Alcoholism-Disease or
Moral Failing?
Just WHAT is it?

How to describe alcoholism: Disease? Moral Weakness? Individual choice? Sin!? Some say alcoholism is not a disease. Others strongly disagree, including much of the medical community. I say . . . Who Cares?!

I never have quite understood why this subject raises so much controversy. I am an alcoholic in recovery. That much I know for sure. But do I have a disease? Or is that past tense? Did I used to have the disease of alcoholism?

And that raises another debate. Am I recoverING or recoverED?

Since I got sober in 1995, I have not lost one night's sleep over this question of alcoholism - disease or not a disease.

I am just grateful to be sober - VERY grateful for this new life in recovery!


I suspect most recovering alcoholics feel about the same way as me. We don't waste much time in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous, for instance, discussing whether alcoholism is a disease or not. It rarely comes up. We admit freely that we are alcoholics - that we have alcoholism. That's about as far as it goes. And, really, that's all that's important.

Taking The First Step
"My name is _______, and I am an alcoholic."

Actually, now that I remember, I didn't say a word at that first meeting. It would have been the second meeting. Feeling humiliated, disgraced, beaten down, terrified, along with a hundred other emotions, I said it.

That's what taking the First Step is all about. It's about admitting absolute powerlessness over alcohol. It's about acknowledging the seriousness of the circumstances, taking a long look in the mirror and seeing clearly a person with an illness in need of rehabilitation.

At the time I took that long look in the mirror, however, I really didn't much care about the nature of alcoholism. Disease, mental disorder, voluntary behavior, moral failing, physical dependency. I just knew I was in trouble and that maybe, just maybe, there was hope for me.

As I've said many times in my website, I am not a medical doctor or a psychologist. I am just a recoverING alcoholic who has the DISEASE of alcoholism. And that's how I have always referred to myself.

Did you catch the present tense I used in that statement? I still have the disease of alcoholism, and God-willing, I will always be a recoverING alcoholic.

It was Dr. E.M. Jellinek who wrote The Disease Concept of Alcoholism in 1960. There is a very interesting book out there called Jellinek's Disease: The New Face of Alcoholism. It is written by Dr. Kathleen Fitzgerald.

Dr. Fitzgerald has an intriguing theory. She proposes that alcoholism should be referred to as Jellinek’s Disease, in keeping with the naming of diseases like Down’s Syndrome, Parkinson’s Disease, and Alzheimer’s.
Dr. Fitzgerald theorizes in this book that perhaps by the use of a more socially acceptable, compassionate term, alcoholism would be thought of as a bona fide illness, and not as a sin, social indiscretion, or weakness of will.