Alcohol

Alcohol Alcoholism Alcoholism is a disease of epidemic proportions, affecting 9.3 to 10 million Americans, and many professionals believe the figures are closer to 20 million (Weddle and Wishon). Alcoholism is a "physiological or physiological dependence on alcohol characterized by the alcoholic’s inability to control the start or termination of his drinking"(Encyclopedia Britannica 210). It consists of frequent and recurring consumption of alcohol to an extent that causes continued harm to the drinker and leads to medical and social problems. Alcoholism, however, does not merely cause harm to the alcoholic, but to the entire family as well, affecting an estimated 28 million children in this country (Weddle and Wishon). These children grow up in the unhealthy and abnormal family systems harmed by alcoholism, carrying the negative effects of this environment with them into adulthood. Consequently, adult children of alcoholics are the innocent victims of a disease which has shaped their personalities and behavior as children and will, if not treated, promote their personal disintegration as adults. Most alcoholics don’t fit the stereotype of the lying in the gutter drunk. Alcoholics are likely to be persons of intense, if sometimes brief, enthusiasms. They often try to do too much too fast. They tend to demand perfection in themselves and in others. Frustrated, they may become painfully depressed or alcoholic, drinking, alcoholism, alcohol, family, alcoholics, one, stop, make, disease, children, alateen, often, control, support, god, drunk, aa, very, try, treatment, take, steps, sometimes, school, result, program, problems, person, own, over, others, million, liver, life, less, illness, group, entire, drink, develop, causes 12, weddle, way, understanding, understand, think, the family, the children