Personally, there is not much I hate more than alcohol or other people encouraging me to drink. If you ever had to live with an alcoholic and defend your mother against him when you were only 3 years old, I guess you understand why. If not, let me please explain it to you a bit: When you are a child of an alcoholic, safety is not something you ever experience as long as he is present. Your childhood is stolen away, as you have to mature quickly to support your mum that spends her evenings crying in your arms scared to death he will kill you all. And as his alcoholism grows worse, you have to watch one of the persons you love most turning into a monster.
Such used to be the situation of my dad. He kept drinking since my earliest memories, turning our life into hell. And be it not he opened once to me, I would probably never understand any person that turns to drinking... and never accept them as people that actually (though not all of them) just need help.
Long before he met my mum, his first wife stole his children and escaped with them to Canada; he has never seen them again. He lost his prominent job due to her act and didn´t end up in jail just thanks to help of his friends. (It was a communistic Czechoslovakia, remember. To attempt to escape to Western countries or have any close relative who does so equaled many years of hard imprisonment) He found a new woman, had a new son - and lost them again. After the change of the regime he founded a company which went into bankruptcy and left him with a Mount Everest of debts. Whenever he tried anything to help himself get out of his misery, life kicked him in the face and he sank even lower.
After he once told me all these things, I was not wondering anymore why he spent approximately 10 years almost constantly drunk as a skunk.
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