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Here comes the winter “Holidaze”
By Michelle Harman
UAS Counselor
Get ready for
turkey, beer, and football games. It’s November and Thanksgiving
is nearing. Many students look forward to home-cooked meals and
seeing family and friends, not to mention having a break from the
pressure of college. It’s a time to kick back and have fun,
at least for a couple days. There’s no such thing as too much
football in our house at Thanksgiving; yet we all know how too much
turkey can make us feel. But what about “too much” beer…or
wine…or partying? Holidays are likely times for doing too much
of anything, especially drinking booze. It’s easy to end up
binge-drinking over the holidays, especially if that’s how
students are used to “partying.”
What is binge drinking anyway? Isn’t it a normal
part of the college experience? According to FACTS ON TAP, “…
many people use alcohol to help themselves relax in social situations,
…but most people don’t drink heavily. There are only a
few people who really get trashed at parties, lose control, embarrass
themselves or endanger their lives.”
So maybe it is a myth that binge drinking in college
is the common experience.
Often, students who binge-drink will surround themselves
with others who drink to get wasted, and compared to their friends,
they don’t seem like a binge drinker. It’s hard for binge
drinkers to imagine that social drinkers don’t get drunk. Why
drink if not for the effect? There are degrees of effect from booze.
Some people can get a gentle buzz without getting drunk. They pace
themselves at one drink an hour and keep their BAC the same. They
eat before or with drinking, and can stop themselves when they want
to stop. They don’t get caught up in the passion to get wasted.
But don’t college binge drinkers “grow out
of it” once they graduate? I guess some do. Some students can
drink heavily and never suffer legal, academic, or relationship
problems. Once their social environment changes, they can adapt
their drinking. But some students come into college with these habits
in place from their teen years, and continue to surround themselves
with other’s who party the same way. Heavy drinking in college
can ultimately lead some people to full blown alcoholism after college.
Old habits are hard to break. (FACTS ON TAP) Alcohol use is different
from alcohol abuse. Some people can drink and it doesn’t affect
their lives, some can’t.
Counseling is available to all students of UAS at no
cost. To make an appointment with the counselor, Michele Harman,
call 465-1298.
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