What is alcoholism?

“A chronic disease in which a person craves drinks that contain alcohol and is unable to control his or her drinking.” (NIH)

“If someone loses control over their drinking and has an excessive desire to drink, it’s known as dependent drinking (alcoholism). Dependent drinking usually affects a person’s quality of life and relationships, but they may not always find it easy to see or accept this.” (NHS)

“In the preceding chapters you have learned something of alcoholism. We hope we have made clear the distinction between the alcoholic and the non-alcoholic. If, when you honestly want to, you find you cannot quit entirely, or if when drinking, you have little control over the amount you take, you are probably alcoholic.” (Chapter 4, Big Book)

“The tyrant alcohol wielded a double-edged sword over us: first we were smitten by an insane urge that condemned us to go on drinking, and then by an allergy of the body that ensured we would ultimately destroy ourselves in the process.” (Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions)

There was a lot wrong with me besides that. That wasn’t my alcoholism, though. There’s no mysterious ‘ism’ in alcoholism. It’s not having a rotten childhood, feeling that one is different or disconnected, or general emotional immaturity. Even the spiritual malady is not itself a component of alcoholism but a universal human phenomenon, something that stands in the way of God and therefore the solution to alcoholism. Rather, the double-edged sword: being compelled to drink, and then over-drink. The solution to alcoholism, the Twelve Steps, fixed all of the other problems, too.