Depressive disorder and alcohol dependence syndrome often appear as comorbid mental disorders, which in turn affects the mutual development and makes it difficult to treat it effectively. Although it is often unclear which disorder is the cause and which is the result, yet we roughly distinguish people addicted to alcohol in primary and secondary depression. Cognitive-behavioral theory is based on the assumption that the mental distortion is the one which exacerbates depression, therefore the psychotherapeutic work is primarily based around the restructuring of the cognitive structure of the individual. This type of therapy is an excellent administered in group therapy, which is important for people who suffer from alcohol dependence syndrome. The club for recovering alcoholics significantly contributes in solving every day problems and contributes to learning the self-control in stressful situations, the members are encouraged to maintain long-term abstinence and helps to restore social, working and family relationships. Through the use of real-life situations and behavioral techniques which are given in the form of homework, the individual consolidates the newly acquired cognitive principles. In the study, which was carried out on members of the club for recovering alcoholics, we were looking for differences among the cognitive structure in people addicted to alcohol, who show depressive symptoms and those who do not show this symptomatology. We tried to explain the different life circumstances that led interviewed individuals to the alcohol dependence syndrome. We found out that cognitive structures at people who searched comfort in alcohol because they either suffer from primary depression, stress, anxiety or live in difficult life circumstances, are very similar. For all interviewees, drinking was some kind of consolation for their bad condition at the time and that is why we confirmed the concept of self-treatment of depression with alcohol.

Depresivna motnja in sindrom odvisnosti od alkohola se pogosto pojavljata kot komorbidni duševni motnji, ki izmenično vplivata na medsebojni razvoj ter otežujeta učinkovito zdravljenje. Čeprav je velikokrat nejasno, katera motnja je vzrok in katera posledica, pri osebah, odvisnih od alkohola, na grobo ločimo primarno in sekundarno depresijo. Kognitivno-vedenjska teorija temelji na predpostavki, da so miselna izkrivljanja tista, ki poglabljajo depresijo, zato je psihoterapevtsko delo v prvi vrsti prestrukturiranje kognitivne strukture posameznika. Tovrstna terapija se odlično aplicira tudi v skupinskem delu, saj igra pri osebah, ki trpijo za sindromom odvisnosti od alkohola, zelo pomembno vlogo. Klub zdravljenih alkoholikov bistveno pripomore pri reševanju vsakdanjih problemov in prispeva k učenju obvladovanja samopomoči v stresnih situacijah, člane spodbuja pri ohranjanju dolgoročne abstinence ter pomaga pri ponovni vzpostavitvi socialnih, delovnih in družinskih odnosov. Z uporabo situacij iz realnega življenja in vedenjskih tehnik, v obliki domačih nalog, posameznik utrjuje na novo usvojene kognitivne principe. V raziskavi, ki je bila opravljena med člani Kluba zdravljenih alkoholikov, smo iskali razlike v kognitivni strukturi pri osebah, odvisnih od alkohola, ki kažejo depresivne simptome in tistimi, ki ne kažejo te simptomatike. Skušali smo razložiti tudi različne življenjske okoliščine, ki so vprašane posameznike pripeljale v alkoholizem. Ugotovili smo, da so kognitivne strukture pri osebah, ki so bodisi zaradi primarne depresije bodisi zaradi težkih življenjskih okoliščin, stresa ali anksioznosti iskali tolažbo v alkoholnih pijačah, zelo podobne. Ker je pri vseh vprašanih pijača predstavljala tolažbo za slabo počutje, smo potrdili tudi koncept samozdravljenja depresije z alkoholom.