Eyewitness News' Anne Marie Tiernon recently sat down with a suburban mom — a very successful businesswoman — to discuss what happened when she lost control of her consumption.
Claudia Braman says it was such a gradual transition, she isn't quite sure when she lost control. She liked to party and so did her friends, especially at her friends' backyard pool. There always seemed to be some reason to celebrate: The Colts are playing! It's Friday! It's girl's night out! Happy Birthday!
There were warning signs. "I would blackout or I would say something really stupid at a party or…at a family gathering, and I would feel the pain that comes with that the next day," Claudia told Eyewitness News anchor Anne Marie Tiernon.
Claudia was convinced she could "do it all." Problem is, she learned the "all" is a never-ending list. She believed her job was to encourage the kids, please the boss, touch base with the hubby, run the carpool, prepare healthy meals and of course don't let herself or the house go.
At the end of the day, Claudia was drained. She wanted a reward and an escape. But after a while, one glass of wine became many more. She stopped keeping count.
As a college-educated mother, Claudia fits a growing profile. The National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) reports 10 percent of U.S. children live with a parent who has alcohol problems. In several years of studies, the National Survey on Drug Use and Health shows people with a college level education consume alcohol more regularly than their peers who did not graduate from college.
Stress at Work
The higher Claudia moved through the ranks, the more she drank. Her expertise was education policy. She worked her way up to a leadership position in Governor Mitch Daniels' administration. Claudia says she felt significant responsibility for public funds and policy decisions for Indiana college students as head of the State Student Assistance Commission of Indiana. She found her job fulfilling and stressful.
"My drink of choice was Pinot Grigio wine." Braman remembers the rationale, "I'm a mom, a hard-working mom, and I deserve this."
"I didn't drink at work, but come three or four o'clock, that itch began," Braman said.
Her mother, Joanne Heritier, remembers when one bottle of wine wasn't enough.
"The volumes she could drink were just scary," Heritier said.
Claudia didn't consider herself a binge drinker. But the NIAAA considers binge drinking the consumption of four or more drinks in two hours. It's considered problem drinking and in the United States it is on the rise, according to a study made public in Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.
Claudia remembers thinking things were getting out of hand. She would make deals with herself. She would plan to drink every other day. Claudia regularly broke those promises to herself. She believed she could hide the problem in public, because no matter how much she drank at night, she could always pull it together the next morning.
"I never got sick, would never throw up. I would blackout all the time, but was never sick and never seemed to have a hangover and be up at seven o'clock in the morning with a smile on my face," Braman said.
Efforts to Intervene
The nights, however, were ugly. Braman and her husband would argue. The kids remember their mother's personality change for the worse. They would try to re-direct.
"I remember several times the kids saying, 'Will you not drink tonight...or will you not drink any more wine?'" Braman said.
Ian is the oldest. He is 15 and goes to school in Center Grove.
"I was kind of ashamed that she drank so much, but I knew at the same time that she couldn't really help it," Ian said.
Daughter Meredith, 13, is in eighth grade. She remembers feeling responsible for her mother's drinking.
"It felt like I was the parent, like I would have to tell her no," Meredith said.
Claudia's friends, too, would try to intervene, telling her that the person who emerged when she drank was very unappealing. They would say, "You are not yourself when you do these things. Can't you not drink? and I would say, 'What is the big deal? I've got to let loose. I am serious all the time. My work requires me to be serious all the time. This is my fun time'...but it wasn't fun, it wasn't fun for anyone."
The First Crisis
And in time, there was a crisis. It was September 13, 2011.
"I had been at a political 'to do' at the Columbia Club," Braman remembers. "I had more than a couple martinis, and it did not register to me that that was a bad idea to drive."
When she was pulled over near her Johnson County home, she was defiant.
"I really kind of had that indignant, self-righteous protection, denial, I'm fine…my house is right around the corner," Braman said.
Her blood alcohol content at the scene measured 0.32, four times the legal limit.
"I know it was very high, very high and the scary thing is…I was going to come home and drink more," Braman said.
She sat overnight in the jail and when released, went straight to treatment at Fairbanks.
"I knew that I had a problem, that I wanted to stop drinking," Braman said.
She says she stayed five days and four nights and then started outpatient therapy.
A Long, Dark Period
But her newly found sobriety was short-lived. The phone rang. It was her mother. Claudia's father was sick and dying.
"Exactly a month after my arrest that is when he passed away. I also resigned my job that day and I also drank that day, 30 days of sobriety gone," Braman said.
It was the beginning of what Braman says was very dark period. A lifelong tumultuous relationship with her father had ended abruptly, without resolution. Because she lost a public post, her DUI mug shot was on the evening news and featured in the south side newspaper. Her income and role as an advocate were gone. Without work her days lacked structure. She was depressed.
"You know that you want to try to help someone but you are clueless about how to do it," Heritier said.
Now Braman, once the life of the party, was drinking alone. She would separate from her family and sit outside on the back porch and drink. Sleep was elusive. Her goal was to drink until she blacked out.
Heritier remembers feeling helpless.
"If we would approach her and say, 'You know, this is probably not a good time to have another drink.' Then she would do something outrageous, like just pick up the bottle and just chug."
"I could drink a bottle of wine pretty quickly and pretty easily, but in the end, the last couple of years, it was a couple bottles of wine," Braman said.
Behind Closed Doors
After a day of classes, her children returned home only to be schooled in addiction.
"I would just tell her to come on in and try to go to bed, but she just wouldn't listen to me," Ian said.
On the outside, their house looks like thousands of other suburban homes in central Indiana. A brick two-story in a quiet neighborhood, with sidewalks and attractive landscaping. But inside, life was chaos. The kids remember not wanting to come home. Not wanting to hear more lies and not wanting to be disappointed.
"It was, I'm sure, incredibly uncomfortable for anyone who had to witness it," Claudia said.
"I don't think she knew she was hurting me as bad as she was. I think if you punch someone, you don't know if it really hurts them that much," Meredith said.
Claudia says after a while, she did not even notice the growing distance between her and her family.
"I was that mom that was at every PTO meeting and volunteering for everything and all those things and then all of a sudden my priorities just change, they changed," Braman said.
How Much is Too Much?
"I see it all the time…all the time," Julie Schneiders said.
Schneiders is a nurse practitioner specializing in women's care at St Vincent Health. She says conversations with her patients reveal excessive drinking is a common health issue.
"You can almost see it as this snow ball that keeps getting bigger and bigger," Schneiders said.
Health experts say when a patient's drinking causes harm or distress it is considered an "Alcohol Use Disorder" - or AUD.
Even in small amounts, alcohol affects women differently than it does men. NIAAA reports that 60 percent of women in the United States have at least one drink a year. Among women who drink, 13 percent have more than seven drinks per week. For women, this level of drinking is above the recommended U.S. dietary guidelines issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Moderate drinking is defined as no more than one drink a day for women and no more than two drinks a day for men. Women generally have more fat to absorb the alcohol and less water to dilute it. That's why men and women generally process alcohol differently and why women can't drink as much as men. One drink is typically defined as one 12-ounce serving of beer, one five-ounce glass of wine or a 1.5-ounce serving of liquor.
Schneiders says a red flag for women is drinking three glasses or more a night. Another red flag - arguing with family about alcohol use.
Schneiders says patients often report issues sleeping and difficulty getting to work on time. If there is a family history of alcoholism, the risk of becoming an alcoholic increases as well.
Classic signs of alcoholism include a craving or a strong compulsion to drink. Alcoholics do not know when to stop. Another sign of trouble is a growing tolerance, meaning it takes more drinks to feel the effects.
The Final Crisis
These are all are signs that Claudia says she either ignored or did not notice before doing something she regrets most.
She drove drunk again and asked her children to lie to police.
Claudia hit a street sign on her way to her Center Grove home in September 2013. A witness reported her to police, and soon they were knocking at her door.
"She wanted us to tell the cops that she had been here for hours," Meredith said.
Instead, the kids told the truth.
"I went back and told my Mom that the police were here. I didn't lie or anything. I just wanted to make sure that we could get everything figured out," Ian said.
Police charged Claudia with a second DUI, her second in two years.
"I have lost credibility. I've lost a lot of things that meant a lot to me," Claudia said.
This time Claudia went to rehabilitation in Florida. She remembers being alone at Indianapolis International Airport for nearly an hour and a half. She says she knew she could get a drink and no one would know, but she says she wanted her life back. She wanted to choose sobriety and did.
Claudia went to her gate, got on the plane and made it to rehab without a drink. She was hopeful. Insurance covered her extended stay at Behavioral Health of the Palm Beaches, Inc. The days were full of therapy. She talked about her feelings and how drinking helped her avoid them. She talked about growing up in a home where your dad is a drinker. She shared that she felt inadequate and ashamed.
A New Start
Eight weeks later, she returned to Johnson County and started an intensive outpatient program at Franciscan St. Francis Health Behavioral Services. She joined Alcoholics Anonymous and trusted her sponsor. She moved through twelve steps and celebrated milestones.
"I got my one year token on September 10, (it) was my one year sobriety date and I am so thrilled about it."
In October, Claudia decided it was time to resolve her ongoing court case. She went to the Johnson County Courthouse and pleaded guilty to a felony. "It's the right thing to do… tell the truth and not to fight it."
She is hoping the judge will see the actions she has taken and reduce her plea to a misdemeanor. That certainly would make it easier to find a full-time job.
In the meantime, Claudia just secured a temporary position for the Florida rehabilitation center. She taped an interview for the company's Hope Campaign and wants to encourage other women to seek help.
"I don't blame anyone but myself for these problems, but I have since of urgency in redemption and making sure that I can find something good out of the bad that I've caused," Braman said.
Claudia's mom now reports being closer to her daughter than ever. Her children are full of forgiveness.
"I think we both have learned a lot through this, I don't think she was intentionally trying to hurt me as bad a she did when she was drinking," Meredith said.
"I think we all believe that she can stay sober and she has put a lot of effort into staying sober," Ian said
"This is an ugly disease. I can't say never because I don't know, but my prayer is and every day every morning that I am blessed to wake up, I say, 'Please, God, take me through another day. Give me one more sober day.' It is a day at a time. Right now, I don't want to drink. I have no interest in ever drinking ever again, but I am also smart enough to know…I have to be hyper-vigilant all the time...I can't be over confident," Claudia explained. "As soon as I think you let down your guard, that is when I think it sneaks back up and can attack you. I say every day I going to commit to being sober. [I am] one drink away from making horrible choices. It doesn't take much and it's on every corner every restaurant you go to, every drugs store you go to, every grocery store you go to, it's right there.
"My story is not that significant other than the fact that I want to use it to help other people to make people aware of what a tragedy it is, but at the same time it's not a death sentence. You can get better. You don't have to lose your family. Your family doesn't have to lose you," Braman said.
Resources
IU Health Chemical Dependency program: 317-962-2622 (24-hour hotline, scheduling)
Mental Health America of Greater Indianapolis:
National: 1-800-273-TALK
Local: 317-251-7575
Text: text CSIS to 839863
