Reply #131: Some alcoholics experience withdrawl symptoms from even short term abstinance

[FedUpWithIt All]

So even without an attempt to withdraw, the need to experience short term periods of abstinence in typical daily life can cause delirium.

I have had extensive exposure to extreme alcoholism in addition to exposure to addicts of other stripes.

I said typical alcohol behavior is practically a non-event compared to the more common behavior of heavy drug use. By typical i mean common alcohol usage.

I have known extreme violence at the hands of both but the violence administered with a drug induced psychosis was much worse IMHO.

I realize from rereading that i was not clear in the post you were responding to. The alcoholic in my life would hallucinate and experience tremors with even a slight abstinence from alcohol. This experience was comparable to the heavy drug addict behavior. Outside of this type of experience, the alcoholic addict was violent, irrational, manipulative and otherwise dangerous in a number of ways BUT could often be reasoned with to a degree and had a somewhat common pattern to their behavior. The drug addictive behavior had much of the same antisocial behavior but was far more unpredictable, had a much more dangerous edge to the violence and was often far more terrifying.