The disease of alcoholism occurs in three successive and progressive stages. Moreover, the transition from one stage to the next is smooth and often imperceptible. The disease does not happen suddenly. Before the first stage of alcoholism is detected, there is a long stage of regular drinking. The duration of the period can last from one to ten years. If a person has a predisposition to alcoholism, then the initial stage passes rather quickly, sometimes several months. Therefore, the concept of “cultural” drinking is not as harmless as it seems at first glance. All alcoholics once started with “cultured” drinking.
Anyone who systematically misuses alcohol has a risk of being exposed to the disease of alcoholism. A complete refusal to drink alcohol can stop the course of the disease. If breakdowns occur, regardless of their number and duration, the disease will begin to progress. Any breakdown not only brings a person back, but also aggravates the addiction to an addiction, worsening his condition.
The first stage of alcoholism is indicated by the fact that a person is fond of drinking alcohol, but does not know how to drink. There is a craving for alcohol and there is no sense of proportion. Due to the tendency to drink out of place, in a state of intoxication, a person can “break wood”. Experts call this state a loss of quantitative and situational control. At this stage of the disease, the state of alcoholism the next day is more or less satisfactory. There is no need for a hangover. However, a person often does not remember partially or completely the events of the previous day, i.e. amnesia occurs. As a rule, at the first stage of alcoholism, drinking does not stop. The stage lasts for several years, there is almost one hundred percent probability of transition to the second stage.
In the second stage of the disease, alcoholism is added to the symptoms of the first with withdrawal symptoms. It is he who is considered the main symptom of alcoholism. In some cases, an alcoholic may not have a hangover in the morning, but endure until the evening. In more severe cases, the patient endures until lunchtime. The most difficult case is considered when the drunkenness begins in the morning, the further, the earlier. If an alcoholic gets drunk in the early morning or even at night, then this is already a binge. Here, serious problems appear in the family and at work, up to the loss of both. Life becomes uncontrollable because alcohol takes the first place in thoughts, and everything else fades into the background. Some drink constantly, some intermittently, but the disease progresses. In the case of the second stage of alcoholism, they stop drinking or try to do so, because health problems come.
The third stage is the final alcoholism in the disease. This is the stage of degradation. It is characterized by severe withdrawal symptoms, liver damage, prolonged binge drinking, impotence, psychosis, dementia, impaired memory and the work of all organs and high mortality. The life of such a person is already lost. However, even at this stage, they sometimes stop drinking, already in old age. However, it is too late to live a normal life.
In the recent past, such a category of the disease, alcoholism, as a household drunkard, was adopted. This seems to be not yet an alcoholic who abuses alcohol. At present, such a term has been excluded from the scientific classification, since there is no difference between an alcoholic and a drunkard. This assessment is social rather than medical. A more “gentle” name for alcoholism is addiction. Nevertheless, whatever you call this disease, it does not change the essence of the matter. The main thing is to know that the problem is present and requires an immediate solution.
In addition to the disease itself, alcoholism, which is cured by the exclusion of alcohol from the life of the patient, alcohol is completely contraindicated for those people who are completely healthy, do not experience libations, but have an individual unpredictable reaction to alcoholic beverages. When taking even small doses of alcohol, they become aggressive and deranged. If a person does not remember himself that he was doing during several hours of insanity, then this condition is called pathological intoxication. Such people are prone to illegal actions, although their aggression is often unmotivated . The main characteristic feature of pathological intoxication is precisely the intake of small doses of alcohol. The reasons for this pathology are unknown, but the fact is that if something like this has come to light at least once, it will surely repeat itself.
In some cases, the consciousness of a person in a state of intoxication is not disturbed, but a seemingly decent person becomes unbearable after taking small doses of alcohol. A person sticks to interlocutors with idiotic questions, carries him to accomplish feats, can drive, becomes whiny or angry. However, similar manifestations occur in alcoholics. Unbalanced personalities differ from patients by the presence of a feeling of shame and awkwardness for their behavior, and alcoholics continue to drink as if nothing had happened.