ALCOHOLISM QUOTES
quotations about alcoholism
A man who drinks too much on occasion is still the same man as he was sober. An alcoholic, a real alcoholic, is not the same man at all. You can't predict anything about him for sure except that he will be someone you never met before.
RAYMOND CHANDLER
The Long Goodbye
Alcohol addiction stunts the spiritual, emotional and mental growth of a person. For the alcoholic, they literally stop wanting to learn or advance themselves on any level other than the one they are already on. This is why many alcoholics are emotionally stunted and are unable to contain their emotions. Many alcoholics believe that once they are sober for a few months they are cured. Nothing could be further from the truth. An alcoholic is not cured just because they stopped drinking. Remember, "the drinking" for the alcoholic is only a symptom of an underlying problem within him or her. Total sobriety takes more than abstinence--it takes a spiritual and mental awareness through healing and growth. I have never yet read about, or heard of a case where an alcoholic stopped drinking, but then years later they were able to drink one or two drinks and stop.
ANGIE LEWIS
The Alcoholism Trap
Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.
HERMAN MELVILLE
Moby Dick
One key symptom of alcoholism is that the individual comes to need a drink for every mood--one to calm down, one to perk up, one to celebrate, one to deal with disappointment, and so on.
PHYLLIS A. BALCH
Prescription for Herbal Healing
The first step toward recovery from alcoholism is the recognition that a problem exists. Once the problem drinker breaks through denial and admits to having a problem, a range of treatment options become available.
JEFFREY S. NEVID
Health in the New Millennium
Alcoholism is a devastating, potentially fatal disease. The primary symptom of having it is telling everyone--including yourself--that you are not an alcoholic.
HERBERT L. GRAVITZ & JULIE D. BOWDEN
Recovery: A Guide for Adult Children of Alcoholics
As an alcoholic, you will violate your standards quicker than you can lower them.
ROBIN WILLIAMS
Weapons of Self Destruction
Talking to a drunk person was like talking to an extremely happy, severely brain-damaged three-year-old.
JOHN GREEN
Paper Towns
Alcoholism is a well documented pathological reaction to unresolved grief.
DAVID COOK
Psychosocial Issues in the Treatment of Alcoholism
Because alcohol is encouraged by our culture, we get the idea that it isn't dangerous. However, alcohol is the most potent and most toxic of the legal psychoactive drugs.
BEVERLY A. POTTER & SEBASTIAN ORFALI
Brain Boosters
I felt empty and sad for years, and for a long, long time, alcohol worked. I'd drink, and all the sadness would go away. Not only did the sadness go away, but I was fantastic. I was beautiful, funny, I had a great figure, and I could do math. But at some point, the booze stopped working. That's when drinking started sucking. Every time I drank, I could feel pieces of me leaving. I continued to drink until there was nothing left. Just emptiness.
DINA KUCERA
Everything I Never Wanted to Be: A Memoir of Alcoholism and Addiction
To understand why alcoholism is a disease, it is important to know about the neurological effects of alcohol on the brain. Simply put, heavy drinking over time causes changes in neurotransmitter activity that the brain must adapt to. In people physically predisposed to alcoholism, this adaptation eventually turns into a fixed craving as the body finds it cannot live without the effects of alcohol. Something that started out voluntarily and enjoyable turns into something more serious--a physical dependence that can cause horrible withdrawel symptoms. This explains why alcoholics cannot just quit drinking like their nonaddicted counterparts can. Thus, it is not the behavior of drinking that is defined as an illness. It is only when the craving to drink becomes involuntary that alcoholism can be thought of as a disease.
MARIA GIFFORD
Alcoholism
One of the most important facts to remember about alcoholism is its progression. Alcoholism begins in an early stage that looks nothing at all like a life-threatening disease, proceeds into a middle stage where problems begin to appear and intensify, and gradually advances into the late, degenerative stages of obvious physiological dependence, physical and psychological deterioration, and loss of control.
WILLIAM F. ASBURY
Beyond the Influence
The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS
The Big Book
All excess is ill, but drunkenness is of the worst sort. It spoils health, dismounts the mind, and unmans men. It reveals secrets, is quarrelsome, lascivious, impudent, dangerous and mad. In fine, he that is drunk is not a man: because he is so long void of Reason, that distinguishes a Man from a Beast.
WILLIAM PENN
Some Fruits of Solitude
Wine hath drowned more men than the sea.
THOMAS FULLER
In my lowest moments, the only reason I didn't commit suicide was that I knew I wouldn't be able to drink any more if I was dead.
ERIC CLAPTON
Clapton: The Autobiography
Alcohol ruined me financially and morally, broke my heart and the hearts of too many others. Even though it did this to me and it almost killed me and I haven't touched a drop of it in seventeen years, sometimes I wonder if I could get away with drinking some now. I totally subscribe to the notion that alcoholism is a mental illness because thinking like that is clearly insane.
CRAIG FERGUSON
American on Purpose: The Improbable Adventures of an Unlikely Patriot
Alcohol is a make-you-stupid drug.
BEVERLY A. POTTER & SEBASTIAN ORFALI
Brain Boosters
You may look over your shoulder often to see if the alcoholic has miraculously appeared as a responsible sober person. While it is possible, it is NOT likely to happen. I could tell you to stop looking, but you will not. He will probably come to you at some point. It will be difficult to prevent him from entering your world because, after all, you love him.
LINDA BARTEE DOYNE
"One path, two directions", The Immortal Alcoholic, February 4, 2018