Parents who drink heavily vs Non-drinkers and their expectations for their kids

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

Cool. None of that stuff happens with mine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Modeling for kids that you have it all under control and know just how much to drink before you can hop in your car in drive (said many a drunk driver, btw) is not how I parent.

Is your daily drink that important to you? (The answer is yes.)

That's the problem with all these conversations. Every drinker thinks they're safe and responsible. We know that many of them aren't.

Alcohol is an adult vice. Most people have vices, but I try to keep the adult ones away from my kids like I would with gambling or pornography.

[Anonymous]

I haven’t dealt with this from the parental side yet, but I’m a millennial and my parents are immigrants. My dad is a daily drinker - 1-2 beers during the week and more on the weekends (socially). My mom hates alcohol, always has, and barely touches it. They both thought American underage drinking laws were pretty arbitrary and took the position that making alcohol freely available took away the “forbidden fruit” aspect and that I could help myself from the bar whenever I wanted, so sometimes my dad and I would have a drink together. This did not extend to serving my friends or hosting parties (but my best friend growing up was European, her parents and mine were friends, and we’d frequently have family dinners where her parents or mine served us both wine).

Once I was in college and got a fake ID, I’d sometimes use it out with them at a restaurant. Many times my mom would order for me at an open bar (or once on a cruise) if I asked. I was 18-20, not 16, though.

I will say my parents’ approach worked. Never felt the need to sneak around to drink in high school and didn’t go wild in college when alcohol was freely accessible because it wasn’t novel at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

Are you a single parent?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

Cool. None of that stuff happens with mine.

DP. ever?

One reason I drastically cut down drinking at home is that I realized that without really planning in, my nights had started to revolve around drinking. not in that I was scheming on how to do it, but that I would have thoughts like “Oh, I can’t go to that 8pm yoga class because I will probably have a glass of wine and be too sleepy” or “Oh, if I call that friend at 8 I’ll be tipsy so maybe better to talk in the AM.” I realized I was thinking that way and that it was NOT something I wanted that my activities would be limited by drinking in that way or even that I would plan around drinking at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Children of alcoholics are psychotic about teen drinking or any drinking for that matter.

There are people who don't drink either culturally or religiously or for health that know it is a normal part of teen behavior but are quite strict but don't freak out and they might counsel or ground but not in a way that is so overt that kids rebel.

There are people who drink regularly (i'm sure this is what you are talking about) but are not alcoholics who know it's part of normal teen behavior and give them tools to be safe like Uber or a place to drink safely and while they don't encourage it, they are not punishing drinking.

Then there are insane parents who drink with teens.

Then there are true alcoholics, and their kids might never touch the stuff due to what they lived with or maybe they drink with their insane parents.

Way to victim blame! Children of alcoholics who want to break the family curse of alcoholism do not drink and they teach their kids the dangers of alcohol use in their family.

I agree with you and found PPs language really judgmental and offensive. However, my mom is a child of alcoholics and I do agree with the PP that when people respond to that experience by being extremely restrictive and intense about alcohol, it's not a great situation. My mom should have gone to therapy and worked through her childhood experiences. Instead, she worked out her issues with her parents on her kids. She was insanely suspicious of everything we did, would accuse us of drinking and lying to her even when we weren't, would give these long lectures about how "our family has issues with alcohol" and that we were genetically predisposed to be alcoholics, etc. I know my mom had a really rough childhood and I try to have empathy for that, but her behavior was also abusive and dysfunctional even though she wasn't a drinker.

I actually was not that interested in drinking as a teenager but decided to start drinking at parties when I was a senior in HS because my mom had accused me of drinking so many times by then that I figured I might as well.

Please don't be that parent. It's really not productive.

I am not that parent. I have had age appropriate talks with my children from a young age. Unfortunately, they have witnessed the effects of family curse and are aware that alcoholism runs deep on both sides. Now older teens, they see clear differences between me and dh and our siblings. Most of their cousins do not drink, either. By 50, the effects of drinking show on the face and body. I am grateful to my young self for making the choice to not drink. The times I did, it went down too easy and scratched an itch I wasn't aware of.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

Cool. None of that stuff happens with mine.

DP. ever?

One reason I drastically cut down drinking at home is that I realized that without really planning in, my nights had started to revolve around drinking. not in that I was scheming on how to do it, but that I would have thoughts like “Oh, I can’t go to that 8pm yoga class because I will probably have a glass of wine and be too sleepy” or “Oh, if I call that friend at 8 I’ll be tipsy so maybe better to talk in the AM.” I realized I was thinking that way and that it was NOT something I wanted that my activities would be limited by drinking in that way or even that I would plan around drinking at all.

I wouldn’t ever go to an 8pm yoga class anyway. And one glass of wine certainly wouldn’t make me too tipsy to call a friend. If things like that made you stop drinking, that’s wonderful. For you. Plenty of people can handle a drink between 5-6 pm and go on to do whatever needs to be done for the night.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

Are you a single parent?

No. So your solution is if I’m drinking I’ll hope my partner is around and not drinking?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Modeling for kids that you have it all under control and know just how much to drink before you can hop in your car in drive (said many a drunk driver, btw) is not how I parent.

Is your daily drink that important to you? (The answer is yes.)

That's the problem with all these conversations. Every drinker thinks they're safe and responsible. We know that many of them aren't.

Alcohol is an adult vice. Most people have vices, but I try to keep the adult ones away from my kids like I would with gambling or pornography.

Yes and people self reporting they’re having “1 drink”

Yeah whatever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much judgment here! "Daily" drinkers being equated with "heavy" drinkers and also neglectful parenting. Avoiding alcohol entirely does not make you a better parent. Also this is the second post I've seen recently casting judgment on parents who are "social" and drink. Someone seems a little anxious....

Do you have teenagers? Do you drive them around later at night or wait up for them to be a ride in case they need it even if you weren't planning to drive? How does that work after your daily drink that is not heavy drinking?

DP. Tonight I will drink a glass of wine around 5:30 or 6 probably, eat a full dinner, and then go pick up my kid around 10. It’s not hard.

I don't believe daily drinkers are not at times driving around after having their daily drink. They just think it's fine to drive after a drink or two.

Depending on their weight and other factors, it may very well be fine. It is certainly fine after a few hours.

I don't know how people with multiple children (elementary age+) and responsibilities (some planned and some not) can carve out the hour or two every day to have their daily drink and be sure they won't need to drive. That is certainly not how my life works.

Well, my life with two teens does work like that. One drives themself and the other needs rides at very predictable, scheduled times. When I enjoy a glass of wine, I’m either in for the night or I know I won’t have to go back out for a few hours.

Okay. Some real life examples. My non-driving teen has stuff like hey can I have a ride to Susie's house or hey I said I'd bring XYZ to school tomorrow can you bring me to CVS. Or even hey my ride home fell through can you come pick me up. Or can you pick me up earlier than planned.

I wish my life were fully scheduled however.

Are you a single parent?

No. So your solution is if I’m drinking I’ll hope my partner is around and not drinking?

Uh, yes? I mean, if unexpected things are really popping up so frequently that you can’t possibly count on a few hours where you won’t have to drive, it sounds like maybe your partner isn’t contributing equally to the driving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Modeling for kids that you have it all under control and know just how much to drink before you can hop in your car in drive (said many a drunk driver, btw) is not how I parent.

Is your daily drink that important to you? (The answer is yes.)

That's the problem with all these conversations. Every drinker thinks they're safe and responsible. We know that many of them aren't.

Alcohol is an adult vice. Most people have vices, but I try to keep the adult ones away from my kids like I would with gambling or pornography.

Yes and people self reporting they’re having “1 drink”

Yeah whatever.

It’s weird that this is so hard for you to fathom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think your drinking determines your comfort level with your teen's drinking? It seems that the daily drinkers are way more comfortable/normalize drinking in teens than those who rarely/don't drink? Agree or disagree?

Social standards exist.

Most immigrants to the USA in recent decades drink much more than multi-generational Americans since it's their culture to do so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think your drinking determines your comfort level with your teen's drinking? It seems that the daily drinkers are way more comfortable/normalize drinking in teens than those who rarely/don't drink? Agree or disagree?

We are a family where my husband and I have wine with our dinner and have since our kid was little. I only stopped drinking wine during pregnancy and nursing. Our DC has seen us have 1-2 glasses at dinner and sometimes nothing but we probably have wine with dinner 5x/week.

Our DC has been going to parties since 16.5/17 and has shared he does have a couple of drinks. These parties are once in 2-3 months so not that often. We usually pick our DC up and DC has never been drunk, just slightly tipsy. We have many candid talks about what alcohol does your brain, body and how we metabolize it and it's better not to drink at DC's age at all, but if you do, drink slowly and drink water or eat food with it.

We feel ok with that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I haven’t dealt with this from the parental side yet, but I’m a millennial and my parents are immigrants. My dad is a daily drinker - 1-2 beers during the week and more on the weekends (socially). My mom hates alcohol, always has, and barely touches it. They both thought American underage drinking laws were pretty arbitrary and took the position that making alcohol freely available took away the “forbidden fruit” aspect and that I could help myself from the bar whenever I wanted, so sometimes my dad and I would have a drink together. This did not extend to serving my friends or hosting parties (but my best friend growing up was European, her parents and mine were friends, and we’d frequently have family dinners where her parents or mine served us both wine).

Once I was in college and got a fake ID, I’d sometimes use it out with them at a restaurant. Many times my mom would order for me at an open bar (or once on a cruise) if I asked. I was 18-20, not 16, though.

I will say my parents’ approach worked. Never felt the need to sneak around to drink in high school and didn’t go wild in college when alcohol was freely accessible because it wasn’t novel at all.

Did it though? It seems you are obsessed with alcohol.