😡🍻What Makes a Mean Drunk😡🍻

It’s probably not news to anyone that alcohol can change your personality.  The effects can be longer-lasting for people who drink excessively, resulting in personality shifts.

Why does this happen? Because of what alcohol does to the brain.

Alcohol is a depressant. 

It affects the brain by interacting with GABA receptors and GABA is the neurotransmitter to blame for any feelings of pleasure or euphoria you might have. 

Alcohol also increases dopamine and alters opioid receptors, and can lead to a release of β-endorphins during acute ingestion.

The combination can cause a person to feel elevated confidence levels, ease in social situations, and even desire. 

Alcohol alters a person’s personality by lowering their inhibitions and making it more difficult to coordinate their movements, making people bold, clumsy, and problematic.

Alcohol can make people angry or upset, some more than others. 

Feeling aggressive from alcohol can be caused by multiple variables. Here are a few:

Gender

Men who suppress unwanted thoughts, especially those that contradict the “tough” masculine norm, are more likely to be aggressive when drunk. Men experience drinking-related belligerence more often than women.

It doesn’t mean women can’t be belligerent drunks, too. We have our moments, but it’s just more frequent in men.

Drinking habits

Binge drinkers may be more aggressive than slow drinkers, which makes sense, considering how alcohol impacts personality.

Drinking heavily makes you more inclined to feel emboldened, less inhibited, and more emotionally volatile – a recipe for making an angry drunk.

Social factors

Peer pressure plays its part. If your friends drink aggressively, you may follow suit. If they drink aggressively and get riled up, waiting for a fight, guess what? You probably will, too. 

Mental illness

Mental illness often co-occurs with alcohol abuse. 

Depression, anxiety, and other mood disorders may cause excessive drinking. People with PTSD experience aggression and turn to alcohol as an outlet, creating an unhealthy anger cycle.

Stress

Some individuals use alcohol to relieve stress, a recipe for disaster. Someone who starts drinking because they’re angry and anxious will often find those feelings amplified by large amounts of alcohol. 

Personality

Personalities vary. These traits can make you alcoholically aggressive, and trait anger and thrill-seeking may lead to violence when drinking. Plus, the emotional guard rails are off when you’re drunk, so anything goes! 

Trauma

Trauma victims may express their trauma through anger, but this might not be apparent when they aren’t drinking. Alcohol can bring that out in people, explaining how otherwise calm people become nightmarish drunks. 

One or more combinations of any risk factors can lead to angry drunk behavior. 

What to do if someone you love keeps getting drunk and saying hurtful things

First, know that it is not your fault. Alcohol can have wild effects on people’s behavior, and, as we just read, some people are wired to look for a fight when they drink. 

You might wonder if this person is revealing their true thoughts and feelings, but what’s likelier is that they are uninhibited from the alcohol and speaking from a purely emotional place that may not be rooted in reality. 

Does that excuse the behavior?

Hell, no!

Nobody deserves to be verbally (or physically) abused. Losing control because of alcohol is no excuse. 

What to do if you say hurtful things you can’t remember when drunk:

If you get drunk and say hurtful things to people you care about, you must apologize for your behavior and stop getting drunk. 

Those are your options. 

Don’t just apologize and then continue to drink and repeat the behavior. 

“I’m sorry. I was drunk” is not an excuse for hurting people. 

If drinking alcohol makes you lash out at others and say regrettable things to people you care about, that is a five-alarm warning to stop drinking.

What is the message you send loved ones if you don’t? 

You’re telling them that drinking is more important than your relationship with them, or you are unable to change due to addiction.

Neither situation is healthy for the other person. You will either continue to abuse them, or they will find a way to get away from you.