Adult Children of Alcoholics: How We Help Save The World

By Lisa A. Romano

I have been wounded by the lingering effects of alcoholism.

As the grandchild of alcoholics, I understand first hand what it feels like to be raised by denial based Adult Children of Alcoholics who suffer from emotional amnesia.

Both of my parents were emotionally and physically neglected as children. Their emotions were never acknowledged when they were little. Because my grandparents were usually inebriated or sleeping their stupors off, my parents emotional selves suffered. As a result, my parents sadly suffered a separation from self. Because my parents never learned to honor self, they did not know how to nurture me or encourage my sense of self. In fact, when I was a child and I dared express an emotion, my parents did all they could to disempower me. Although I was a child full of emotions, I was aware that expressing what I felt was not approved of. Looking to please my parents in the hopes of feeling like maybe I was enough, I learned to suppress my emotions, and in turn, like my parents, became alienated from my own self.

Over a decade ago my life hit rock bottom. With my marriage in ruins and my physical health fading, I entered therapy only to be told that all of my life's problems were related to my childhood. Turns out that all those emotions my parents tried to control me into not expressing, needed to surface in order for me to heal.

Unaware at the time, I believed wholeheartedly that my life was ending. What I didn't understand way back then, was that my life was actually just beginning.

It is has been over a decade since I learned to embrace the fact that my life had been effected by the alcoholism of my maternal grandparents. Because I lived in a dry home, it was not easy for me to spot what might have been wrong. My house 'looked' so normal, I assumed I was the problem.

In the years since my recovery journey began, I have leaned to believe that being an ACoA is a gift.

Because I am an ACoA, I have had that rock bottom moment that has helped stir my awakening.

Because I am an ACoA, I have been fortunate enough to have learned to unearth that which was suppressed so long ago.

The masses of mankind are asleep--unaware that they are victims of society's vices. Most men do not know they are enslaved. But we ACoA know better. Because we allowed ourselves to feel enslaved, we also learned to allow ourselves to seek for answers to our solutions within, and to stop giving up our personal power to things outside of us.

As recovering ACoA's we are learning to accept self and in turn--others. Most people don't 'get it'. They never look within, search for peace on a heart level, or embrace the concept of releasing the ego. And so, society carries on under the illusions of materialism, social classes, and conditioned belief systems. The masses have been duped.

You--like me, probably learned the hard way. You learned that you could not control people by guilting them, pleading with them, deceiving them or by playing the victim. You learned that what goes around comes around--eventually, and that trying to fix people to gain acceptance, or to control the level of someone else's need to keep us around, does not guarantee a sense of true gratification.

Luckily I have reached the promised land. I have learned to embrace the child within, and to nurture my being through mothering my own self. I no longer judge my feelings, or speak negatively towards my self in my own mind. I have learned to forgive my grandparents, and my parents, because I understand they were victims of a dark age.

As an ACoA in 2013 I am so very blessed. From online information, to CODA meetings, to self help books, recovery is at my disposal. In this new age of enlightenment, it is cool to honor self, to feel connected to all that is and to believe in the power of my own mind.

If you are an ACoA, your healing helps save the world, because as you heal, and as you spread your good news about recovery, you are a beacon to others that need help out of darkness. As you expand your personal awareness of self, you offer others the only thing that can ever save this world. You offer your fellow man--HOPE.

Lisa A. Romano
Bestselling Author/Speaker/Healer
Lisa is the author of the books The Road Back To Me, Healing From Within, and My Road--Beyond the Codependent Divorce.

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