Alcoholism On The Whole Family Analysis

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The consequences of alcohol consumption can be severe, especially for the poor. Alcoholics spend all of the money they have to sustain their addiction, and in return can cause their family to face extreme consequences such as not being able to afford clothes, rent, or even food. Alcoholics do whatever they can to get their hands on alcohol, while their family is doing whatever they can to survive. In The Glass Castle, Rex Walls serves as an example of how alcoholism can have serious financial consequences and severely affect a family. Alcoholism is defined as an addiction to the consumption of alcohol, or the mental illness and compulsive behavior resulting from dependency on alcohol. Alcohol abuse and alcoholism can impact your financial …show more content…
Family members can become so poor as an outcome of living with an alcoholic that they can't even afford the basic necessities such as food. The article How Alcoholism Affects the Whole Family states that “The alcoholic may be unable to hold a job, because drinking has become the most important thing in his or her life.” This suggests that the alcoholic will have no money left over to spend on their family who is in need. This also means that families won't have food on their plates everyday of the week and in the worst case not at all. The Walls are an example of the worst case because half-way through the book when Jeannette “...looked in the refrigerator. There was nothing inside but a half-gone stick of margarine.” (Walls 68) This shows how poor the family actually is from the actions of Rex. The kids are eating margarine because they are so hungry and it’s literally the only thing they have left. This ultimately affects the family fatally because of their deficiency of food which is a follow-up of Rex’s alcohol addiction. In The Glass Castle, Rex Walls serves as an example of how alcoholism can have critical financial consequences and severely affect a family. As mentioned in the beginning, alcoholics can have an extreme impact on their family and finances. Therefore, living with an alcoholic can lead to things going downhill for not only the individual, but for the people they live with. Rex Walls is a perfect example of how alcoholism can have dreadful effects on a family. Rex Walls makes it nearly infeasible for his family to make it by in

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