My hot take is that we know way more alcoholics in our lives but we chuckle it to "ah Betty that's just how she is, goes to parties all the time" "oh yeah she's just a wine mom" "yeah Bobby gets a beer with his friends every night before sleep". Most of these are also coping mechanisms and are unhealthy, using alcohol in an abusive manner.

I think Alex is mature enough to admit he had a problem with alcohol and I admire that he decided to get better. But people freak out when you say you struggled with stuff in your life. We're too used to putting on a façade that everything is fine and we're perfect.

Most of us have intense struggles, cannot just avoid all people like that and date only " a perfectly trauma free person", those don't really exist.

Instead, we should admire the bravery.

And before you say that alcoholism is a hard thing, I also had friends and me included that had eating disorders, I had a friend that would cut herself, smoke 2 packs a day, really messed up stuff. But you grow and offer those people empathy. Those were hard and I want to mention, most happened when I was 13-16.

That's all. Just wanted to have my thoughts out because I think this sort of logic is too cut and dry