Member-only story
Recovery Reading 02/12/24 Alcoholism Is a Real Disease!
No one aspires to be an alcoholic
“You didn’t cause it; you can’t control it; and you can’t cure it.” — Al-Anon saying
Many families with an alcoholic member get their priorities mixed up. They ask questions the alcoholic such as— “What are they doing?” “What are they not doing?” They wonder, “If I do all the right things today, will they stop drinking?” “What can I do to stop the alcoholic from drinking?”
I used to ask those questions myself, especially the latter two ones. I ended up micromanaging MYSELF to act in a way that wouldn’t piss off my dad. He was an angry man and I was scared of him when he was both drunk AND angry.
It’s natural for family members of alcoholics — especially kids — to try to make sense of the drinking and imagine they did something, or didn’t do something, to make the alcoholic drink.
This is dead wrong.
Alcoholism is a real disease
Alcoholism (now renamed “alcohol use disorder [AUD]) is a DISEASE. It’s listed in the International Classification of Diseases, which is published by the World Health Organization (good reading on AUD here). The ICD is important because it provides a common language for recording, reporting, and…
