Mark McLean remembers tasting alcohol for the first time.

I was probably five years old when I would take my first sip.

You know, you'd see Dad's bottle sitting on the table and you'd take a sip.

Then you'd take a drink of Coke and then make the Coke taste sweeter.

And that's how it kind of started.

Mark started drinking more in high school. It was just going out and having a good time with my buddies.

It was just really easy to get, really easy to go out and have a good time, basically.

Mark's fiance knew he was drinking.

I just don't think she worried about it too much.

Then after we were married, it just started to become an everyday thing.

By the time his three kids were old enough to know what was going on, Mark's life was ruled

by alcohol, and it had a huge effect

on his family.

So let's just take a day, okay?

And I come home from work.

All the problems started pretty soon after he came home from work.

It's not that bad right then.

By the time he would be home for about half an hour, he would already be drunk. But as the night progresses, then... I just remember laying in bed and hearing, mainly my dad yelling. Yelling, screaming. And it kept me up at night a lot. I start getting a little more impatient. I had a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach every time I heard my dad yelling. A little more angry. I didn't know what he was capable of doing to us.

Anything would set me off once I got to that level.

Just about anything you can think of that's negative, he said to one of us.

And then you'd get up, go to work, get off work, and start all over again.

It became all-consuming.

...