Brenda Drinking

Sunday was pretty much a bummer of a day. Diane didn’t sleep well and was all upset about a telephone conversation with her sister, Brenda.

I mentioned about accompanying my brother while he donates bone marrow. It turns out that the dates coincide with the "Visit" from Brenda and family. – I put "Visit" in capital letters because it is the annual event that is not to be messed with. Brenda is supposed to arrive on Saturday and I would have to leave Tuesday. I would miss the last 1 1/2 days of their stay.

So Diane calls her sister to let her know. Her first mistake was to call in the afternoon. Brenda usually starts drinking about noon and you don’t want to do anything to set her off after about 3:00pm. Sometimes she’s not too bad but it’s hit or miss. Well we got a big miss this time. I won’t elaborate on all the details but Brenda kept hollering about how important this "Visit" is. She’s complaining about how she only gets to see us once a year, blah, blah…. She and Diane are raising their voices at each other (it’s on the speaker phone). Finally Brenda says "call us sometime and let us know when a good time to come is".

So, we called my brother back and explained how "The Visit" is important and I asked him to see if someone else can accompany him. I told him that I would do it if no-one else could.

Then Diane calls her sister to give her the news. This time the conversation is an all-out yelling contest. I don’t even know what they said to each other but Diane asked her a couple times if she had been drinking. (The answer was obvious).  After less than 2 minutes Brenda hangs up on Diane.

Diane is really torn up over the exchange. She keeps going over it in her mind and asking herself how it could have turned out different. I should never have agreed to accompany Scott. She should never call Brenda after lunch. Etc… All of this is just working around the problem which is that Brenda is an alcoholic and needs to do something about her problem.

I should mention that it was Brenda’s sons’ 16th birthday. Quite a memory for him! He’s mentioned it many times that he wishes she wouldn’t drink so much.

She tends to get mean to people. Usually it’s her husband or their son. Sometimes it’s her mom. Othertimes it has been her daughter or her sister. She has never been excessively mean to me (just a little pissy).

The next morning their mother calls me and we talked for over an hour. She was visiting Brenda that evening so she got to hear all about the conversation. It ruined their evening and the birthday "celebration" too. She has tried to confront Brenda about the drinking but she’s not very skilled at approaching people and Brenda is not receptive. It always turns into a fight. It doesn’t help that she drinks every day too and seems to encourage it at times.

I have never confronted Brenda about her drinking but I have decided that I need to. I’m even considering arranging a family intervention meeting. Anyone know any good resources for this? 

I have always enjoyed her company but that is now changing and she needs to know it.