A Domestic Dilemma Dealing with Alcoholism

The folllowing sample essay on A Domestic Dilemma discusses it in detail, offering basic facts and pros and cons associated with it. To read the essay’s introduction, body and conclusion, scroll down.

This fiction addresses such problems as what would the neighbors think, what would people at the office say, how safe are the children around their mother when she is drunk, and what can Martin do to help his wife and their marriage. This story is about the dilemma or decisions Martin feels forced to make dealing with alcoholism.

Alcoholism can cause families to face difficult decisions In their lives and the abuse of alcohol usually goes undetected until It Is too late. In this story, Martin Is trying to understand how Emily alcohol abuse started;He himself had always enjoyed a good drink. When they were still In Alabama they had served long drinks or cocktails as a matter of course.

For years they had drunk on or two?possibly three drinks before dinner, and at bedtime a long nightcap.

Evenings before holidays they might get a buzz on, might even become a little tight. But alcohol had never seemed a problem to him… (66-67). Muscles writes about the abuse of alcohol and how it causes domestic violence, child abuse or neglect and an emotional strain on the family as a whole. Dealing with a loved one’s alcohol abuse can be emotionally draining and that causes domestic violence to accelerate; “There were times of unexplainable malevolence, times when the alcoholic fuse caused an explosion of unseemly anger” (Muscles 67).

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How a Husband Deals with His Wife’s Alcohol Abuse

Martin is trying to keep his life stable and picture perfect in everyone’s eyes. Hiding the fact that Emily drank, he went as far as hiring a maid, at a costly price, to manage the household. But the strong denial or rationalization of Emily abusing alcohol made It extremely difficult for Martin to help her: “l haven’t the vaguest idea what you mean. Unless you are referring to the glass I used for a spot of hurry’ (Muscles 66). Thus, after he hired a maid, Emily then started to hide her drinking.

Before Martin knew it, the drinking was out of control and the violence started. Martin was yelling at Emily up in the bedroom about her drinking and how sick he was about it and how bad it was for the family as a whole. The arguing continued down in the kitchen, when Emily appeared, now yelling in front of the children. Confrontation and yelling is a sign of domestic violence that can escalate into greater, more Intense violence, and the children are the ones who suffer the cost. Alcoholism does not only affect the person drinking.

It affects the entire family. Child abuse and neglect Is much more common when there Is alcohol abuse In the family. Muscles shows that Email’s drinking caused her to neglect her children’s DSSSL needs In ten quest Tort more alcohol . When Marten came none en Tuna t children’s toys were left outside, only breakfast seemed to have been fed to the children, and the children were unsupervised in the living room playing with cords and plugs while Emily was upstairs drinking. The story makes it seem as though the hillier have been alone since Emily served them breakfast and mistakenly put cayenne on the toast instead of cinnamon.

“l like to have burnt up,” Andy said, “Drank water and ran outdoors and opened my mouth” (Muscles 65). Neglecting others’ needs for the need to drink is only part of the problem of alcoholism. Child abuse happens more often when alcohol is involved, some-times unintentionally by the user. Then there was an accident. Coming home from work one evening about a year ago, he was greeted with screams from the children’s room.

He found Emily holding he baby, wet and naked from her bath. The baby had been dropped, her frail skull striking the table edge, so that a thread of blood was soaking into the gossamer hair. Emily was sobbing and intoxicated. (67) Martin seems to be carrying a lot of pain and concern for his wife, his Job, his family and his life in general. Emily is hiding loneliness and depression by drinking.

Alcoholism was causing a distressing strain on them both. The strain was becoming overwhelming and children were being affected by it. Emily drinking causes an enormous emotional strain on Martin. He feels obligated to cover up her drinking, and finds it hard to deal with Emily problem of depression. The inner emotional strain of it all causes him to hate his wife.

Martin anticipated his own embarrassment, wondering if the others at the office could possibly suspect. He felt that his secretary had divined the trouble long ago and pitied him. He suffered a moment of rebellion against his fate; he hated his wife (69-70). His thinking becomes consumed with his own anger. He starts to ponder the fate of his future and the fate of his children and all looked ghastly.

He even envisions his children dead. Life decisions were being made in haste and out of anger all because of Emily alcohol abuse. Alcoholism can cause families to face difficult decisions. Muscles places Martin in a dilemma, a patrolled dimension of hate and love for Emily and what he was going to do about the alcoholism. This story takes place in the sass’s when there was neither any program for alcohol abuse, nor the want to advertise that there might be an abuse problem in your family.

As far as Martin was concerned he was alone and he alone would have to come up with the solution to this problem. Muscles shows that Emily has the classic signs of Alcoholism: People who are dependent on alcohol spend a great deal of time drinking alcohol and they have memory lapses (blackouts) after drinking episodes. “Did I make a scene? Oh, Martin, did I make a scene before the children” (Muscles 69)? Two minutes prior to saying that Emily was kneeling on the floor talking to her son. Alcoholism changed Emily from a simple, Joyful woman, to a lonely, depressed individual. At the end of the story Martin in sorrow and love looks at his wife as a different person.

For the first time that evening he looked at his wife” (Muscles 71). “By moonlight he watched his wife for the last time” (Muscles 71). He says goodbye to the women he married, the naturally simple women, the mother of his beautiful children and the person he loves and started looking at his wife in a new way, as an alcoholic. “A Domestic Dilemma” Day Carson Muscles snows ten consequences, suffering Ana neglect that can come from alcohol abuse. Because of the alcoholism, Martin sacrifices his love for Emily and their marriage for the best interest of himself and his children.