Teresa was a forty-five-year-old insurance agent who knew that she had some drinking issues. For example, within the past month she has felt the need to have a drink or two before going to work, four months ago she failed to pass a random urine alcohol test where she works, five weeks ago she got stopped by the police for a DWI, and finally, for going on six months she has started to fail to remember what she says and does when she goes out drinking with her friends.

Like hosts of other people, Teresa’s experiences with alcohol began gradually and stayed at this speed for quite a long time due to the fact once in a “blue moon” she engaged in intermittent social drinking. In truth, for about four years, every time she drank, she made sure to drink in moderation. Something about her drinking behavior, nevertheless, seemed to completely change when she got divorced.

So She Can Come to Terms With the Divorce of Her Husband With Less Grief, Teresa Came to the Conclusion That She Will Start Hanging Around More Repeatedly With Some of Her Pals Who Love to Have Fun and Drink

Teresa got exceedingly “down” about the loss of her husband, and as a way to refrain from dwelling on her negative emotions she determined that she would start hanging around more often with some of her buddies who love to have fun and drink.

Quite forthrightly, Teresa believed that having fun almost every day by partying and drinking with her pals would help her get beyond the divorce of her husband with less grief.

Teresa’s Drinking Escalates Significantly the More Habitually She Goes to Private Parties, Family Get-Togethers, Dinner Dates, Sporting Events, and Happy Hours With Her Buddies

It didn’t take long, however, before her drinking escalated to a significant degree the more routinely she went to and drank at family get-togethers, sporting events, happy hours, dinner dates, and private parties with her pals. Moreover, the fact that her drinking friends were all quite a few years younger than she was and therefore able to drink and party more thoughtlessly was one of the reasons that she didn’t concentrate more on her increased drinking. In a word, she was drinking and having fun just like everyone else in her group of friends without much forethought about the negative effects of her hazardous and irresponsible drinking.

Yet somewhere in her awareness she knew that she probably needed alcohol counseling but stayed away from the thought as much as possible.

Teresa Gets a Physical Examination, Discloses the Facts About Her Excessive Drinking to Her Healthcare Practitioner, and Discloses the Truth About Her Depression

One afternoon during her annual physical, her doctor asked her if she drank alcohol. Not wanting to lie to her healthcare practitioner, Teresa acknowledged that she regularly drinks more than she should. In fact, she said that she commonly drinks in a hazardous manner. Then Teresa told her healthcare professional about her sadness. More specifically, she stated that shattered relationships usually elicited a negative cycle of events characterized by increased drinking which further resulted in more discouraging feelings that, in turn, led to more drinking. And this is explicitly what happened when she and her husband got divorced three months ago.

When her doctor heard this, he told Teresa that according to various facts and statistics on alcoholism he has been exploring, alcoholism and depression routinely arise in the same person. He then told Teresa that some of the alcohol statistics, facts, and research investigations he has been reading about also underscore the fact that people who drink in a hazardous and abusive manner and who also experience depression need to get treatment for both medical circumstances.

Teresa’s Healthcare Practitioner Schedules an Appointment for a Psychological Assessment and For an Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Evaluation

Teresa’s healthcare professional then told her the following: “I am not trying to make an impulsive analysis, but with your medical condition we may be facing two separate problems. As a consequence, I think we should make an appointment for you to get an alcohol abuse and alcoholism assessment from my partner, Dr. Warner, who is a substance abuse and chemical dependency specialist. Whether your drinking circumstance is more related to alcoholism or alcohol abuse is not clear at this time, but I think that further exploration is needed. Then I feel we probably should schedule an appointment for you to get a psychological exam from another one of my partners, Dr. Myers, who is a clinical psychologist. I want to get a better understanding about your pessimism and see how much your drinking and depression are interrelated.” Teresa displayed her agreement with her healthcare practitioner’s strategy and thanked him for his time and assistance. Now all she had to do was to try to cut back on her drinking and get ready for her appointments.

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