Collateral Damage: Isolation makes Drinkers Thirsty

A week ago, the thought that March Madness could actually be cancelled given the billions of dollars involved had not yet crossed my mind. Now, just seven days later, my brain is whirling with the depth and breadth of the collateral damage from the doctrine of isolation that is more severe than anything we’ve experienced in our lifetimes. Is that too dramatic for you? Can you name a time when government ordered constitutionally protected private businesses to close, churches were shuttered and the travel industry was destroyed? I can’t. Dramatic? Yes. Really, inconceivably happening? Also yes.

(If you are struggling with the temptation to drink as we isolate and our everyday lives are so dramatically changed, please click here to read my Elephant Journal article published this week on the topic of the unrelenting shame of drinking alcohol through crisis.)

I’ve seen the spread curves, and I understand the reasoning behind social distancing. I’m not here to argue about if we have or have not gone too far. I know how deadly and contagious the virus is, and no, I don’t want to be Italy. While I could literally go on for thousands of words expressing my shock and heartbreak at the destruction these measures — the necessity of which I am not trying to dispute here — are bringing on our society, I won’t do that. I’ll focus on one…