Am I identifying as an alcoholic for attention?

There are roughly 7 billion more effective and pleasant ways of getting attention than identifying as an alcoholic.

Scene from the classic 1998 film “Can’t Hardly Wait”

Hi Katie,

I recently came to the conclusion that I am an alcoholic. There wasn’t a huge incident that precipitated the realization, just a few bad nights, and reflecting on my long history of binge/blackout drinking. I’ve only told a handful of family and friends, but I’ve been surprised by their skeptical reactions. It’s making me wonder: am I just identifying as an alcoholic for attention?

Sincerely,

ATTN

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Content note: This post mentions eating disorders, self-harm, and suicidal ideation

Hi ATTN,

Thanks for writing, and good for you for taking the time to reflect on your relationship with alcohol.

You have a long history of blackout drinking and recent “bad” boozy nights—if you’ve concluded that there’s a compulsive, uncontrolled aspect to your drinking that’s interfering with your life, I believe you came by that realization honestly. Whether or not you call it alcoholism, alcohol use disorder, or Pringles Syndrome (once you pop, you just can’t stop*), doesn’t really matter. Nor do you owe anyone a justification or explanation for why you’ve reached this conclusion.

So, no, I don’t believe you’re identifying as an alcoholic “for attention,” but it’s worth considering what it would mean if you were. What would be the goal? You’re an alcoholic—what now? Your family and friends are a little more thoughtful when you’re at an event where there’s going to be drinking? Suddenly, there are cans of Diet Coke in the cooler? You get pats on the back as long as you don’t pick up a drink? Playing the alcoholic card in a bid for attention seems like a long way to go for relatively minor and superficial rewards.

It’s also a really ineffective way of getting that attention. I got more attention than I ever wanted when I was drinking—almost all of which was a huge pain in the ass. Many alcoholics of my ilk end up drinking alone in hopes of avoiding the kind of attention that comes with being an inebriated hurricane of chaos and bad ideas.

Sure, people congratulated me when I got sober, but it didn’t feel like a reward for accomplishing something difficult. It felt like people were happy that I stopped voluntarily playing tug of war with a Grizzly bear.

Your question hit on something I’ve thought about a lot over the years—our societal understanding of doing something authentically versus seeking attention. Years ago, I wrote an essay (edited by the great Sari Botton, who recently republished it in Memoirland) about the last days of my drinking. In it, I explain that I was admitted to the ER with a BAC that should’ve killed me and some questionable items (like a boxcutter) in my purse. Unsurprisingly, this landed me on suicide watch:

Everyone who spoke to me in the hospital was either certain I had been trying to kill myself or certain I was making a desperate, pathetic cry for attention. I could not tell them which of these things was accurate because I did not myself know. Now, over 10 years later, I still don’t.

When your brain has been soggy with alcohol for months or even years at a time, it can be hard to revisit your motivations with the hindsight of sobriety. What do I remember thinking before I landed in the emergency room that day? Jlsiduierifut8yeiuhkldjshflk.

But I do remember the emotional outline of how I felt. Did I seriously want to die? Or was I simply unable to express how scared I was of the addiction that had taken over my body, how tired I was of the endless quest to numb my depression and self-loathing, how sickened I was by the selfishness and victimhood that I clung to like a life raft because they were the only motivating forces at my disposal? In other words, was I trying to bring attention to how much pain I was in, or was I in so much pain that I truly wanted to die?

And at that point, is there really a difference?

When I was growing up, a common response to girls who might have an eating disorder or kids who were engaging in self-harm was that they were doing it for attention. The implication was that these were not genuine symptoms of an underlying condition, but rather that kids were merely acting out the symptoms in a craven attempt to garner attention from parents or peers¹.

Well before the dawn of social media, “attention” was already a hot commodity—a goal in and of itself. In my experience, if people thought you wanted attention, it automatically meant you weren’t deserving of it. Ignore the boy calling you mean names; he’s just looking for attention. Josie still isn’t eating? Don’t say anything; she just wants attention.

When whispers went around school about a kid who was doing something “for attention,” I don’t remember anyone ever asking why. Why might that person need or want attention? Maybe Josie doesn’t have an eating disorder, but meal restriction is not typically a fun or pain-free process; what is she trying to express that she’s otherwise unable to say? Or maybe she does have an eating disorder, but it doesn’t look like what people expect.

Your family and friends probably have a specific idea of what an alcoholic is, and they may think you don’t meet all of their arbitrary criteria. That’s fine. You don’t need to correct them if they’re wrong or provide them with justification for why you’re right. You can call yourself an alcoholic around them or not. None of it changes the facts on the ground.

The only question that matters is this: Now that you’ve identified as an alcoholic, what are you going to do about it?

*Pringles, please don’t sue me; I’m a fan—your chips are good, and I used to make bongs out of the packaging.

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I’m not a doctor or mental health professional, so my advice shouldn’t be construed as medical or therapeutic. You are free to take or leave it.

1

Adults’ attitudes to self harm ‘discourage young people from getting help’: ‘see me’ campaign is addressing stigma to improve support in mental illness.” Paediatric Nursing, vol. 18, no. 3, Apr. 2006, p. 5.