Addiction to alcohol made me really start to question whether I had another person living inside me. I even began to refer to that other side of me (the wastes side) as a separate person. That's how crazy alcohol made me. It brings out a side of us that is often quite ugly. That's how powerful this drug is...

You are really yourself when you are sober, and you are never yourself when you drink. That's how I look at it now. Of course, since I don't drink anymore, I don't really have to worry about that other guy ruining things for me ever again. That's one of many gifts sobriety gives us.

Katie,

I have also wondered if I have some sort of personality disorder with the roller coaster feelings I've had since stopping drinking two months ago. I can be very happy at times and then depressed soon after. I think we have to give our bodies plenty of time to normalize before we think about mental problems. During my first week I probably could have been diagnosed with a variety of serious problems.

A complete change of personality was required for me to recover from alcoholism.

Having said that I recall during a ten week stay in the laughing academy at the age of twenty, that I was very keen on having a personality disorder.

A temporal lobe condition sounded good to me. It would explain the mood swings and strange behaviour, and it sounded much more classy than being a dumb old alcoholic.

I spent most of my time their trying to persuade the medics to give me a brain scan. Fortunately for me, they had a clearer view of reality than I did, and they stuck with the alcoholism diagnosis.

Fortunate because, as I found out recently, I was in a hospital for the criminally insane. The alcoholic ward was the only unlocked ward. Odd that I would rather have been mentally ill than be an alcoholic. If I had got my way, they would have transferred me to a locked ward, and I might still be there.

i have a diagnosed personality disorder and i am an alcoholic. i don't know which came first.

i'm nearly 4 and a half months sober. the anger has diminished but i am still often completely overwhelmed by the world in general. at the moment i'm on a slippery depressive slope but i will not drink on it. if i do, all is finally lost.

i'm having a further assessment by the mental health team now i'm sober. my problems are still there, but i am present in the moment to try and deal with them.

so, a yes-and-no answer! i think (hope!) i'm a calmer, kinder person these days. my issue is managing the fact that although i may be sober, i still have the personality disorder. it will never go away, but i have a better chance of learning to live with it now.