Welcome,
I am very much aware of similar experiences such as yours, age does not seem to matter where alcohol is concerned.
My drinking from 16 yrs old for 35 more years cost me everything, not the monetary costs, but the costs money cannot buy.
I do not understand "addicted to alcohol", as I was not a daily drinker, it's whenever I drank alcohol be it daily or every now and then, I would drink to black-out and the next day I probably drink again despite the calamity from the binge the day before.
The money would run out, I isolate and it got worse and worse, vowing , " I will never drink like that again"....
So why did I keep trying to drink ?
I learnt that the greatest obsession of the real alcoholic is to one day hope he/she can drink like others.
So I was not addicted, I was obsessed, in other words it was in my thoughts, my mind that I thought one day, I'll get it right!
Then I discovered I will never be able to safely drink, due to the way my body deals with alcohol, and only I can tell that inner experience of my drinking if I am truly honest.
The honest truth is, I can never safely drink alcohol at all, due to the way my body has always dealt with alcohol. Always I mean from the days my mom took me to church for a spoon full of church wine, I wanted more right there and then, I was 8 years old and I do not have a problem drinking family, in fact the entire clan never seem to have a problem with alcohol, just me.
So I believe I was born alcoholic in the medical sense of the word.
You may need to consider, that once you take alcohol and find you cannot stop at one drink, and only want more, and that "change" in personality, to consider that there may never ever be a time where you may drink "normally".
If that is the case, then chances are you are alcoholic but only you can admit that to yourself....
All this stuff I learnt in the BB of AA with most meetings of AA and 12 step work.