The Different Affects of Drug Abuse Among Genders

Drug abuse is common among individuals that experience a traumatic event in his or her life. Drugs are usually taken to alleviate physical, mental, or emotional pain. Two drugs that are often abused are morphine and alcohol because of its addictive nature. Women and men are affected differently depending on the type of drug that they abuse. As seen in A Long Days Journey into Night by Eugene O’Neill, Mary Tyrone seems to be affected mentally by her morphine addiction, whereas the men, Tyrone, Jamie, Edmund, in the household appear to be affected physically by their alcohol addiction. Cynthia Robbins’s “Sex Differences in Psychosocial Consequences of Alcohol and Drug Abuse” supports the different effects of drug abuse among men and women, while Gerardine Meaney’s “Long Day's Journey into Night: Modernism, Post-Modernism and Maternal Loss” article focuses on the generalized view of women and men, specifically of Mary and Tyrone in the play. Robbins examines three different hypotheses concerning gender differences in the impact of alcohol and drug abuse. She claims that the generalized view of women being more vulnerable lies on physical vulnerability, social control and labeling, and internalized sex role norms. Preconceived gender roles play a great role in how others view drug addiction in women than in men.

Throughout the play, A Long Day’s Journey Into Night, Mary Tyrone, the mother, is seen to use morphine to alleviate her rheumatoid arthritis. She also uses it to ease her anxiety over Edmund’s tuberculosis. However, she was first introduced to morphine when her husband hired a cheap hotel doctor to administer the drug to ease her pain while giving birth to Edmund. Though the pain of childbirth didn’t last long, her morphine...

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...nd internalized

sex role norms as Robbins discusses. Alcohol is an equally bad drug in

comparison to morphine. Society would condemn Mary for using morphine more than

James Tyrone because society places greater responsibilities on women than on men.

Drugs are viewed as more masculine, thus encouraging men to abuse drugs, while

women are shamed for it.

Works Cited

Meaney, Gerardine. "Long Day's Journey into Night: Modernism, Post-Modernism and

Maternal Loss." Irish University Review. 21 (1991): 204-18.Jstor.org. Web. 29

Apr. 2014.

O'Neill, Eugene. Long Day's Journey into Night. New Haven U.a.: Yale Univ., 1989.

Print.

Robbins, Cynthia. "Sex Differences in Psychosocial Consequences of Alcohol and Drug

Abuse." Journal of Health and Social Behavior Vol. 30, No. 1 (Mar., 1989): 117-

30. Jstor.org. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.