For example, perhaps you have unresolved issues with trauma, and drugs or alcohol have become a way for you to avoid thinking about the past. Or, maybe most social interactions make you feel anxious, so when you go to parties, you drink to the point where you feel more confident in socializing with others.
Reasons Substance Abusers Struggle With Intimacy
Many people with substance misuse disorders struggle to relate to other people and form close personal bonds. For obvious reasons, problems like childhood sexual abuse, anxiety and depression give rise to strong feelings of shame and guilt that tend to make people withdraw from society. The connection also leads to the urge to self-medicate and sweep those problems under the rug.To make matters worse, many people who have underlying intimacy issues begin relying on drugs and alcohol to self-medicate relatively early in their lives, often in their teens or early 20s. As soon as they begin to form their addictive behavior, it stunts the process of emotional growth that forms the foundation of healthy adult relationships.
Often, those who enter recovery report feeling stuck at the emotional level of however old they were when they first began abusing substances. In other words, someone who began drinking or using drugs in high school will probably have the same emotional maturity as a 16- or 17-year-old until they eventually start their recovery journey and resume the process of growing up.
Others start off with deep-seated intimacy disorders that fuel their substance abuse, which in turn exacerbates their intimacy issues. Either way, for many people, substance abuse and intimacy issues become equal halves of a vicious and destructive cycle.
The Costs of Substance Abuse on Relationships
While addiction takes its toll on every relationship in someone’s life, the hardest-hit relationship is often the one between the drug or alcohol abuser and their spouse or partner. As the addiction escalates, it starts to create an emotional divide between the partners that is challenging to overcome. Worsening alcohol and drug use also leads to more arguments, which can sometimes become violent. In some cases, this tension can create an environment in which the partner with the addiction begins to rely on their substance of choice more and more to reduce stress and avoid having to think about the extent of the problems.There are several telltale signs that drinking, drug use and self-destructive habits by an intimate partner are causing tension within the relationship to the point that drug rehab may be necessary to stop the cycle.
- Drinking or drug use is one of the only activities the partners like to do together.
- Domestic violence sometimes becomes an issue when a partner has been drinking or using drugs.
- One or both partners need to be drunk or high to become sexually intimate or to discuss the problems in their relationship.
- The substance abuser’s drinking or drug use has become the source of many arguments about failure to take care of household responsibilities, lying about where they are going or what they are doing, staying out too late, etc.
- The non-addicted partner has had to make excuses for the drug or alcohol abuser by apologizing to others for their behavior or calling in sick when they are too high or hung over to report to work.
- The partner with the substance misuse disorder drinks or uses drugs to alleviate tension or stress related to household conflict over their substance abuse problems.
