5 Ways Your Drinking Can Affect Your Kids

This post is brought to you by SAHM in collaboration with DrinkWise and is the second in a two-part series. Read the first installment here.

In Australia, drinking is just a part of the everyday, and regular (even extreme) drinking is a relatively normal and accepted part of our culture.

In fact, you’ve probably never put that much thought into your own drinking habits, but if you’re a parent you should have.

Why?

Because what you’re doing right now is having an effect on the type of adult that your child will grow in to. Even when they’re very young, children are always watching and learning from the adults around them. This is a necessary part of their own development, but that doesn’t mean that everything they’re learning is good for them. There are things, things you might not even realise you are doing, that are shaping your child for the future. We don’t want our kids to have an unhealthy relationship with alcohol, but with our own behaviour we might be ensuring it.

1. You Drink After Work

They Think Alcohol Is Needed To Relax

In popular culture and the media it is considered the norm to enjoy a drink after a long day at work. Whether it is a beer or a glass of wine, most people don’t think there’s anything wrong with having a drink at the end of the day. But if you have kids you need to consider the lesson that they’re learning from this habitual and often automatic type of drinking: alcohol helps people unwind. In reality, there are a number of different things that help people to relax, and alcohol is one of the most unhealthy options. Every time you walk in the door after work and gravitate straight to alcohol, your child is subconsciously learning that only with alcohol is it possible to unwind and relax.

2. You Glorify Intoxication

They Think Being Drunk Is Cool And Accepted

You might think there’s nothing wrong with having a laugh at someone when they’ve had a few too many, or boasting to your mates about how sloshed you got on the weekend. The problem is, when your kid listen to this they associate something incredibly unhealthy – such as getting intoxicated – with being accepted by friends, being funny and being cool. In reality, drinking to the point of intoxication is seriously unhealthy and quite dangerous. Drunken people aren’t able to make good decisions, and often get involved in unsavoury situations. They’re also at a greater risk of personal injury simply because they aren’t in their right mind. Kids shouldn’t be learning that getting drunk is cool or acceptable. Drinking in moderation should always be encouraged over drinking to excess.

3. You Drink At Social Gatherings

They Think There’s No Fun Without Alcohol

Think for a moment about the last social gathering you went to. It might have been a dinner party, a BBQ or even a birthday. Now try and think of the last social gathering you went to in which absolutely no alcohol was available. Can you remember one instance where that happened? Often unintentionally, social gatherings are seen as a chance to kick back with a few drinks. But as your children watch you drink at these gatherings, they are learning that no gathering can be complete or fun without the addition of alcohol. Kids should be aware that it’s possible to socialise and have fun without drinking. This understanding will help them in the future with the peer pressure of drinking to fit in.

4. You Don’t Have Friends That Don’t Drink

They Think Drinking Is A Must

Drinking is such a common part of the Australian social fabric that it seems more unusual to meet someone that doesn’t drink than it is to meet people that do. In fact, how many people can you think of in your social network that don’t drink at all? Excluding pregnant women, it’s exceedingly rare to meet people that consciously choose not to drink. As a result your child is rarely in the company of people who exist in a world without alcohol. For parents, this is definitely a situation to avoid. If the only adults that your child sees are those that drink on a regular basis, they’re likely to assume that drinking regularly is a normal part of being an adult. A healthy relationship with alcohol means that you drink in moderation, or perhaps not at all, and are accepted by those around you.

5. You Don’t Practice What You Preach

They Think You’re Insincere

Consistency is key when talking to your kids about drinking, but you also need to have consistency in your behaviour. If you talk to your children about responsible drinking, but then don’t practice it, or warn them about the dangers of getting drunk, only to brag about it with your friends, your message is essentially unheard. In order to get your children to understand that alcohol is always an option and not a necessity, you need to live your own lesson. The thing to remember is that even if you aren’t talking, your actions often speak louder than anything you say. Parents often lament that their children cannot control their own alcohol consumption, not realising that their own behaviours over the years made that state seem entirely acceptable. Think about what you will say, and how you will act, very carefully.

Children are sponges. They absorb everything that is happening around them, from what people say to what they do, and then apply it to their own existence. It can be hard to create an environment where children only see people who have healthy relationships with alcohol, but it is necessary to help them through the challenges of being a teen under pressure.

The potential dangers of teen drinking are broad, and it is amazing how much difference you can make straight from the beginning.

Have you read part one in our two-part series in collaboration with DrinkWise? Find it here