22 |
drinkanddrugsnews
| 7 February 2011
Alcohol |
BME services
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com
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LIVES
With alcohol services already the poor relation in
terms of funding, Asian women drinkers are among
the hidden groups that aren’t getting the specialist
help they need, says Vic Motune
T
he statistics speak for themselves. A third of women in the UK
drink more than the recommended daily guidelines of two to
three units a day – equivalent to a couple of small (125ml)
glasses of wine, according to the NHS Information Centre’s 2009
Statistics on alcohol report. And 6 per cent of the country’s
women drink at ‘at risk’ levels – more than 35 units per week.
Whether it’s teenage girls binge drinking illicitly, women in
their 20s and 30s drinking as part of their busy social lives and careers, or women
who drink to cope with stress at home or work, alcohol has become a greater part
of women’s lives over the past 50 years. Unlike some societies around the world,
it’s rare in the UK to hear of women who drink being condemned as bad mothers
or undesirable marriage prospects. Unless, that is, you happen to be from one of
the Asian communities in cities such as London, Birmingham or Leicester.
Five years ago, Jas (not her real name), from west London was studying law at
university when her Sikh parents, who came to Britain from the Punjab in the
1960s, told her that they had found a husband for her from their home village.
‘Despite my wanting to continue studying and have a career, it hadn’t
occurred to them that I would have an opinion or might not actually want to get
married,’ she says. ‘My parents talked to his parents and everything was
decided. I did agree to go along with it as I respected my parents and didn’t want
to upset them, but when I realised that marriage was not what I wanted at that
stage of my life, I just got more and more unhappy. When I did raise some
doubts, my mother in particular made me feel guilty, implying that if I didn’t go
ahead with it, it would bring shame on the family. She told me she wouldn't be
able to walk the streets. Keeping your parents happy can sometimes mean you
end up ruining your own happiness.’
Jas’s way of dealing with that unhappiness was to turn to alcohol. At first it was
one or two glasses of wine a few times a week, but it quickly became larger
amounts to help her deal with the stress and depression she was feeling. Over a
period of several months she managed to keep it hidden from her parents and
other members of her extended family, drinking mostly on her own while studying
late at night. But realising her drinking had escalated to several bottles a week,
she decided she needed help and plucked up the courage to ring a local
counselling service. It wasn’t a great success.
‘I had one counselling session, but it was clear that she didn’t have that much
helpful advice to give me,’ she says. ‘She said she’d never spoken to any Asian people
before and kept saying how unusual a person like me was. It really put me off.’
Desperate for help, she got in touch with a student counsellor at her university, and
was able to talk in confidence and get help from a specialist alcohol treatment service.
Research into alcohol and tobacco consumption among young people from
minority ethnic groups in the East Midlands, by Martyn Denscombe and Nicky
Drucquer of De Montfort University, found that the percentage of regular drinkers
among Sikh and Hindu women rose significantly between 1990 and 1997.
Professional careers, greater opportunities for study and travel, and financial
independence, have meant many more young British Asian women are interacting
with people from other backgrounds who drink alcohol. But despite these social
changes, women who drink or who find themselves in situations where they are
dependent on alcohol are seen as a threat to family honour (‘izzat’), which in turn
impacts on a woman’s willingness to seek help if it’s needed, either from her family
or from treatment services.
According to a 2003 policy briefing by the YWCA, alcohol misuse among Asian
women is often linked to other problems. The briefing, Sobering thoughts: young
women and alcohol concluded: ‘Statistics regarding Asian women’s drink problems
are often likely to miss women who do not access services or who are unlikely to
disclose the fact that they have a problem. If an Asian woman is drinking, this often
may be linked to some other problems she is concerned about and therefore a dual
diagnosis approach may be necessary to uncover issues like domestic violence,
mental health or family issues, intergenerational issues, arranged marriage, and
cultural conflict. For drinking mothers, the fear of losing their children if they involve
professionals in their lives is great. This is compounded by the everyday experience
of racism and leaves them feeling powerless.’
In a bid to provide support for this hidden group of drinkers, EACH (Ethnic
Alcohol and Counselling Hounslow, Harrow and Brent), a support service which
provides culturally specific information about the dangers of alcohol and drug
misuse, recently received funding from the Department of Health to run a tier 4
residential rehabilitation service for black and minority ethnic (BME) alcohol and
substance misusers in the area.
‘If you’re in London, and you need to attend a rehabilitation centre to help
tackle alcohol misuse issues, you’re more likely to be sent away to somewhere like
Bournemouth,’ explains EACH’s Lakhvir Randhawa. ‘Quite often the rehabilitation
centres are out in the countryside, which is fine, but it may not necessarily be
where you want to go if you are a woman and especially if your support networks
and roots are in the local community.
‘A lot of women from BME communities want to remain at home where they
have access to family care, to the mosque or simple things like hair care and food
and not have to face questions from other family members, such as why are they
going away? Or why are they leaving their children? To be seen to be going away,
leaving the family and the community behind for six months, may actually create a
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