You may have a drinking problem, even if you never hit rock bottom:
Under consideration is a paradigm shift in the way we view mental illness, including substance use. At the core of this new paradigm is the idea that some conditions might be better thought of as existing on a spectrum rather than in terms of discrete categories such as alcohol abuse and dependence. … The almost alcoholic zone is actually quite large. The people who occupy it are not alcoholics. Rather, they are men and women whose drinking habits range from barely qualifying as almost alcoholics to those whose drinking borders on abuse.
Joyner thinks the authors define almost alcoholics too broadly.
The Dish 