Union and aggression: The married life of alcoholic women

This study employed a qualitative approach, carried out with female members of Alcoholics Anonymous groups, with the aim of understanding the meaning they attach to their marital relationship. The information was collected through in-depth interviews which were recorded, transcribed, codified and categorized using content analysis methodology. The data were interpreted considering Symbolic Interactionism. The narratives show that these women have relationships with people who consume alcohol, leading them to initiate or increase their own consumption, a situation that ensures the couple stay together, attributing to alcohol an affective bonding in the beginning, redefining this meaning in the interaction and then attributing it to the aggression