Fragmented Intimacy: Addiction in a Social WorldI recall during my early years as a clinical psychologist being asked by hospital staff to speak with a 32-year-old man addicted to alcohol who was being discharged following treatment for pancreatitis. This had been his third admission for the same illness, and hospital practitioners were exasperated by his choice to continue dri- ing despite being repeatedly told it would cause irreparable damage to his pancreas from which he would be unlikely to survive. I met him in a side-room on the ward. He sat in his pyjamas in the corner of the room, thin and ashen looking, with a worried frown fixed across his face. Our conversation was initially stilted and I was trying hard not to replicate the lectures and sermons he was likely to have already received from hospital staff. As we talked I was able to piece together bits of inf- mation about his current circumstances: he lived alone, he was unemployed, and his only family contact was with a brother who visited to check on him occasionally. He started to relax into the conversation and then talked about his long struggles with alcohol: his drinking had begun in his early teens; it had provided him with con- dence and friendships; he had had some serious motor vehicle accidents; he had tried to stop drinking but soon continued; he had lost friends, jobs, and family re- tionships; and in response he had increasingly sought intoxication as a refuge. |
Contents
3 | |
9 | |
A Social World | 18 |
Addiction and Connecting | 36 |
Responding to Addiction | 51 |
Chapter 6 | 61 |
Chapter 8 | 125 |
Family Resources | 197 |
Mobilizing Communities | 220 |
Applications to Practice | 243 |
Looking Ahead | 270 |
Notes | 281 |
Glossary | 311 |
Author Index | 329 |
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abuse accord action activities addictive relationship addictive substance/process addictive system alcohol appear approaches associated assumptions attempts become begin behavior challenge Chapter close clubs collective commitment connectedness connections contexts continue cultural Danny deterioration developed discussed drinking drug early effects emerge emotional enable engage environment example experience explored feel focus fragmentation friends gambling going happen identified important increase individual inset box intimacy intimates involves issues lead leaving less living looking maintain major managed means meetings move nature objects occur opportunities paradigm parents particle particularly periods person physical position possible problems range refers reintegration relation remain replacement response role seen sense social social system social world strategies strength strong talk things thinking tion understanding violence whole
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Page 5 - Alcoholics are those excessive drinkers whose dependence upon alcohol has attained such a degree that it shows a noticeable mental disturbance or an interference with their bodily and mental health, their interpersonal relations, and their smooth social and economic functioning; or who show the prodromal signs of such developments.
Page 5 - Alcoholism is a primary, chronic disease with genetic, psychosocial, and environmental factors influencing its development and manifestations. The disease is often progressive and fatal. It is characterized by continuous or periodic: impaired control over drinking, preoccupation with the drug alcohol, use of alcohol despite adverse consequences, and distortions in thinking, most notably denial.