Alcohol Abuse At Work

Alcohol is prominent in all regions of the United States. It doesn’t take much of a search to see alcohol or alcoholic advertisements in the stores, the marketplace, on billboards, and on the television. Alcohol is just about everywhere. It almost seems sometimes that more people drink alcohol than don’t.

A common thing among our friends and family members is to go get a drink at lunch time or after work. For someone who may be addicted that is trying to curb their use or stop altogether, this may be a challenging thing. Sometimes it is just a matter of a coworker asking “Want to go get a drink after work?” and before the addicted one knows it, it’s after one a.m. and the bar is closing.

Maybe their weekly schedule consists of a couple of drinks after work and then a few more at the house for a nightcap. They wake up and repeat the whole cycle again, day after day. Then maybe the day comes when they drink before work, at lunch time and after work or at home or they call in sick so that they may sit at home and drink all day.

To some, this may be surprising but actually it is more common than one might think. In fact, many people live everyday with a drink nearby, whether it is in their hand or waiting for them in the tavern around the corner or down the street.

There are many obvious reasons not to abuse alcohol, but especially while at work. When drinking at work and depending on your occupation many things can happen under the influence of alcohol. You can become a threat to other people’s physical welfare, especially if you’re drunk when operating machinery, or drinking and driving to and from work.

In this day and age, the smell of alcohol on ones breath at work is cause for termination. Many people who abuse alcohol at work may find themselves losing one job after another especially if they have a drinking problem. No matter how hard they try to not drink during working hours, the idea of a beer, whiskey sour or the bottle they brought to work with them and have hidden in the desk drawer or glove box may be just too hard to turn down.

One of the definitive ways to separate the non-alcoholic from the alcoholic is to see if the person can drink one drink at, say, lunchtime and not drink again for the rest of the day, week or month. For the alcoholic, a drink at lunchtime is usually just the beginning of a binge that will end them up drunk by bedtime. Some alcoholics may be able to curb their craving for a day, maybe two or three, but it will usually be short lived. More than likely they will find themselves once again drinking during working hours, threatening their own life and those around them by their drinking problem and inebriated state of mind.

There are harsh consequences to alcohol abuse at work. Many people have killed themselves, or been killed by people under the influence of alcohol while at work. The best case scenario for someone who drinks at work is termination. But this means they are only biding their time if they continue to drink while at work. Something worse is bound to happen. Every time a person drinks at work, they are taking one step closer to disaster and no one is able to predict when that disastrous time may come.

If you or someone you know has a drinking problem and is abusing alcohol at work or at home, assist them in finding the appropriate help and call an alcohol treatment program today.