dear Daisy, I'm sorry I was going to reply to you but somehow it got lost in all the other posts, but your post interests me because I was also the same as you as I used alcohol as a 'coping mechanism' but it was one reason which caused my divorce.
Those 8 years of trying to get help must have been torture for you, because if your doctor thinks that you have an addictive personality this shouldn't stop him/her from giving you any antidepressants, although the alcohol will reduce the effectiveness of these AD, but they still may have some effect on you.
The trouble with therapy is that it does exactly what you have said, as they tend to put all the blame on the person who is drinking, so this then turns you off, because for the simple reason it doesn't put much emphasis on why you are drinking and sympathies on everyone else, OK I can accept what they are saying when I was drinking, but there are so many other factors that come into it.
As I said it ended my 25 year marriage, but now I only drink socially, but this is not concerning your post.
When we have issues and are facing or had depression for a long time the moans and groans from comments which we know of, and can do nothing to ease them from someone else, it does get to the point of will I have a drink or won't I.
There is a medication which I have mentioned on this site before on a number of occasions which your doctor can give you, but only if you want to stop drinking, it will erase the want to drink.
If your doctor says that you have an addictive disorder, which I tend to have, because I have OCD, so without addressing your emotional symptoms is unlikely to do anything, so by having treatment and this is not addressed is not going to help you. L Geoff. x
