Co-authored by: Janeth Nuñez del Prado, LCSW

Getting a DWI charge is a huge stressor which negatively impacts your life, threatens and interferes with your future plans, and costs you time and money. But can it also be a signal that something deeper in your life is going wrong? Can getting a DWI, despite all the inconvenience, embarrassment, and cost, alert you to a problem that it is time to take head-on? Can there be an opportunity amidst the crisis?

To start, maybe this “wakeup call” talk is not what is going on for you. It is true that getting a DWI can be a one-off, bad luck, wrong place at the wrong time sort of thing. It’s possible that you don’t drive after drinking often and, instead, this was a one-time thing. Besides, you may feel like your driving that night was not so dangerous after all.

A false accusation of DWI, like any false criminal charge, is an injustice and a danger to you, your reputation, and your future prospects and must be resisted vigorously both legally and psychologically. Being charged falsely is a hit to your mindset and it takes positive energy to overcome.

But if there is some truth to the charge, should the situation still be resisted psychologically? I firmly believe that any and all criminal charges need to be resisted vigorously and effectively in the legal sphere. This is because the consequences from convictions can be so severe that we must fight. After all, according to the Constitution, it is always the government’s burden to prove their charges beyond a reasonable doubt. But even if a charge is being resisted legally, it may make sense to be psychologically receptive, within the confines of attorney-client privilege and therapist-patient privilege, to examine what may be going wrong in our lives that is causing us to drink problematically and move forward in our lives in a more healthy way: to live according to your values. 

Ask yourself: is this first time I have driven after drinking too much, or is it the first time I got caught? Most people who are arrested for DWI have driven drunk before, this is just the first time the police got involved. One often-quoted study found that the typical person who is arrested for DWI has previously driven drunk an average of 80 times.

The danger of DWI and increasing use of alcohol is that people lose track of how it actually affects them because the use occurs and increases over time and the damage is gradual and compounding. From my own experience as a lawyer who has defended a lot of DWIs including felony level charges involving great bodily harm and death, people are often surprised by how impaired they actually were at the time. They underestimate their intoxication because it’s becoming their normal reality, but when they see the body cam video, it’s surprising to them just how much the alcohol is actually affecting them. It’s dangerous and it usually gets more dangerous over time.

So what should you consider doing if you have a DWI? Get into a mode of self-reflection and discovery. Be kind to yourself, but be real. Ask: In what ways is my drinking causing problems in my life? How might my life be better if I drank less? What steps can I take to decrease my drinking?  You can take an honest assessment of how much you are drinking and how it is impacting your health, relationships, or even your work. There are many research-based treatments that can help you to decrease your alcohol use and build healthy relationships and coping mechanisms. How should you deal with the DWI charge if you are thinking, yes I think I may be guilty? My advice is the following. You should have your attorney fight to maintain your presumption of innocence. If you can win, you should cultivate gratitude and take steps to ensure you don’t get slapped with the same charge again. No matter what the outcome, if you are thinking about a change, you should take forward steps towards recovery. Real service from a supportive attorney is to help you go through that door if you find it open and are ready to go through. Supportive service means not only recommending specific types of counseling, but helping to locate and connect you to these services. It means accompanying you along the road to health and wellbeing.