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Tag: problematic drinking

  • Ellie Goulding Describes Using Alcohol To Cope With Early Fame

    Ellie Goulding Describes Using Alcohol To Cope With Early Fame

    “I assumed I couldn’t be good enough, smart, funny, or crazy enough to be with certain people without it.”

    Ellie Goulding opened up about the way she used alcohol to cope during the start of her career on a recent episode of Fearne Cotton’s Happy Place podcast.

    “I would say, ‘Right, I’ve got to drink this morning because I’ve got this interview and I don’t really know how to answer the questions, because I don’t really know who I am any more,’” the 32-year-old explained.

    Dealing With Fame

    Goulding rose to fame in 2010 with the release of her debut album, Lights. The album debuted at number one on the UK charts and the “Under the Sheets” singer went from a relative unknown to one of the biggest pop stars across the pond.

    The mounting pressure took its toll on the singer who began to use alcohol to bolster her famous persona.

    “I thought drinking would at least make me a bit more funny, or interesting,” Goulding said. “I had to be a fake person to deal with the surreal situation I was in. I assumed I couldn’t be good enough, smart, funny, or crazy enough to be with certain people without it.”

    While Goulding acknowledges the role that alcohol played in her life at the time, she maintains that she was not addicted to it.

    “I wasn’t an alcoholic,” she said. “I could go months without a drink, too.”

    Panic Attacks & Anxiety

    Goulding has been about the pressures of fame before. In 2017, she penned an essay for Well + Good chronicling the mental health struggles she faced as her fame began to rise.

    “I was thrilled, of course—sharing my music with the world was a dream I’d been working toward for years—but it was a lot all at once,” Goulding writes. “Suddenly I was living alone in London, and everything was happening so fast.”

    The life-altering experience brought on panic attacks for the singer. “The scariest part was it could be triggered by anything,” Goulding writes. “My new life as a pop star certainly wasn’t as glamorous as all my friends from home thought. Secretly I was really struggling physically and emotionally.”

    Goulding shares that the combination of a lack of self-confidence and the intense pressures of her career led to her mental health battles. “I think part of what sparked my panic attacks was not feeling confident enough to believe in myself—I was scared I wasn’t as good of a singer as everyone thought I was,” she writes. “And as the stakes grew, I was afraid of letting everyone, including myself, down.”

    Even performing was a struggle, she revealed, citing her performance at the 2016 Grammy Awards. Eventually, though, Goulding realized that she had to find confidence within herself in order to move forward. “I was annoyed for being paralyzed with nerves every time I was about to perform on television. I told myself that this was exactly where I was supposed to be and if other people believed in me, I had to start believing in myself,” she writes.

     

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • How Teen Drinking May Affect Brain Growth

    How Teen Drinking May Affect Brain Growth

    Researchers investigated whether drinking alcohol during the teen years stunted brain growth.

    Drinking alcohol could stunt brain growth in teenagers and increase their risk for problematic drinking in the long term, according to a recent study. 

    The findings were published in the journal eNeuro. To examine the effects of alcohol on brain development, scientists allowed rhesus macaque monkeys to drink as much as they wanted. They tracked how much the monkeys ate and drank, and used MRIs to measure their brain growth. 

    “Heavy alcohol reduced the rate of brain growth” by 0.25 milliliters per year for every gram of alcohol consumed per kilogram of body weight, the researchers found. Smaller brain volume can be associated with less cognitive abilities, because there are fewer connections in the brain. 

    During the teen years, the brain is rapidly growing and developing, which may explain why teens are particularly vulnerable to the brain-stunting effects of alcohol. 

    “The transition from adolescence to adulthood is associated with brain remodeling in the final stages of developmental growth. It is also a period when a large proportion of this age group engages to binge and heavy alcohol drinking,” study authors wrote.

    The stunted growth could lead to long-term cognitive effects, although further studies would be needed to examine that theory. 

    “This is the age range when the brain is being fine-tuned to fit adult responsibilities. The question is, does alcohol exposure during this age range alter the lifetime learning ability of individuals?” lead author Dr. Tatiana Shnitko said to The Journal. 

    In addition to affecting brain volume, drinking during the teen years also seemed to be associated with heavier drinking later in life in the monkeys that were studied. 

    “Thus, developmental brain volume changes in the span of late adolescence to young adulthood in macaques is altered by excessive alcohol, an insult (the cause of some kind of physical or mental injury) that may be linked to the continuation of heavy drinking throughout later adult life,” they wrote. 

    This indicates that early drinking could lead to lifelong problems in humans’ drinking patterns as well. 

    While not all the effects from monkeys can be extrapolated to humans, studying the effects of alcohol on primates’ brains is a powerful tool for researchers. Study author Christopher Kroenke said that using monkeys allowed researchers to control for factors and focus on the specific effects of alcohol use. 

    “Human studies are based on self-reporting of underage drinkers,” he said. “Our measures pinpoint alcohol drinking with the impaired brain growth.”

    The amount of alcohol that affected brain health would be equivalent to about four beers a day. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Does James Bond Have A Drinking Problem?

    Does James Bond Have A Drinking Problem?

    A new study did a breakdown of James Bond’s drinking behavior to determine if the secret agent has a “severe” and “chronic” relationship with alcohol.

    Over the course of two-dozen films over the past 60 years, James Bond was seen drinking alcohol 109 times—and often engaging in risky behavior when doing so—The Washington Post reports. 

    These numbers come from a recent study conducted by public health experts from the University of Otago in New Zealand, which concluded that Bond had a  “severe” and “chronic” relationship with alcohol and met more than half the criteria for alcohol use disorder. Bond also, according to the researchers, engaged in risky behavior during or after drinking.

    “Chronic risks include frequently drinking prior to fights, driving vehicles (including in chases), high-stakes gambling, operating complex machinery or devices, contact with dangerous animals, extreme athletic performance and sex with enemies, sometimes with guns or knives in the bed,” lead author Nick Wilson said in a statement.

    In Quantum of Solace, researchers noted that Bond drank six Vespers (gin, vodka and a mix of wines), which would have put his blood alcohol level at about .36 grams per deciliter. This, according to researchers, is nearly enough to lead to come, heart failure and death. 

    But Bond topped that in one of the Bond books, in which he had 50 units of alcohol in just one day. According to Wilson, that’s “a level of consumption which would kill nearly everyone.”

    In an email to The Post, Wilson wrote that the films are “very good for studying trends in behaviors such as smoking and drinking” and that “it was also a fun study to do— and the ridiculousness of some of Bond’s actions after drinking helped give the work some scope for a laugh.”

    A 2013 study also examined Bond’s relationship with alcohol in the books, stating that it had him “at high risk of multiple alcohol-related diseases and an early death.’” Researchers also added that his level of funtion “is inconsistent with the physical, mental, and indeed sexual functioning expected from someone drinking this much alcohol.”

    According to authors of the most recent study, Bond’s place of employment should have stepped in.

    “Bond’s workplace (MI6) should be a more responsible employer by referring him to work-funded counseling or psychiatric support services for managing his alcohol use disorder,” authors wrote. “These services should also determine whether he has any post-traumatic stress after killing so many people and having been tortured so often.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Does Climate Affect Alcohol Intake?

    Does Climate Affect Alcohol Intake?

    Researchers investigated whether there was a connection between alcohol intake and climate for a new study.

    Could the climate where you live be leading you to drink more?

    Recent research says yes. 

    According to The Independent, a new study determined that across the country and the world, alcohol intake and related diseases increased as temperatures and hours of sunlight decreased. The study, conducted by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and published in the journal Hepatology, looked at data from 193 countries. 

    Ramon Bataller, the senior author and chief of hepatology at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, says the study is the first to make the connection between climate and alcohol intake and disease. 

    “It’s something that everyone has assumed for decades,” Bataller told The Independent. “Why do people in Russia drink so much? Why in Wisconsin? Everybody assumes that’s because it’s cold. But we could not find a single paper linking climate to alcoholic intake or alcoholic cirrhosis. This is the first study that systematically demonstrates that worldwide and in America, in colder areas and areas with less sun, you have more drinking and more alcoholic cirrhosis.”

    More specifically, the study found that as the hours of sunlight and the average temperature fell, the intake of alcohol per individual, the percentage of the population drinking alcohol, and binge-drinking levels each increased. 

    According to study author Meritxell Ventura-Cots, people living in Ukraine consumed 13.9 liters of alcohol per capita each year in comparison to 6.7 liters in Italy, which has a warmer climate. The same was true in the US, where in Montana the average was 11.7 liters, compared to 7.8 liters in North Carolina.

    Bataller said the results of the study could help officials focus on colder climates and add resources there accordingly. He also, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, said the results could help an individual with a history of family alcohol use disorder to keep the climate in mind when thinking about moving.

    There are a variety of possible explanations for the link, Bataller stated. One is that people who live in colder areas may drink more because it could lead to feeling warmer. In contrast, those who live in warm areas may be more likely to feel light-headed or unwell if they drink.

    Additionally, Bataller said, cold and dark climates can make depression worse for some people, which may lead to alcohol use. 

    Peter McCann, a medical adviser to Castle Craig Hospital in Scotland, told The Independent that these findings mean stricter laws on winter alcohol prices and advertising are justified. 

    “This weather-related alcohol consumption is directly linked to our chances of developing the most dangerous form of liver disease – cirrhosis – which can ultimately end in liver failure and death,” he said. “Stricter laws on alcohol pricing are surely justified when we consider the devastating combined effect of low sunlight and cheaper alcohol on consumption.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Alcohol-Related Deaths Surge Among Women

    Alcohol-Related Deaths Surge Among Women

    A new study revealed that alcohol-related deaths among women have increased substantially from 2007 to 2017.

    Despite being overshadowed by the current opioid epidemic, alcohol kills more people each year than opioids—and it’s hitting women especially hard, with the death rate rising 67% between 2007 and 2017. 

    Lawyer Erika Byrd was 42 when she died in 2011. A few months before her death, after leaving a treatment center, Byrd had lunch with her father and admitted that alcohol had made her into a different person. Though doctors never said alcohol killed her, her father Ron says he knows it did.

    “The death certificate never says alcoholism,” he says. “It said heart arrhythmia and heart valve disease. But nobody in our family had heart problems.”

    According to USA Today, the new statistics come from a recent analysis from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington. The analysis examined alcohol deaths in the 10 years between 2007 and 2017 and found that overall, the death rate increased by 24%.

    However, the numbers when it came to women were especially concerning with the increase of 67%. In contrast, the rate for men increased 29%. According to USA Today, alcohol-related deaths include those caused by cancer, liver cirrhosis, pancreatitis and suicide. 

    Another study published last year in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research supports the idea that alcohol is becoming more problematic among women in particular.

    In the study, researchers examined data from emergency room visits from 2006 to 2014 and found that there was a significant increase among middle-aged women when it came to visits related to acute and chronic alcohol use. 

    According to New York City attorney and author Lisa Smith, who has been in recovery for 10 years, alcohol is a growing issue but isn’t being treated as such.

    “It is poison, and we’re treating it like it’s something other than that because there‘s big corporate money behind it,” she told USA Today. “A lot of people are getting really rich on something that is toxic to us.”

    Ali Mokdad, a professor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, tells USA Today that there are often differences in problem drinking for men and women. In particular, he points out that women often begin drinking casually as a way to de-stress after the workday and the problem builds from there. 

    Stefanie Wilder-Taylor, an author and podcast host, agrees. “Moms just aren’t going to call home and say they’re stopping for a couple drinks after work with friends or going to the gym to unwind,” she tells USA Today. Instead, she says, they will drink at home while preparing dinner or relaxing.

    This was the case for Amy Durham, who nearly died from her drinking six years ago, at the age of 40. Durham was taken to the hospital with triple organ failure and ended up in a coma for more than a week. Afterward, she was on dialysis and placed on a liver transplant list. 

    Now, she has been in recovery for six years and works in the field, using her own story to reduce the stigma for women.

    “I want to show the world what recovery looks like, especially for women where stigma is still the way it is,” Durham says. “I want people to know there is hope.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Frankie Grande Celebrates Sober Milestone

    Frankie Grande Celebrates Sober Milestone

    “I discovered that the path to the light was not in drowning my sorrows, but in facing them head on… in sobriety.”

    Following the one-year anniversary of the horrific Manchester Arena bombing at the Ariana Grande concert on May 22, 2017, the pop star and the people close to her have opened up about how they have coped in the aftermath of the horrific attack that killed 22 people.

    The pop star’s brother, Frankie Grande, a singer, dancer and YouTube personality, penned a heartfelt letter that he shared with People magazine, in which he described the pain and trauma that the attack caused, not only on the victims themselves, but on him and his family.

    In his letter, he shares that he is now one-year sober, a decision he made after falling into a “very dark place” that he tried masking with drugs and alcohol.

    “Today I am one year sober… and the gratitude that I feel in the face of this milestone is measureless. After the tragic events of Manchester, with the senseless loss of life and fear that came from knowing my family was unsafe and that I was completely powerless to protect them, I went to a very dark place with no tools to handle the feelings that came along with the devastation of the attack. I tried to pull myself out of the darkness by drinking and abusing prescribed drugs as I had done in the past for so many other reasons… but that only made the hole that I was trying to crawl out of even deeper.”

    The 35-year-old Broadway performer went on to describe how his previous party-centric life had “turned into a nightmare where I never felt more alone.” This went on until Frankie finally reached a point where “living was just too painful” and decided to seek help.

    Since then, life has been different for Frankie. “I am here today because with that help I discovered that the path to the light was not in drowning my sorrows, but in facing them head on… in sobriety,” he wrote.

    His letter went on to inspire and encourage anyone to have hope, despite whatever personal hell they might be going through. “In fact, you can become STRONGER than you ever thought possible,” Frankie wrote. The performer said he’s never been happier with his decision to be sober.

    “This decision to be sober is a lifetime decision. I live without needing a drink or a drug to change the way I feel or perceive my circumstances and outcomes,” he wrote. “I have repaired relationships I previously thought unsalvageable and I am living my best TRUEST life.”

    At the end of his letter, Frankie lists a number of resources that may help somebody who is struggling: Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous, SAMHSA, and the Suicide Prevention Hotline.

    In a recent post on Twitter, Frankie thanked his sister Ariana Grande for giving him strength and supporting his recovery.

    Last month, the 24-year-old pop singer shared how she’s been coping with the trauma of the Manchester bombing.

    “Music is supposed to be the safest thing in the world. I think that’s why it’s still so heavy on my heart every single day,” she said at the time. “I wish there was more that I could fix. You think with time it’ll become easier to talk about. Or you’ll make peace with it. But every day I wait for that peace to come and it’s still very painful.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Chef David Chang Talks Mental Health, Anthony Bourdain

    Chef David Chang Talks Mental Health, Anthony Bourdain

    “Sometimes I don’t even realize I am in a state of depression because it’s gotten so clever as to how I can’t even recognize it… Every day is a battle.”

    Chef David Chang dedicated the newest episode of his podcast The Dave Chang Show to honor the late Anthony Bourdain. The New York City chef, the host of the Netflix series Ugly Delicious known for his Momofuku restaurants, discusses his own battles with mental health, and the steps he’s taken to address his own issues.

    The chef said he knew he needed help back in college, but did not feel comfortable with the idea. “I needed to see a professional because I was in despair. And I have had bouts of despair since high school. But I was just told to suck it up. I was told that that’s embarrassing,” he said.

    Mental illness evolves with time, Chang said, and is a daily struggle. “After a 15-year-plus battle of it, [my mental illness] is an incredibly complex organism that is smarter than I am half the time,” he said. “Sometimes I don’t even realize I am in a state of depression because it’s gotten so clever as to how I can’t even recognize it. It is constantly morphing and evolving. Every day is a battle.”

    Opening Momofuku Noodle Bar in New York City in 2004 became his “vehicle to fight depression.” The massive undertaking kept the young chef busy after experiencing the worst of his depression in 2003.

    Alcohol didn’t help the situation. “Along the way, drinking really fucked me up,” said Chang. “I had a hard time communicating. I had a hard time dealing with the stress. I had a hard time with impostor syndrome, I still do.”

    He sought help with a mental health professional around the same time, and after a few “false starts,” he settled on a psychiatrist that he’s been seeing since 2003.

    He said that being able to talk through his problems is the “genuine benefit” of therapy. Though he himself had trouble opening up in the first few sessions, out of embarrassment, he still went back.

    Chang acknowledged that there are many paths to recovery. “You cannot assume that what works for some person will ever work for another. There is not just a universal standard for depression or neuroses or any other kind of mental disorder, because we are each completely unique individuals. We all experience the world independently and uniquely,” he said.

    Chang said he hopes that through conversation and dialogue, he will help others shed the embarrassment of dealing with a mental illness.

    “We all need help, even those of us that think that everything is going great. It’s so hard to ask for help. And more specifically it’s really hard to find that help,” he said. “I thought the best way to honor Tony would be to talk about my own struggles with depression… If it makes any of you feel a little bit better for seeking help for your own struggles, then it was worth it. I think it was what Tony would want me to do.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Simon Pegg On Past Drinking Struggles: "I Was Profoundly Unhappy"

    Simon Pegg On Past Drinking Struggles: "I Was Profoundly Unhappy"

    The actor recently revealed that a past battle with depression led him to self-medicate with alcohol.

    English actor and comedian Simon Pegg has had a busy year, appearing in Steven Spielberg’s sci-fi adventure Ready Player One, among others, and gearing up for the release of Mission: Impossible—Fallout.

    The prolific actor, screenwriter and producer is generally private about his personal life, but shared in a recent interview that he, like many others, struggled with depression and a drinking problem.

    “I was depressed. I had always been susceptible to it. But at the same time as I started to ascend into what would conventionally be regarded as a success, I was going down,” he told Empire magazine.

    The success of his TV and film career did not translate to happiness. “The more material success presented itself to me, the less I could understand why it wasn’t fulfilling me in any way. It wasn’t that it wasn’t [fulfilling] me, it was because I was depressed. It’s not a mood. It’s a condition,” he said.

    Drinking became a crutch, but that didn’t last. “I just drank more heavily… Eventually I crashed out. At Comic-Con in 2010—I’ve never told anyone this—we were promoting (the 2011 sci-fi film) Paul and I sort of went missing for about four days. I got back to the UK and just checked myself in somewhere.”

    That eventually led to the decision to put the bottle down. “I got well in 2010. I stopped drinking,” said the Shaun of the Dead actor. “I got a little bit of help. If you look at (the 2010 comedy) Burke and Hare, I’m bloated and fucking dead-eyed… I look at it now and think, ‘Fuck me, I was in a dark place then.’ I was drunk a lot of the time and I was profoundly unhappy.”

    Pegg credits the crew working on the Mission Impossible series, in which he has played the recurring role of Benji Dunn since 2006, with helping pull him out of his depression. “They took care of me and it helped me to get out of this dark place and realize that life was enjoyable,” he said. “By the time I finished Ghost Protocol (the 2011 Mission: Impossible film), I was better.”

    The next Mission: Impossible—Fallout is due for release on July 28.

    Pegg discussed the meaning of happiness in 2014 with the Los Angeles Times, while promoting his latest film at the time Hector and the Search for Happiness.

    “It’s taken a while for me to get there; it’s taken me a while to understand what it is, how to be it. My own route to it has been an interesting one, and I think the one thing the movie says very clearly is that you can’t be happy unless you’ve experienced every facet of emotion that there is,” he said. “To know what happiness is you have to be able to pick it out from the forest of emotions. So you have to be scared and upset and miserable. You have to get all that stuff in order to truly be happy. And at 44, I think I’m there.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • David Cassidy Revealed He Was Still Drinking, Didn't Have Dementia Prior To Death

    David Cassidy Revealed He Was Still Drinking, Didn't Have Dementia Prior To Death

    Cassidy made the confession to a producer in a recorded conversation, which will air as part of an upcoming documentary about his life.

    Last year, Partridge Family star David Cassidy announced that he was suffering from dementia. But just two months before he died last November, Cassidy admitted that he never had dementia, but was struggling with alcoholism throughout the end of his life. 

    “There is no sign of me having dementia at this stage of my life. It was complete alcohol poisoning,” Cassidy explained to A&E producer Saralena Weinfield in a recorded conversation that is now part of a documentary called David Cassidy: The Last Session, which will air on June 11. 

    According to People, Cassidy went on: “The fact is that I lied about my drinking,” he said. “I did this to myself to cover up the sadness and the emptiness.”

    It was no secret that Cassidy battled alcoholism. He was arrested for driving under the influence three times in five years. However, after he went to inpatient rehab in 2014 he told friends and family that he was sober. 

    “If I take another drink, I’m going to die, physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. I’m dead,” Cassidy told Piers Morgan during an interview following that rehab stay. “You know, they say it’s a slippery slope… It’s not a slippery slope. It’s from 12:00 to 6:00 on the clock and the whole face is ice. One sip, one drink, because there is no such thing, not to an alcoholic. You have one and you’re done. I’d be done.”

    In 2017, footage of Cassidy during a live performance appeared to show that he was drunk. It was after that performance that he said he was suffering from a major medical issue—dementia. 

    However, just before his death Cassidy revealed that this was never the case. 

    “I have a liver disease,” he told Weinfield after he was rushed to the hospital after falling. Two months later Cassidy died of organ failure at the age of 67. Not even his two children knew that he was still problematically drinking alcohol, according to People. However, not everyone was shocked. 

    “Part of alcoholism is lying,” Partridge Family costar Danny Bonaduce said. “When you’re an addict, you know you can’t be honest with people. You say what you want them to hear. I can’t be mad at David for that, but it’s still a tragedy.”

    Ultimately, documentary producers said that they decided to use the confession because they felt that Cassidy wanted it made public. 

    “He wanted to share this very private part of his life, and to be honest once and for all. And I think he succeeded in doing that,” said producer John Marks. 

    View the original article at thefix.com