Colin B wrote:Addiction can be described as a 'disease' - but its a mental health condition that is the root cause.
I'm not sure that's correct, although how do you diagnose it?
I've known four, maybe five alcoholics in my life.
I'd say three of them definitely had mental health issues, although you'd have to know these people well to recognise it. They hid their issues well and you'd have to almost live with them to see the little things they did that added up to show that they had mental problems.
Of the other two, I was too young to know one of them well. The remaining one was an alcoholic pure and simple, drinking from morning to night, still functioning after a fashion, and even asking for alcohol on his death bed. I never detected mental health issues with him, although what started him on the evil drink path, I don't know. He was already an alcoholic when I first met him.
