positive or negative, the drinker is projecting. A conscious, rational grasp of reality does not exist for the alcoholic. The outcome of these psychological factors--rationalization, suppression, and projection--is mental mismanagement. Mental mismanagement and the repressed feelings of the alcoholic create a state in which judgment is progressively impaired. In a state of impaired judgment, alcoholics are incapable of recognizing that they are not functioning normally. Consequently, spontaneous insight is not possible.
This distorted perception of reality continues as long as the person continues to drink. The progressive nature of alcoholism creates physiological problems as well as psychological ones. The alcoholic may enter an amnesia-like state. Although called blackouts, this state is not to be confused with drinking to the point of passing out or losing consciousness. On the contrary, during blackouts alcoholics can go right on functioning as if they were totally aware of what was going on around them and would remember wh
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