Why do people not want to believe that alcoholism is a disease?
a.) HMO’s and some other insurance companies don’t want to believe anything is a disease! Then, they have to pay for it! But, despite this (and believe me, if there were any loophole at all, they would find it!), they find themselves having to go along with the American Medical Association and admit that it is, indeed a disease. b.) What about other people? Why do people get angry when “it is called a disease”? Let me tell a little vignette here. When I was on tour, training counselors, later that evening in my hotel room, I was watching a talk show on tv. On stage with the host was a group of recovering alcoholics, whose body-language, in each of them, was very arrogant. The audience looked very angry and got angrier each time that one of them said “he had a disease”. I wanted to say to the host at the time, “please just ASK the audience why they feel so angry.”But of course I knew the answer——– whenever I’ve counseled a family member who didn’t want to hear “it’s a disease”, it
