Should a recovering alcoholic drink non-alcoholic beer?


Written on October 15, 2009 – 2:00 pm | by Drug Abuse Help

Hi, my father is an alcoholic who has been dry for 20 years. Recently he had a relapse and began heavily abusing the prescription drug Ativan, which is like Valium or Xanax.
He lied to our family for a long time about abusing the Ativan and recently came out with it. He has stopped taking it but hasn’t shown any signs of improvement, he has depression and anxiety disorder and continues to never exercise, eat only chips and candy, and be a huge jerk to the family.
He started drinking nonalcoholic beer around the same time he started taking the Ativan. He has continued to drink the nonalcoholic beer, usually one a day but sometimes up to three a day.
Is this okay? It makes me really uncomfortable, and the other day after he had two nonalcoholic beers his eyes were all red and it scared me. If this is not something he should be doing, what can I do about it? Anytime you mention the Ativan or the beer he gets angry and tries to blame it on others.

2 Responses to “Should a recovering alcoholic drink non-alcoholic beer?”

  1. Helen_W_ said:

    Oct 15, 09 at 1:53 am

    Non alcoholic beer contains an extremely small amount of alcohol–about the same amount as a container of orange juice that has sat in the fridge for a couple of days! Your father is NOT getting drunk by drinking it.

    The ativan is another matter. It appears that your father has become addicted to that. He is not "in recovery" at this point, he is a practicing an addiction to prescription drugs–actually a very common addiction these days.

    I am going to provide you a link which might help you (and him, if he is interested in possibly changing his behavior):

    http://www.smartrecovery.org/

  2. Mariam said:

    Oct 15, 09 at 4:24 am

    Eating the correct food is crucial for your health. You can try supplementing your diet with acai berry, it’s not solely a widely tested and acknowledged weight loss product, it’s a superfood too. There’s a risk free trial offered at http://forath.beststardiet.info I’ve been taking it for 2 weeks now and it’s definately working!!

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