The Adjustment of the Family to the Crisis of Alcoholism

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Abstract
The onset of alcoholism in family members is viewed as precipitating a cumulative crisis for the family. Seven critical stages were delineated: attempts to deny the problem, to eliminate the problem, family disorganization, attempts to reorganize in spite of the problem, efforts to escape the problem, reorganization of part of the family, and recovery and reorganization of the whole family. Each stage affects the form the following one will take. The family finds itself in an unstructured situation which is undefined by the culture. Thus it is forced to evolve techniques of adjustment by trial and error. The unpredictability and lack of structure in the situation engenders anxiety in family members which gives rise to personality difficulties. Factors in the culture, in the environment, and within the family situation, prolong the crisis and deter the working out of permanent adjustment patterns. With arrest of the alcoholism, the crisis enters its final stage as the family attempts to reorganize to include the inactive alcoholic and make adjustments to the changes which have occurred in him.

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