Some people think that boundaries should only apply to strangers or colleagues. That’s not quite right. They’re also invaluable for keeping your relationships with your family and friends healthy. Even though your family probably means a lot to you and you should help them out, it doesn’t automatically mean you should sacrifice all of your plans at the drop of a hat to fix their complicated problems or enable their addiction. Sometimes, saying ‘no’ may be the right thing to do, even if you feel guilty.
Case in point, one anonymous woman opened up online about how she decided to go through with her family holiday trip and boarded the plane, leaving her sister and her three kids behind. The author refused to skip her flight to help out her alcoholic brother-in-law who got banned from flying for his extremely unruly behavior. He is one of hundreds of millions of people around the world who struggle with alcohol use disorders. Scroll down for the full story.
Excessive alcohol consumption and unruly behavior can lead to a person not being allowed to board a plane
Image credits: Eva Darron / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
A woman turned to the internet for advice after sharing how she refused to miss her flight due to her alcoholic brother-in-law's actions
Image credits: Mikhail Nilov / Pexels (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Getty Images / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Ok_Sherbet_2114
7% of the global population lives with alcohol use disorders. Alcohol dependence is a very widespread problem
Excessive alcohol consumption affects a massive part of the global population. The World Health Organization (WHO) states that based on data from 2019, there are around 400 million people aged 15 and over (7% of the world’s population) who live with alcohol use disorders, of whom an estimated 209 million live with alcohol dependence.
According to the WHO, 2.6 million deaths were caused by alcohol consumption back in 2019. 1.6 million of these deaths were from noncommunicable diseases, 700,000 from injuries, and 300,000 from communicable diseases.
Alcohol-related mortality most heavily affects men. Broadly speaking, even low levels of alcohol use can impact your health in a negative way; however, most harm comes from “heavy episodic or heavy continuous alcohol consumption.”
Heavy alcohol use can increase the risk of various liver diseases, heart diseases, and different types of cancer, and lead to serious mental health issues like depression and anxiety. The WHO notes that 4.4% of cancers diagnosed around the world and 401,000 cancer deaths were linked to alcohol consumption. The highest proportion of alcohol-attributable deaths (13%) in 2019 occurred among young people aged 20 to 39.
Aside from the impact on your physical and mental health, alcohol abuse also affects your social life and finances. It can lead to problems in your family and at work, and lead to unemployment.
Younger people are disproportionately negatively affected by alcohol consumption, with the highest proportion (13%) of alcohol-attributable deaths in 2019 occurring among people aged between 20 and 39 years.
The NHS suggests that men and women are not advised to drink more than 14 units of alcohol per week if they want to keep the health risks to a low level. A unit of alcohol is 8 grams or 10 milliliters of pure alcohol. If you’re trying to reduce the amount you drink, it’s best to have several alcohol-free days each week.
Heavy drinkers can often tolerate very high levels of alcohol that would be dangerous to anyone else. Alcoholics can experience strong physical and psychological withdrawal symptoms if they suddenly stop drinking or cut back too quickly. For example, they may become depressed, have difficulty sleeping, hallucinate, sweat excessively, and get tremors in their hands.
Unruly behavior among plane passengers is, unfortunately, a fairly common occurrence
According to the EASA, every 3 hours, the safety of a flight within the European Union is threatened by passengers who are unruly or disruptive. The majority of these incidents (70%) involve aggression. Things can get so out of control that, on average, a plane is forced to do an emergency landing once a month.
Unruly behavior can involve excessive drinking before or during the flight, using illegal substances, being verbally or physically violent, not complying with the cabin crew's instructions, and distracting the crew from their duties.
The story got a lot of attention online and touched on a couple of very sensitive topics, including family boundaries and alcoholism. At the time of writing, the author’s post has 13k upvotes and over 900 comments. Many members of the AITAH online community felt like they wanted to share some advice and support the OP. Unfortunately, we were unable to reach out to the author of the story for further comment because her account got suspended.
The majority of readers felt very strongly that the woman did nothing wrong by sticking to the plan and getting on the plane. From their perspective, it wouldn’t have been right for her to sacrifice her holiday because her brother-in-law, an adult, continues to make very questionable decisions.
This isn’t to say that addiction isn’t serious—in reality, alcoholism is a major problem. However, tolerating consistently disruptive behavior only exacerbates the issue instead of pushing someone to take the steps they need to get sober and take control of their life.
Enabling someone's addiction isn't healthy for you or for them
Sometimes, letting someone deal with the natural consequences of their actions—instead of rushing in to save them—is a lesson they need. Being an enabler isn't a good thing.
Solidarity and empathy are essential parts of living a good life, but you also have to be somewhat practical about where your time and energy are best spent. In short, the woman had to ask herself whether staying behind to help her sister and her kids would have been the right thing to do.
It would have been kind, sure: it’s not the kids’ fault that their father behaves in such a way that he isn’t even allowed to board a plane. That being said, would the woman’s brother-in-law change his behavior after everybody stayed behind for him? Probably not. If alcohol is such a big problem at this point, you probably need the help of a good therapist specializing in addiction, as well as help from a doctor.
As harsh as it might sound, the healthiest thing for everyone may have probably been to get on the flight and go on the trip, leaving the alcoholic man behind. This sends a very strong message about boundaries, mutual respect, and—again—natural consequences. Once he’d sobered up, he could have joined the rest of the family on another flight, bus, or train. But of course, it’s always easier to give out advice than to face such a sensitive situation in person.
Alternatively, the man could use this entire situation as the wake-up call that he needs to overhaul his life. Not next week. Not tomorrow. Now. Not just for his own sake, but also for his spouse, children, and other family members.
What would you have done in this situation, dear readers? Do you think the woman was right to enforce her boundaries and get on the plane? Or should she have stayed behind for the sake of her sister and her kids? Have you ever had a family member who struggled with addiction? Have you ever had issues with excessive drinking? It’s a sensitive topic, but if you feel up for it, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.
Most internet users were on the author's side and thought that she did the right thing by enforcing her boundaries
Not everyone was on the same page, however. Some internet users thought that the woman should have reacted differently
