Smashed
Story of a Drunken Girlhood
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
Garnering a vast amount of attention from young people and parents, and from book buyers across the country, Smashed became a media sensation and a New York Times bestseller. Eye-opening and utterly gripping, Koren Zailckas’s story is that of thousands of girls like her who are not alcoholics—yet—but who routinely use booze as a shortcut to courage and a stand-in for good judgment.
With one stiff sip of Southern Comfort at the age of fourteen, Zailckas is initiated into the world of drinking. From then on, she will drink faithfully, fanatically. In high school, her experimentation will lead to a stomach pumping. In college, her excess will give way to a pattern of self-poisoning that will grow more destructive each year. At age twenty-two, Zailckas will wake up in an unfamiliar apartment in New York City, elbow her friend who is passed out next to her, and ask, "Where are we?" Smashed is a sober look at how she got there and, after years of blackouts and smashups, what it took for her to realize she had to stop drinking. Smashed is an astonishing literary debut destined to become a classic.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This isn't just one girl's story of sneaking drinks in junior high, creeping out for night-long keg parties in high school and binge-drinking weeknights and weekends through college it's also a valuable cautionary tale. At 24 (her present age), Zailckas gave up drinking after a decade of getting drunk, having blackouts and experiencing brushes with comas, date rape and suicide. She weaves disturbing statistics (from Harvard School of Public Heath studies and elsewhere) into her memoir: most girls will have their first drink by age 12, and will have the experience of being drunk by 14; teenage girls drink as much as their male peers, but their bodies process it badly (they get drunk faster, stay drunk longer and are more likely to die of alcohol poisoning); and date rape and booze go hand-in-hand. Zailckas had alcohol poisoning at 16 after a night of downing shots at a party with friends, but having her stomach pumped in the emergency room and enduring a month of being grounded didn't check her desire to drink. Fraternity keg parties led to drunken sexual encounters not-quite-remembered; drinking began to replace intimacy. Alcohol defined Zailckas's adolescence and college years to such an extent that, as she tells it, she lacks the tools to be an adult: she's unsure how to maintain relationships and unclear about sex without an alcohol buzz. Zailckas is unsparingly insightful and acutely aware of what drinking can and does do to girls. She explains that while kids are taught that drugs are always dangerous, alcohol is perceived as an acceptable rite of passage. Her book is deeply moving, written in poetic, nuanced prose that never obscures the dangerous truths she seeks to reveal. , which will garner a literary audience, and has also received praise from those who work in the substance abuse field.
Customer Reviews
Denial
I'm a psychiatrist who treats a lot people with chemical abuse and dependency. Throughout this memoir the author claims that she is not, and never was an alcoholic, which she defines as one who is physiologically addicted to and dependent on alcohol. Rather, she repeatedly refers to herself as merely being a past "abuser" of alcohol, but this rather detailed memoir of drinking (a "drunk-alogue") clearly indicates that she was a flaming alcoholic, but one among a minority who have managed to eventually get sober largely on their own, without rehab and/or AA. To do so is very uncommon, but there are those few who manage to pull it off. I'm writing this review because I don't want this memoir to encourage and perpetuate certain readers' defense mechanisms, particularly denial, rationalization, and intellectualization.
Becoming and being an alcoholic who is "dependent" on alcohol is indicated by the following, which doesn't necessarily include total physiological dependency:
-repeatedly drinking in excess, particularly from an early age;
-it allows one to suddenly feel "normal" and disinhibited, which leads to compulsive drinking and choosing to be with those who repeatedly drink to get drunk, and disassociating with those who do not;
-repeated blackouts, followed by remorse, embarrassment, shame, compromising values, losing one's dignity, sexual promiscuity, date rape, and so on;
-repeated efforts to cut down, control, or stop drinking such as counting drinks, attempting to pace drinking, switching to lower alcohol content drinks, and so on;
-overwhelming consequences from drinking, such as driving under the influence, driving while in a blackout, DUIs, aggression, physical injuries, and so on;
-chronic hangovers and morning drinking;
-deterioration in school or job, getting fired, being labeled a drunk, and so on;
-hiding bottles and sneaking drinks;
-continuing to drink despite significant and/or overwhelming physical and social consequences;
-morning drinking just to feel "normal" and finding that one's tolerance for drinking enough to feel normal or buzzed keeps increasing;
-tremors, shaking hands, vomiting up the first drink, needing an eye-opener, etc;
-smelling like booze, deteriorating hygiene, letting go, eats.