Yes, we are heroes

From a support group email list, as translated from the German by a friend:

When You Meet a Sober Alcoholic

When you meet a sober alcoholic
You meet a hero.
His mortal enemy slumbers within him;
He can never outrun his disability.
He makes his way through a world of alcohol abuse,
In an environment that does not understand him.
Society, puffed up with shameful ignorance,
Looks on him with contempt,
As if he were a second-class citizen
Because he dares to swim against the stream of alcohol.
But you must know:
No better people are made than this.

-- Friedrich von Bodelschwingh (1831-1910).