How can someone be an alcoholic but not have it be maladaptive?!


Question: How can someone be an alcoholic but not have it be maladaptive?
My best friend 's mother was an alcoholic and drug addict. My friend clearly inherited the alcoholism. The odd part is that she's not affected by it. In psychology class we were taught disorders are only a problem if they are maladaptive to your life (affecting it negatively), and besides the obvious affect it will end up having on her health, she's operating just fine. she's held down several waitress positions since she was 16 years old, full time, and has never been fired. She's also always moved in to head waitress position where she's worked within mere months. she supports herself and her lifestule well, and is never late or has to take off work, despite that she drinks from the moment her shift ends to like 4 am the next day. even if she has to go in hung over after only two hours sleep, she without fails rises to the occasion. It's affected her relationships, in that she can really only ever stay friends with people who drink like she does (or date ppl who drink like her) but to her it's not a problem. she really doesn't mind. I guess my question is, would this be alcoholism or just plain being a drunk? How is it possible it's not affecting her work. I'm not judging her, I'm fascinated by it, actually. That's why the question.

Answers:

You've hit a very interesting question. The division between health and maladaptive behavior is not always clear, but there are many high-functioning alcoholics. Is there a difference between your friend's behavior and a person who is prescribed a sedative for anxiety?

Obviously, she doesn't have a physician monitoring her "medication" to make sure she isn't having problems with it, but if she is self-monitoring sufficiently, is it really different? Maybe not.

But I would suggest that it is more maladaptive than she cares to admit. She has relationship problems, and she is surrounded by partiers, who are probably not the most emotionally satisfying group to hang out with.

She manages to get to her job, but she is too hung over to consider doing anything else like taking classes so that one day she can have a better job and life that doesn't leave her wanting to drink herself into emotional oblivion.

The addictive nature of alcohol often causes escalation into clear problems. Though your friend has not wrapped her car around a tree (or around a child), she clearly is not making adaptive choices.

Health issues aside, if she were drinking because it is fun (and that were actually true), an arguement could be made that it is not maladaptive.

But she's stuck in a job that she doesn't like with a social and romantic life that she can only tolerate if she is constantly numbed by alcohol. Unfortunately, the alcohol use is stopping her from being able to improve either her work or personal situation. That is the definition of maladaptive behavior, and she is an alcoholic who is so far into denial that she can't even recognize the harm it is doing, even though the harm is clear.




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