Back in the late 1960s there wasn’t a lot of information about alcohol effecting the development of a fetus, but after little Abby was born Sharon and her husband Ron knew that something wasn’t right with the child. The little girl displayed some abnormal facial features.

She had small eyes for one thing, and she didn’t grow they way they expected. As she got a little older, other problems began to surface. She was slow, had poor vision and a heart murmur. These were all signs of retardation, but their pediatrician could not put a name to it.

It wasn’t until the early 1970′s that the term Fetal Alcohol Syndrome was introduced and recognized. At least one of three major criteria for Fetal Alcohol Syndrome must be present in order for a diagnosis of the condition to be made. The first area is growth retardation before and after birth. The second centers on abnormal facial features, such as a smaller head, smaller eyes, a flattened bridge of the nose and a shorter nose.

Also apparent can be a flattening of the vertical groove of the area between the upper lip and nose. Lastly, there is evidence of abnormal neonatal behavior, mental retardation or evidence of other abnormal neuro-behavioral development. What makes the diagnosis difficult is that any of these features can be seen apart from any alcohol exposure.

Aside from the examination of the child, it is helpful for the physician to have an understanding of the mother’s drinking habits. In Sharon’s case, there was no discussion of her drinking, and no cause of the problem was ever diagnosed. If a physician is familiar with a mother’s alcohol abuse, the diagnosis is more easily deduced.

Researchers have found that heavy alcohol abuse throughout a pregnancy is the most damaging factor. Also binge drinking during pregnancy is potentially damaging.

Making the diagnosis more difficult is the fact that not all babies of drinking mothers will have developmental difficulties. According to a 2004 article by R.J. Floyd and J.S. Sidhu entitled “Monitoring Prenatal Alcohol Exposure,” in the American Journal of Medical Genetics, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome occurrences range from approximately .02 per thousand births to as many as 1.5 per thousand. It is difficult to estimate the numbers among women who abuse alcohol, because it is difficult to diagnose what is alcohol abuse.

In Sharon’s case, the fact of her alcoholism was hidden. While some of her friends might have suspected alcoholism, there was never a diagnosis. The developmental problems with the little girl took their toll on Sharon, whose alcoholism eventually got in the way of everyday life and finally she sought help.

During her recovery from the disease, Sharon was faced with the knowledge that her drinking was a factor, giving her another layer of guilt and remorse to work through. The problems that her daughter had were probably avoidable.

In the nearly 40 years since then, there have been so many advances in medical knowledge about Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and mothers have access to far more immediate information and counsel. Potential mothers are well advised to understand the risks of using alcohol during pregnancy.

Ned Wicker is the Addictions and Alcoholism Recovery Chaplain at Waukesha Memorial Hospital Lawrence Center He author’s a website for addiction support:

Alcoholism-Support.org or Alcoholism Symptoms

Arguments are pervasive, and violence or even incest may play a part. Children in alcoholic families tolerate harm as intense as soldiers receive in battle; they also bear the trauma like an millstone throughout their lives.
Not only is the experience destructive, it’s frequent, says Stephanie Brown, founder of the Alcohol Clinic at Stanford Medical Center, where she devised the developmental model of alcohol recovery. 76 million Americans (approximately 45 percent of the U.S. population) have been exposed to alcoholism in the family unit in one way or another, and an estimated 26.8 million of them are children. “These children are more at risk for alcoholism and other drug abuse than are children of non-alcoholics, and more at risk of marrying an alcoholic as well.”
Getting the better of the legacy of a parent’s alcoholism can be hard partly since there is a long history of denial. “The family is dominated by the presence and denial of alcoholism, which becomes a major family secret,” says Brown, now director of the Addictions Institute in Menlo Park, California. The secret becomes a dominant principle required to keep the family unit together, the foundation for coping strategies and mutual beliefs, without which the family unit might crumble.
Claudia Black, a leading expert on grownup children of alcoholics and writer of It Will Never Happen to Me, says these children grow up with three dangerous rules: don’t trust, don’t feel, and don’t talk. Since alcohol-dependent parents are so self-involved, they forget birthdays and other important events, providing their children with the sense that they can have trust in no one. Since the parents impose so a great deal of hurt on their families, they teach their children to bottle up their emotions just to exist. Alcoholic parents often have angry or fierce outbursts that (combined with the drinking itself) they end up denying, and children in such a household may believe the illusion, themselves. Since the children are instilled to deny the reality around them, they acquire a resistance to discussing urgent, crucial, or important facets of life.
Brown adds that children of alcoholics might suffer depression, anxiety, and obsessions, all related to the punishing experience of growing up in such a household. Addressing the legacy of disruption means addressing the traumatic stress, she states that. First and foremost, adult children of alcoholics “have issues with control.” That means they are afraid of others and have problems with intimacy; they harbor anxiety that if they lose control, they may become addicts themselves.
The most crucial emotional leap for such a survivor: sorting out the past from the present. They need to recognize that when they overreact to something now, “they are really feeling pain from the past.” As soon as they have that skill, they can begin to progress.
Brown advocates psychotherapy for grownup children of alcoholics, and states that group therapy could work exceedingly well. “When family distortion is the problem, groups are ideal for bringing that out.” Brown particularly recommends looking for support from Adult Children of Alcoholics World Service Organization or Co-Dependents Anonymous, which provide 12-step programs. If a group is unavailable, individual psychotherapy, family therapy, and even psychopharmacology can be helpful..

The Signs

Thirteen characteristics of adult children of alcoholics Janet Geringer Woititz, widely recognized as the founder of the Adult Children of Alcoholics movement, lists 13 traits to look out for.

These people:

• Can only guess what normal behavior is
• Have trouble following a project from beginning to end
• Lie when they could easily tell the truth
• Mercilessly judge themselves
• Have difficulty enjoying themselves
• Take themselves too seriously
• Have trouble with close relationships
• Overreact to change when they have no control
• Constantly look for approval and affirmation
• Usually feel that they’re dissimilar to other people
• Are either too responsible or too irresponsible.
• Are highly loyal, even if loyalty is undeserved
• Are impulsive.

They tend to act without giving serious consideration to alternate behaviors or the consequences of their actions. This impulsiveness leads to mental confusion, self-loathing and loss of control over their environment and they spend an excessive amount of energy accounting for their actions.