The typical depiction of an alcoholic is usually not a young middle-class woman like Mary-Kate Harrington. But by 24 years old, she was leaving rehab and now works to make sure stories like hers are told. We spoke with Mary-Kate and expert Dr James Morris to why youth alcohol problems are often forgotten.

Drinking out of a paper bag on a park bench, homeless, male, at least 40 years old.

This is the image Mary-Kate Harrington, 27, believes most people, including her former self, picture when they hear the word ‘alcoholic’.

Her story of alcoholism and recovery couldn’t be further from this stereotype.

She describes herself as an old-soul, middle-class, and never a “ravey-baby” clubbing in Clapham.

But in her early twenties, she found herself battling alcohol binges and addiction.

There is no minimum age for alcohol problems and by the time she was 23 Mary-Kate knew exactly what an alcohol binge looked like and felt like.

One weekend stands out to her as a moment where her problem really started to spiral.

After a heavy binge, she remembers waking up to find a mug of coffee and some leftover wine on the counter:

“I remember very clearly deciding to have the wine over the coffee that morning.”

She says, with some irony: “And that was the ‘aha’ moment. We had arrived, ‘the great elixir of life’.”

From here, she describes the next six months as a series of destructive binges with dangerous consequences:

“If I’m lucky, I’m waking up at the bottom of my stairs in my flat.

“If I’m unlucky, I’m waking up a week later in A&E, not knowing where I’ve been, covered in bruises, black and blue. 

“If I’m very unlucky, I’m waking up in detox where there’s algebra equations on the wall that are disappearing and I can’t quite solve them, or I have to take Librium because I’m going to have a seizure if I don’t stop [drinking].”

Librium (chlordiazepoxide) is a medicine sometimes prescribed for alcohol withdrawal (NHS).

During one of her worst hospital stays, she made a promise to herself:

“I remember being in a hospital coming off of a bender not being able to lift anything, because the shaking and trembling of my hands was so bad.

“I thought ‘If I get out of this, I have got to tell people how I did it’.”

The journey was not easy, but Mary-Kate was sober by the time she was 24 and credits the help of her friends and family:

“[They] were just clinging onto me for dear life, trying to figure out a way to just get me to stop drinking for enough time to figure it out.

“I hear a lot of these bright, ‘aha’ moments where people are on the floor and they’re grandmother appears and they’re like ‘Call this helpline’. I did not have anything like that.

“I’m grateful I was loved. I had people around me that really loved me, and saw what was happening.”

Her friends and family recognising she had a problem was crucial for her recovery.

However, the ‘alcoholic’ stereotype can make it hard to see when someone younger has a problem.

Mary-Kate believes the stereotype is archaic: “That kept me out of the room for so long. This idea that I was far too young, ‘You need to be at least 40 to be an alcoholic’.

“I hear a lot of young people saying they found it easier to say that they were an addict before they were an alcoholic.

“Young people think alcoholism is a disease [where] there’s a barrier to entry until you reach a certain age. In fact it’s an addictive substance, and if you take enough of it, you’ll be hooked.”

She says to watch out for how alcohol makes you feel and what happens to you when you drink:

“If alcohol takes anything more than your money, it’s probably not worth it.”

For her, going into recovery was the way forward:

“The first time I went [to rehab], I went to a very holistic place. Tennis, yoga, Tai Chi, people smoking a lot of cigarettes, drinking a lot of coffee. […] That just didn’t work.

“I arrived with seven suitcases and my fishing rod in a full tweed outfit.

“I left after 26 days and got drunk. Then I […] had three binges in two months.”

Then she went to a stricter rehab centre, this time with one suitcase and no fishing rod.

She says stripping back her life allowed her to have a penny-drop “dawning of the day” moment.

But it was what she was told when leaving rehab that really stuck with her:

“I remember there was a long drive to leave this rehab. They told me I can go left or go right. 

“If I go right and do all the work, I probably will want to drink again. If I go left, I will drink again. 

“And for the first time in my life, that actually scared me a lot. The prospect of drinking again really scared me.”

It was how powerless drinking left her which scared her the most and the journey to recovery from here was not smooth:

“I was a slow learner. I was in a fog of ignorance that would not lift.”

In a few months though, the fog did start to lift.

One of the tools that helped her through was keeping busy, which she describes as the “great anaesthetic”.

But there is one thing she believes is the most crucial:

“Time. Time is key.

“You really need a bit of sobriety time under your belt to see the wood from the trees and go ‘Oh yeah, it was disrupting my life. Oh yeah, my life was quite good without it’.”

She now runs Thrive which delivers workshops and talks, including at schools and universities, where she tells her story.

For her, this is part of recovery.

There was one interaction at a workshop that has stuck with her in particular where she didn’t receive the warmest reception at first:

“One that I will always remember is somebody who was maybe a bit cheesed off that day.

“They were quite a stoic, stiff upper lip character.”

But by the end, she says they had completely turned around and confided with Mary-Kate about an addiction they had faced.

She says: “It was unbelievable. I could not believe it.

“In an hour, you can change people’s perception, or understanding, or ability to talk, which was amazing.”

Mary-Kate says recovery has given her the freedom to do what she enjoys:

“I love parties, I love a theme, I love a dinner party, I still have a lot of friends who drink.

“The freedom, which I never lose sight of, that I’m just able to get up, go, be accountable, be present.”

Today, Mary-Kate is enjoying her life and sharing her story with young people.

She promised herself in that hospital bed to recover and tell people how she did it. Now she is.

Hear from our expert:

Dr James Morris has 20 years experience in alcohol research and works with people with alcohol problems. His work has included advising the World Health Organisation as well as working for the UK’s Department for Health devising clinical guidelines for alcohol treatment. He teaches counselling professionals about behavioural change and his research focuses on the psychology of alcohol use, stigma, and addiction. Dr Morris is also the host of ‘The Alcohol “Problem” Podcast”.

Dr James Morris says: 

“Young people who might be experiencing alcohol problems might not see it as a problem, or might not want to see it as a problem, because they feel they don’t fit the stereotype. 

“So they don’t want to go to an AA meeting and listen to people twice or three times their age talking about having more years of sobriety under their belt than they’ve been alive.”

He added people are much more likely to dismiss a young person struggling with alcohol use.

He says people assume it is just a part of being young or enjoying yourself in your 20s.

There is no clear figure for the number of young people facing alcohol problems.

Reports from the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities show 3393 people aged 18-24 were in contact with treatment services for alcohol use in 2024/25 in the UK.

However, Dr James Morris says there is a problem with young people in particular not engaging with recovery or treatment.

The true number of young people struggling with alcohol use is likely much higher, with estimates from the Institute of Alcohol Studies showing around only 20% of people accessing treatment.

Dr James Morris believes stigma stops people from reaching out for help:

“Many people are reluctant to say ‘Oh, I have an alcohol problem’ because they know that they’ll be judged and stigmatised and treated differently.”

He says the warning signs for alcohol use are often different in young people because they have had less time to become physically dependent on alcohol.

Dr James Morris says this is another reason young people don’t access support services:

“They’re less likely to align with these rock bottom alcoholism stereotypes, which are typically associated with people who are older and have this story of losing their family, their job, their house.”

He advises young people to look out for a lack of control when drinking: 

“So you might have vowed to not drink on a certain day, and then you find that you drink on that day. Or you might have set yourself a limit ‘I’m only going to have two or three drinks when I go out’ and you end up having more.”

Recognising the problem is the first step, but treatment will look different for everyone according to Dr James Morris.

He says some people will need to go into recovery while other people might not need any specialist support.

But he says anyone struggling with alcohol use should seek out help.