well if you want to be old-fashioned about it
Originally, ACoA started in the early 70's when a lady called Claudia Black started doing research on family dynamics in alcoholic homes. At the time, there was a lot of money for research into alcholism, and the pioneers like Dr. Black put that funding to work researching the effects of alcoholism on children. She published a book called "It will never happen to me", and in the early 80's it took off like wildfire. ACoA groups started springing up all over the world, those were wonderfuly exciting times.
ACoA and research into the family dynamics have grown since then. A lot. Today we know it's not the _alcohol_ that causes the problem, it's the "toxic environment". Children suffer the same effect regardless of what chemical the adults are addicted to, and even if the addiction has nothing to do with chemicals. If the parents are adicted to gambling, or sex, or themselves, it doesn't matter, the children suffer.
There's been a lot of suggestions to change the name to "Adult Children of Toxic Environments", or ACTE. It would be a huge expense in terms of copyright and public relations, and overall people seem to find us anyway. So, for now, we're sticking with the name and welcome anybody who's childhood was a mess due to their parents dysfunction.
So if you want to be hip and cool, and keep up with the times, then technically you _are_ welcome to call yourself an ACoA, my dear Freedom
Mike ((((( hugs )))))