| Abstract [eng] |
Talking about mental health and person, who has a psychical disorder, functioning in a social environment one of the foremost influence on these processes is person’s self awareness that he is different from others. And this awareness of having a psychical disorder, for example, alcohol addiction, so as encountering with other social constructs and standards that contravene them, can also be understood as barrier and as individuality, that does not necessarily has to interfere in a person’s qualitative functioning in social area. Forasmuch the subject of intrinsic stigma is a new attitude to the expression of stigma both in theoretical and empirical academic fields, this study is meant for the research on features of intrinsic stigma. This have been done using the virtues of qualitative analysis that gives opportunity not to confirm the theory, but to reveal new and maybe even unexpected aspects of the problem. With respect to that addiction to alcohol is a mental and physical health disorder that is disturbing the whole world’s community, the aim of this study is to investigate the features of intrinsic stigma in the context of alcohol addiction. Therefore to embrace the accumulative experience and knowledge about the investigating problem, in the theoretical part of this study the occurrence of alcohol addiction, stigma and intrinsic stigma and the connections between these factors are taken into research. While the qualitative analysis in the practical part accomplished to reveal the experience in life of people with addiction – social workers, whose long time lead abstinent living and doing their work in area, where other addicted people seek help. These reflections of experience helped to discover intrinsic stigma‘s developmental mechanism in the context of alcohol addiction. A person, who grows up in dysfunctional family, which has an intrinsic stigma, and is a part of it‘s system also experiences and gradually internalises this stigma. Inner guilt and weakness because of incapability to control the family’s intrinsic stigma step by step becomes habitual and everlasting self-blaming – hereby inner family’s stigma turns to a personal intrinsic stigma. During this process we can also encounter loneliness, which is a response to the family surroundings and alcohol addiction, which started from the search for the „source of power“ later moves and affects all the fields of life. Thus proceeding self-execration, self-destruction and social an inner disintegration, when reached the point of culmination and suicide, becomes a call of psychical and spiritual help. Gradually the openness to people and their help and new quality of relationship becomes a method of self-defence, which leads to providing help to others using the experience – hereby this process grows on admirable job and self-realization. As follows, addiction from the barrier becomes the gift of life, revealing the goods of spiritual world – wisdom, plenitude and peace of being what you really are. |
