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Dry drunk is a term used, often disparagingly, by members of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and by substance abuse counselors who subscribe to the AA theory of alcoholism to describe the recovering alcoholic who is no longer drinking but whose thought processes are considered to continue to be distorted by the thought patterns of addiction.

Not yet "sober"

This person is not thought to be truly sober, and thus, a distinction is made in AA between being dry, or abstinent from alcohol consumption, and being sober, or living a life of abstinence based on the principles of AA. In AA, sobriety is a state that can only be obtained by both abstaining from alcohol and working the twelve steps of AA because, according to the AA Big Book (page 64), alcohol(ism) is only a symptom of the underlying spiritual disease directly addressed by the Twelve Steps. If that malady is successfully treated, its symptoms (including, but hardly limited to alcohol consumption) cease to be a concern.

AA's 12 step program

Although dry drunk is not a medical diagnosis, the phrase is used by members of AA to describe a group of symptoms which they believe come about as a result of not following the twelve steps. The steps include the inventory and confession of character defects and wrongs as well as prayer and communion with a Higher Power, which can be any religion or form of spirituality, though the non-religious are often told that their higher power can be anything, even a rock, or a tree. While this directly and explicitly conflicts with the Big Book ("Many of us said to our Maker. . ." , "My Creator, . . ." , "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out" ), it is a tactic often employed by some in AA to make the program more palatable and less offensive to newcomers. It is believed in AA groups that a person who quits drinking without embracing the tenets of AA as the means to quit drinking will experience many unpleasant feelings and exhibit maladaptive behaviors. These feelings are said to include despair, anger, rage, depression of mood or clinical depression, and anxiety and are expressed in behavior stemming from those types of feelings. This dry drunk state is thought to lead, virtually without exception, to the resumption of an even more intensive and harmful drinking spree.

Joan Mathews Larson, Ph.D author of the book "Seven Weeks to Sobriety" believes that the clinical manifestation of the symptoms described by AA as "Dry Drunk" or "Dry Drunk Syndrome" are, instead, an alcoholism-related form of the blood-sugar disorder hypoglycemia (See: )

Notes

1. Alcoholics Anonymous. A.A.'s Twelve Steps.

See also

• Alcoholism
• Alcoholics Anonymous
• Al-Anon
• Substance abuse
• Rational Recovery
• Moderation Management
• Teetotalism
• hypoglycemia
• George W. Bush

External links

• Dry Drunk Syndrome Minnesota Recovery Pages
• Dry Drunk definition at About.com
• http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-drydrunk.html

• Alcohol abuse