In many cas­es, the part­ner with­out the addic­tion may feel neglect­ed, lost, or even over­whelmed by the respon­si­bil­i­ties of sup­port­ing a loved one while cop­ing with their emo­tion­al pain. Cou­ples ther­a­py can pro­vide an envi­ron­ment to explore these feel­ings and work towards solu­tions togeth­er. Engag­ing in treat­ment as a unit can facil­i­tate a col­lec­tive approach to recov­ery and rela­tion­ship rebuild­ing. When part­ners express their feel­ings using “I‑statements,” such as “I feel hurt when you pri­or­i­tize your amphet­a­mine addic­tion treat­ment sub­stance use over our time togeth­er,” it min­i­mizes blame and encour­ages a more sup­port­ive atmosphere.

Financial strain

At Pos­i­tive Sobri­ety Insti­tute, our com­pre­hen­sive and high­ly effec­tive treat­ment guides you on the path to a health­i­er rela­tion­ship with your­self and the ones you love. Our coun­sel­ing team of licensed psy­chi­a­trists, psy­chol­o­gists, fam­i­ly ther­a­pists, and social work­ers pro­vide indi­vid­u­al­ized care that fits your needs. At PSI’s out­pa­tient treat­ment in Chica­go, IL, our team will pro­vide guid­ance sup­port to both you and your loved ones as you recov­er from alco­hol depen­dence and restore your rela­tion­ships. Many indi­vid­u­als with alco­hol addic­tion need exter­nal treat­ment and sup­ports to find sobri­ety and address harm that may be relat­ed to alco­hol and rela­tion­ships in their life. Alco­hol can erode trust, increase con­flict, cre­ate emo­tion­al dis­tance, and lead to finan­cial strain, all of which weak­en the bond between partners.

• Research shows that alco­hol is involved in about 55% of domes­tic abuse cas­es, high­light­ing a seri­ous con­nec­tion between drink­ing and violence.
• Alco­hol ruins rela­tion­ships because exces­sive use impairs judg­ment and deci­sion-mak­ing abil­i­ties, which may lead to bad deci­sions and impul­sive acts that can be detri­men­tal to the rela­tion­ship and put both part­ners’ health in jeopardy.
• Alco­holism can cre­ate a hos­tile envi­ron­ment in the home that trig­gers con­flict, ten­sion, and dysfunction.

Trust and Communication Issues

It’s impor­tant to com­mu­ni­cate and mutu­al­ly agree upon guide­lines regard­ing alco­hol con­sump­tion, social sit­u­a­tions, and behav­ior. When one or both part­ners reg­u­lar­ly con­sume alco­hol, trust may become com­pro­mised due to var­i­ous rea­sons. Exces­sive drink­ing can lead to errat­ic behav­ior, unre­li­a­bil­i­ty, and poor deci­sion-mak­ing, which can erode trust over time.

• Aside from phys­i­cal and men­tal abuse, alco­hol addic­tion has oth­er, sig­nif­i­cant con­se­quences for relationships.
• Heal­ing rela­tion­ships can take time, so be patient with your­self and your loved ones.
• It’s always hard­er to rebuild trust than it was to gain it in the first place, and in some cas­es, affect­ed loved ones may decline attempts at amends.
• Lov­ing an addict can be dif­fi­cult; how­ev­er, under­stand­ing the effects of sub­stance abuse can help fam­i­ly and friends pro­vide an envi­ron­ment of sup­port, empa­thy, and patience.
• It is esti­mat­ed that 70.5 mil­lion adults in the Unit­ed States strug­gle with sub­stance abuse.
• Alco­hol can have a sig­nif­i­cant impact on rela­tion­ships, affect­ing var­i­ous aspects of com­mu­ni­ca­tion, emo­tion­al inti­ma­cy, and con­flict resolution.

Can alcohol change a person?

If you’re not sure if you have a prob­lem or if drink­ing is a prob­lem in a rela­tion­ship, you can take our free alco­hol addic­tion self-assess­ment. Recov­er­ing addicts often face com­plex rela­tion­ship dynam­ics that can sig­nif­i­cant­ly impact their recov­ery jour­ney. The process of heal­ing isn’t just about elim­i­nat­ing sub­stance use; it requires atten­tion to the qual­i­ty of rela­tion­ships sur­round­ing the indi­vid­ual. Open com­mu­ni­ca­tion and rebuild­ing trust are nec­es­sary to con­front these chal­lenges. Part­ners need to artic­u­late their feel­ings and estab­lish clear bound­aries to nav­i­gate the emo­tion­al tur­moil effectively.

Drink­ing can take away the time and desire for sex and even lead to sex­u­al dys­func­tion. To reduce report­ing bias, we strict­ly adhered to the anonymi­ty and con­fi­den­tial­i­ty of the sur­vey. Addi­tion­al­ly, some items were scored using reverse scor​ing​.At the end of the sur­vey, res­i­dents who com­plet­ed the ques­tion­naire received a cash prize of a spe­cif­ic ran­dom­ized amount (￥10, ￥15, or ￥20). Sub­stance abuse and men­tal health are often inter­con­nect­ed, with each con­di­tion height­en­ing the other.

Research shows that social sup­port can sig­nif­i­cant­ly pre­dict addic­tive behav­iors, such as sub­stance abuse 7 and inter­net addic­tion 8. When peo­ple lack suf­fi­cient social sup­port in real life, they may turn to the inter­net to seek help in meet­ing their psy­cho­log­i­cal needs 11. In addi­tion, a meta-analy­sis of 92 stud­ies on smart­phone addic­tion in main­land Chi­na showed a sig­nif­i­cant neg­a­tive cor­re­la­tion between social sup­port and smart­phone addic­tion. 12 Pre­vi­ous research has shown that social sup­port is close­ly relat­ed to smart­phone addic­tion, but the under­ly­ing path­ways have not yet been ful­ly revealed.

A friend or part­ner may con­stant­ly hear rea­sons for being late, dis­ap­pear­ing or mood swings. Sec­ond­ly, we used the Wilcox­on rank sum test and Kruskal-Wal­lis test to com­pare the dif­fer­ences in the sociode­mo­graph­ic char­ac­ter­is­tics of smart­phone users. Third, we test­ed the rela­tion­ships between vari­ables through Spear­man cor­re­la­tion analysis.

Alcohol and domestic violence

• Now think how many of them occurred when one or both of you were under the influ­ence of alcohol.
• If you or your part­ner are strug­gling with alco­hol addic­tion, seek­ing treat­ment from a spe­cial­ized facil­i­ty can pro­vide the nec­es­sary support.
• A 2013 study found that of the 52 peo­ple who par­tic­i­pat­ed, over 34 of them (that’s more than 60%) not­ed that sub­stance use was a fac­tor for separation.
• As pre­vi­ous­ly indi­cat­ed, the rela­tion­ship and the issues with­in it need to be thor­ough­ly addressed – if they aren’t, then con­flict will con­tin­ue, and the like­li­hood of a relapse increases.
• At Pos­i­tive Sobri­ety Insti­tute, our com­pre­hen­sive and high­ly effec­tive treat­ment guides you on the path to a health­i­er rela­tion­ship with your­self and the ones you love.

This cre­ates an unhealthy and poten­tial­ly dan­ger­ous envi­ron­ment for their loved ones. In some cas­es, alco­hol-relat­ed chal­lenges in rela­tion­ships may require the assis­tance of a pro­fes­sion­al. Seek­ing help from a ther­a­pist or coun­selor who spe­cial­izes in addic­tion and rela­tion­ship issues can be ben­e­fi­cial. These pro­fes­sion­als can pro­vide guid­ance, sup­port, and tools to help nav­i­gate the com­plex­i­ties of alco­hol’s impact on the rela­tion­ship. Under­stand­ing the impact of alco­hol on trust and infi­deli­ty is cru­cial for main­tain­ing a healthy and thriv­ing rela­tion­ship. By rec­og­niz­ing the poten­tial risks and active­ly address­ing them, cou­ples can work towards fos­ter­ing a strong foun­da­tion built on trust, hon­esty, and open communication.

Cre­at­ing these bound­aries allows the indi­vid­ual strug­gling with addic­tion to take account­abil­i­ty for their actions while also pro­tect­ing the emo­tion­al well-being of the non-addict­ed part­ner. By set­ting lim­its, both part­ners can work towards a health­i­er dynam­ic that pro­motes recov­ery instead of per­pet­u­at­ing the cycle of addic­tion. Main­tain­ing per­son­al well-being is cru­cial; sup­port sys­tems, whether friends or pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tions like SAMHSA’s Nation­al Helpline, can pro­vide essen­tial resources.

It’s impor­tant to rec­og­nize these chal­lenges and active­ly work on open and hon­est com­mu­ni­ca­tion when alco­hol is involved. Fam­i­ly owned and oper­at­ed since 2014, Infi­nite Recov­ery was found­ed by Michael & Ylian­na Dadashi to give those strug­gling with addic­tion a sec­ond chance and help to rebuild their lives. Clean and sober since 2009, Michael is pas­sion­ate about help­ing oth­ers dis­cov­er their authen­tic self and live a life of true free­dom and pur­pose. Peaks Recov­ery is licensed to pro­vide the high­est lev­el of inpa­tient and res­i­den­tial pro­gram­ming in Col­orado. In addi­tion to sat­is­fy­ing state cri­te­ria, we have fur­ther received the high­est recog­ni­tion from the Amer­i­can Soci­ety of Addic­tion Med­i­cine (ASAM) for our 3.7 and 3.5 lev­els of care.

Although social sup­port is an exter­nal envi­ron­men­tal fac­tor, there is evi­dence that the social envi­ron­ment impacts the devel­op­ment of neur­al net­works, there­by affect­ing indi­vid­u­als’ emo­tion­al man­age­ment and behav­ioral inhi­bi­tion 13, 14. Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, social sup­port char­ac­ter­ized by emo­tion­al, infor­ma­tion­al, or instru­men­tal help is regard­ed as a pro­tec­tive fac­tor against neg­a­tive emo­tions 15. Pre­vi­ous research has shown that social sup­port can sig­nif­i­cant­ly pre­dict neg­a­tive emotions.