A kid is adopted from an alcoholic family. Would kid’s risk of alcoholism be less if bio dad had abstained?
Posted by adminJul 31
My girlfriend read a study that says if a parent was ever an alcoholic, then that parent’s child has an increased probability of becoming an alcoholic. We agree on this but have drawn differnt conclusions from it. (I’m a former alcoholic, sober since 1997). I raised a hypothetical question: Suppose I, a former alcoholic, put my kid up for adoption. Now assume instead, I had abstained from alcohol for life, and put my kid up for adoption. Would my kid be less at risk of developing alcoholism in the second scenario? I think not, my girlfriend thinks so. That is, I think that once I was born with a genetic (lets say 60%) likelihood of developing alcoholism, I would be no more or less likely to pass that on to my offspring, whether or not I had abstained from alcohol (in our scenario the child is raised away from me so that environmental cues don’t play a role). She thinks, that even if the child was raised apart, the kids risk of alcoholism is higher in the first scenario? Help!
5 comments
Comment by bud the hippie on 07/31/2010 at 9:47 pm
a child born to alcholic parents even if put up for adoption still has the addictive tendencies, I know I’m the product of alchol ic parents
Comment by just your average guy on 07/31/2010 at 10:34 pm
The question is how long after birth does the child live with the drunk father. Like in feral children, babies are at the ideal age of learning things and when they see their father coming home drunk every day u think he doesn;t understand but in reality he is affected psychologically. There is nothing to do with genes or heredity in this. take some one from a completely non alcoholic family and put him up with alcoholic parents and he develops the traits of alcoholism very quickly.
The mind of a child through out his childhood is at optimum for learning. He loves to imitate the older people, thus if u come in drunk that picture will always remain in his mind that one day he might also want to feel drunk just like you did once.
The words “you” used through out the above passage have absolutely no reference to any individual but insteead is to everybody and nobody
Ciao
Comment by CHARLZ!! on 07/31/2010 at 10:34 pm
not always. it might be less influenced because its dad has been abstained but a person can choose which way they want to go
Comment by ambivalently26 on 07/31/2010 at 11:09 pm
Dr. Drew always says that if one or both of the parents are addicts, the child has a 50% chance of inheriting the gene, adopted or not. However, a child raised in a healthy environment would have less need to turn to drugs and alcohol to cope with emotional problems…abstaining from alcohol doesn’t mean you don’t have the addiction gene.
Comment by sonobear on 07/31/2010 at 11:37 pm
Not only is there possibly an inherited family tendancy for certain behaviours, alcoholism presumeably included, but new research indicates that what has previously been called rubbish DNA includes ‘switchable’ ( my word – don’t know the real one!) DNA.
It appears possible that environmental factors can switch on and switch off these DNA segments. So environmental factors such as exposure to poisons ( including alcohol), food availability and nourishment, diseases and even extreme anxiety seem likely to have an effect on future offspring. Possibly for many generations.
So I would say that yes, the adopted offspring of an alcoholic parent would have a greater tendancy to abuse alcohol than if the parent had not been alcoholic. Luckily however, we have free will unlike animals and someone who knows they have a higher chance of abusing alcohol can choose not to be exposed to it.
Full respect to you for beating the addiction, it is a hard road but well worth travelling down. Sure beats the alternatives……