Hi everyone, I have often been interested in this topic for some time and found this article by Stanton Peele useful so I thought I'd post a link here.

http://www.peele.net/lib/personality.html

I found the conclusion particularly encouraging :

"In this sense, then, the idea of an indelible alcoholic personality — the belief that a leopard can never change its spots — can actually contribute to or create alcoholism. That is, believing that one has a personality that means he or she can never hope to control his or her drinking can be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Trying to persuade people that they have such a personality can literally do more harm than good. After all, some people who appear completely out of control of their actions at one point significantly change their outlooks and ability to regulate their behavior later in life."

Warrenjames

Thanks for this James, very interesting reading. I think in many ways, we are what we believe. If we believe we can, we do, if we believe we can't, we don't.

Curi

Yes, this conclusion reinforces why the teachings of AA are so harmful and why AA actually harms many more people than it helps.

Yep, this is why I'm not really keen on embracing the term "alcoholic". It implies a loss of control and total identification with a disease that I'm not comfortable with. And I think that throwing your hands up and saying, well I do this because I'm an alcoholic is a bit reductive and could serve to reinforce passive behaviours. Of course, if it helps someone, great. But I suspect it woudln't do much good for me.