#A WAKE UP CALL SERIES#
As substance abuse perpetuates, that wake-up call becomes an arrest or a tragic accident.Įventually the frustration from once fighting over how much someone drank last night pales in comparison to the proceeding damage to their health, career, finances, family, child custody, and legal freedom.In the some of the toughest stories, that series of wake-up calls turns into an overdose.Īs the opioid epidemic continues to take a painful toll, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that the rise in opioid abuse has resulted in a 30% increase in emergency room overdose submissions.While we hate to hear situations escalate to life-threatening levels, we can take important lessons from these circumstances about recognizing the signs and acting sooner. Perhaps the next wake-up call means losing a job or a partner. When an addict doesn’t take initiative to change substance abuse habits, the next episode or binge requires even more damage and despair to feel costly, and what we thought was “rock bottom” becomes deeper and darker.Just like the substances themselves, consequences can build numbness, causing a hangover or blackout to lose its sense of alarm. The scary truth about wake-up calls is that we become desensitized to their seriousness as the drinking and using prevail over time and the damages appear repairable.
Wake-up calls in addiction may start seemingly small, but they progress into more dangerous situations. Unfortunately, we often dismiss the warning signs and more manageable wake-up calls, feeling a new sense of surprise and shock each time outcomes get worse. We get a momentary foreshadowing of the troubles ahead if the problem continues. When we’re neglecting to correct an inclination within ourselves or find a solution for a persisting problem, a wake-up call can feel like life’s sudden way of bringing an issue to higher consciousness. Psychology Today defines wake-up calls as an awakening to something one has been ignoring. Consider the following perspective on watching for warnings and responding to wake-up calls. Too often we look back in hindsight and wish we could take those early warning signs more seriously. Whether they come in the form of an injury, threat, or loss, wake-up calls surface as a shattering moment of reality, capturing the nearness and severity of a problem.In situations of substance abuse, a wake-up call can feel like a moment where something meaningful begins crumbling, and the consequences of repeatedly getting drunk or high begin to unfold. Sometimes we reconcile with those wake-up calls as being the result of taking something for granted or running a risk too many times, proving to finally catch up with us.
Maybe that behavior stemmed from a poor attitude, a shortcut in a process, or a bad habit. When people refer to wake-up calls, those events typically mark the culmination of a negative behavior developing over time.
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