WORLD> America
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WORLD> America
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US women are drinking more, DUIs are up
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-08-07 16:02 In the Chicago suburb of Wheaton, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's daughter was stopped by police after she pulled away from a McDonald's with three of her kids in the car. She pleaded guilty to drunken driving and was sentenced to 18 months of court supervision. Sgt. Glen Williams of the Creve Coeur, Mo., police department recalls stopping a suspected drunken driver on her way to pick up two preschoolers. Sometime later, "she told me it actually changed her life, getting arrested," he said. "She was forced to get help and realized she'd had a problem." The increase in arrests comes as women are drinking excessively more than in the past. One federal study found that the number of women who reported abusing alcohol (having at least four drinks in a day) rose from 1.5 percent to 2.6 percent over the 10-year period that ended in 2002. For women ages 30 to 44, Schuler's age group, the number more than doubled, from 1.5 percent to 3.3 percent. The problem has caught the attention of the federal government. The Transportation Department's annual crackdown on drunken driving, which begins later this month, will focus on women. "There's the impression out there that drunk driving is strictly a male issue, and it is certainly not the case," said Rae Tyson, spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. "There are a number of parts of the country where, in fact, the majority of impaired drivers involved in fatal crashes are female." Schuler's relatives have denied she was an alcoholic and said they were shocked to learn of her drug and alcohol use before the July 26 crash. The wreck, about 35 miles north of New York City, killed Schuler, her 2-year-old daughter, her three nieces and three men in an oncoming SUV she hit with her minivan. Schuler's 5-year-old son survived his injuries. Schuler, a cable company executive, could have had a drinking problem that her family didn't know about, said Elaine Ducharme, a psychologist in Connecticut who has seen more excessive drinking, overeating, smoking and drug abuse during the recession. Unlike men, women tend to drink at home and alone, which allows them to conceal a problem more easily. Because of this, they seek treatment less often than men, and when they do, it is at a later stage, often when something catastrophic has already happened, said Dr. Petros Levounis, director of the Addiction Institute of New York at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center. "Our society has taught us that women have an extra burden to be the perfect mothers and perfect wives and perfect daughters and perfect everything," Levounis said. "They tend to go to great lengths to keep everything intact from an external viewpoint while internally, they are in ruins." In the current recession, women's incomes have become more important because so many men have lost their jobs, experts say. Men are helping out more at home, but working mothers still have the bulk of the child rearing responsibilities. "Because of that, they have a bigger burden then most men do," said clinical psychologist Carol Goldman. "We have to look at the pressures on women these days. They have to be the supermom." And just becoming a parent doesn't mean people will stop using drugs or alcohol, Ducharme said: "If you have a real addictive personality, just having a child isn't going to make the difference."
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