June 9, 2019
Recently, I did some research about alcoholism and noted three myths. Here's one to ponder for this week.
Myth # 1 Alcoholics are undisciplined people with sloppy
drinking habits.
There is a long list of people with successful careers and plenty of personal discipline who are also alcoholics such as: Sam Johnson of SC Johnson Wax Company, journalist Elizabeth Vargas, former First Lady Betty Ford.
(Some people compartmentalize their drinking and keep it out of their workdays. They are called “functional alcoholics.”)
Alcoholism is a disease; so is diabetes. A person is not responsible for having either disease, only responsible for managing it. Tara Connor says:
An alcoholic is not a bad* person who needs to become good, but a sick person who needs to become well.
Some researchers call it a neurotransmitter disease. (For a more full discussion about this see Jolene Park’s TED Talk.)
Kathleen Whalen Fitzgerald, in her book Alcoholism: The Genetic Inheritance, explains that the alcoholic differs from others in three major ways. (See her book.) Because of this, the alcoholic has a physical craving for a drink and does not feel "normal" until having one.
Once alcohol enters the body, it is carried to the liver to be processed and eliminated. For a person with Jellnick’s disease, this process does not work like it does for other people.
“One becomes an alcoholic because one is biologically vulnerable and tests this vulnerability by drinking.”
*It should be noted, however, that drinking lowers inhibitions and clouds judgement, so there are often poor moral and lifestyle choices made because of drunkenness.
