A Woman Exhibits Signs of Depression and Alcoholism and Makes an Appointment to See Her Medical Practitioner About Her Irresponsible and Excessive Drinking and Mental Health Issues
Friday, October 23rd, 2009Teresa was a forty-seven-year-old legal secretary who realized that she had some problems with her drinking. For instance, within the past two months she has felt the need to have a few drinks before going to work, a week ago she failed a random urine alcohol test at her place of employment, two months ago she got stopped by the police for a DWI, and last but not least, for the last seven months she has begun to forget what she says and does when she goes out drinking.
Similar to multitudes of other individuals, Teresa’s alcohol involvement began slowly and stayed at this level of involvement for quite some time because every now and then she engaged in intermittent social drinking. In truth, for around six months, every time she went out to drink, she made sure to drink in a responsible manner. Something about her drinking, nonetheless, seemed to radically change when her husband divorced her.
In Order To Overcome the Divorce of Her Husband With Less Distress, Teresa Came to the Conclusion That She Will Begin Hanging Out More Regularly With Some of Her Pals Who Love to Whoop it Up and Drink
Teresa got very despondent about the loss of her husband, and as a way to refrain from fixating on her depressing feelings she determined that she would start associating more routinely with some of her buddies who love to drink.
Quite candidly, Teresa truly believed that having fun almost every day by drinking and partying with her buddies would help her come to terms with the breakup of her husband in a less painful manner.
Teresa’s Drinking Escalates Considerably the More Often She Goes to Happy Hours, Family Get-Togethers, Private Parties, Sporting Events, and Dinner Dates With Her Friends
It didn’t take very long, however, before her drinking increased to a significant extent the more frequently she went to and drank at dinner dates, sporting events, happy hours, private parties, and family get-togethers with her friends. Furthermore, the fact that her drinking buddies were all quite a few years younger than she was and therefore able to drink and party more carelessly was one of the reasons why she didn’t direct more of her attention to her increased drinking. Simply put, she was having lots of fun drinking just like everybody else in her group of buddies without much reflection about the unhealthy results of her hazardous drinking.
Yet in the back of her mind she knew that she most likely required alcohol counseling but avoided the thought as much as humanly possible.
Teresa Gets a Physical Examination, Admits Her Drinking to Her Healthcare Practitioner, and Acknowledges Her Dejection
One afternoon during her twelve month physical exam, her healthcare practitioner asked her if she drank alcohol. Not wanting to lie to her physician, Teresa acknowledged that she commonly drinks more than she should. If truth be told, she stated that she regularly drinks in an abusive manner. Then Teresa informed her doctor about her constant negativity. More explicitly, she mentioned that wrecked relationships often elicited a depressing progression of events typified by increased drinking which further resulted in more discouraging feelings that, in turn, resulted in even more drinking. And this is explicitly what happened when her husband and she got divorced nine months ago.
When her healthcare professional heard this, he informed Teresa that according to various alcoholism facts and statistics on alcoholism he was reviewing, alcoholism and depression many times happen in the same person. He then informed her that some of the alcohol statistics, facts, and research investigations he has been reading about also emphasize the fact that individuals who drink in an excessive manner and who also experience depression need to receive treatment for both medical circumstances.
Teresa’s Physician Makes an Appointment for a Psychological Appraisal and For an Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Assessment
Teresa’s healthcare professional then told her the following: “I am not trying to make an unprofessional diagnosis, but with your medical condition we may be dealing with two separate problems. Consequently, I think we need to make an appointment for you to get an alcohol abuse and alcohol addiction assessment from my partner, Dr. Hults, who is an alcohol and drug addiction specialist. Whether your drinking circumstance is more correlated with alcohol addiction or alcohol abuse is unknown, but I feel that further evaluation is warranted. Then I feel we should make an appointment for you to get a psychological exam from another one of my partners, Dr. Schmidt, who is a counseling psychologist. I want to get a better handle on your depression and see how much your depression and drinking are associated.” Teresa displayed her agreement with her healthcare practitioner’s “game plan” and thanked him for his help. Now all she had to do was to try to decrease her drinking and get ready for her appointments.