Alcoholism In Jeannette Walls The Glass Castle

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Jeannette Walls wrote The Glass Castle in 2005, after she had escaped her toxic childhood lifestyle. Her life was full of constant nomadism and family drama, and this memoir captures everything from her personal point of view. Her father’s alcoholism is a prevalent factor that drives almost all of the events that occur in the novel. Rex’s abusive alcohol consumption prevents him from maintaining a steady job/income, affects the children emotionally, causes the family to take on certain roles as a coping mechanism, and fuels violence towards Rose Mary.

According to “Three Ways Alcoholism Affects the Whole Family”, an alcohol addiction blog, “Alcohol is expensive and alcoholism is doubly so”. Alcohol places major financial burdens on the family. …show more content…

Therefore, they do not possess the finances to support their spouses and children. This lack of financial resources causes families to go without money for clothing, food, or housing. In Jeannette Walls’ memoir, The Glass Castle, Rex Walls is a severe alcoholic. He cycles through multiple jobs in every region that the family decides to “live”. The Walls family never truly develop a home or steady life for themselves due to their constant “skedaddling”. Rex’s inability to keep a job and lack of money contributed to the malnourishment of the children. When Rex lost this job in the Barite mine, the kids came to face the fact that they would “have to eat less”. The children had to take drastic action in order to obtain food. Brian was so starving that he went into his neighbor's house and stole a jar of pickles. The neighbor caught him and made him eat all of the pickles at once. Another time, Jeanette and Brian came home to an empty fridge, so they went scavenging through the dumpster to find food. Blinded by hunger, they were ecstatic to find a box of moldy chocolates. The family members resort to selfish tactics in order to eat. In one scenario, Rose Mary is found scarfing down a chocolate bar while her children are left to suffer. The kids eat random food items to sustain

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