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iors, the COA become aware that home is not a safe place. Often COA are likened to survivors of a war zone. Family life is inconsistent and arbitrary.
Faced with a progressively deteriorating situation, children of normal intelligence and feelings develop unhealthy ways of coping with the alcoholic’s crazy behavior. They learn to deny their feelings and to shrug off disappointments. They learn to judge themselves poorly and to feel isolated and alone. They feel guilty and responsible for the irrational turmoil around them. In detaching from their true feelings, the COA learn three damaging lessons: Don’t talk, don’t trust, don’t feel.
These are a few of the characteristics that otherwise normal COA acquire, and like all children they carry lessons learned in their homes into adult life.
Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACOA) do not shed their compulsive traits merely by growing up. Like»all of us, they tend to apply the fundamental lessons learned in childhood to their adult lives; usually with predictable, negative results. They continue to feel isolated and to see themselves as victims. At least half become chemically dependent themselves and many marry alcoholics.
Their low self-esteem continues and they tend to be “people-pleasers” to gain acceptance. Outwardly,
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