Once an alcoholic...always an alcoholic

So many people have tried after some period of sobriety to drink or use like normal people. Usually this ends in disaster. In the literature of AA/NA we read so many stories of people that realized that they had the addiction of alcoholism and or drug abuse, got sober for some time, and thought that it would be different if they tried the old game again. We can say that we have never heard a good ending to any of these stories. Most people that are able to get back tell the story that in a short amount of time they were as bad off as they ever were. It just proves to us that if we have the disease of addiction, and we pick up again, we get worse and never better.