because they too had been mulling over their lives and concluded that their life-styles were much too often focused on drinking. They also understood that they would have to change notably if they were to become more accountable and exhibit more care for their careers, their aspirations, and for their health in the next twenty or twenty-five years.

After their candid discussion with their friends about their aspirations, dreams, and hopes, Augie and Merissa in effect started to have more meaningful relationships with all of their friends. The key reason for this was the fact that all of them had a similar mindset regarding their abusive and heavy drinking and their relatively short and long-term aspirations, plans, and goals.