I wasn't. I learned to believe I needed alcohol to have fun to socialize to cope to mourn, and I learned to love alcohol more than life itself. Now I don't know when to say when, because when I am under the influence I always want more, but as far as the mental obsession with drinking and needing alcohol in my life I think I learned and trained my brain to believe that. So if that is the case is it really a disease, or something that we learned?Thoughts?
So, what came 1st, the chicken or the egg? No, I can't say that I was an alcoholic when I was born, but I definitely believe that I was born with alcoholic tendencies and as soon as I began putting alcohol into my body, it was off to the races.
I'm no medical expert, and cant tell you the difference between a disease and a malady, but I believe that alcoholism is a physical medical condition, if not a disease. From as early as I can recall (13 yrs old) as soon as I started drinking, I craved more alcohol and did not have the ability/willpower/self-restraint (call it what you will) to stop drinking until I was intoxicated ti some degree. The mental obsession to drink is a different subject. That came about after having drank for a period of time and realizing that by drinking alcohol, I would get the feeling that I desired. Eventually, after drinking for years, it did get to the point that I physically needed to drink... I was getting the shakes, hang-overs, etc, and knew that a drink would be a brief relief.
Although I don't spend much time worrying about it, I do believe that alcoholism is a physical and mental disease. I think the physical allergy (addiction) comes 1st once you (innocently) drink alcohol. When I did, I blacked out the 1st time and had a great time, and wanted to drink as much as I could get my hands on. Then eventually, I developed the mental obsession to drink in order to deal with life's situations, and eventually due to WD's.