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abstainer

noun

No English definition recorded for this entry.

L315957 on Wikidata ↗

Wiktionary

Pronunciation: /æbˈsteɪ.nɚ/

noun

Etymology: From Middle English absteyner, equivalent to abstain + -er.

  1. One who abstains; especially, one who abstains from something, such as the use of alcohol or drugs, or one who abstains for religious reasons; one who practices self-denial.

    To one of my very nervous patients, who was an abstainer, whose fancy was fixed on his mother, and who repeatedly dreamed of climbing stairs accompanied by his mother, I once remarked that moderate masturbation would be less harmful to him than enforced abstinence.

    He was a total abstainer and a nonsmoker, had no recreations except a daily hour in the gymnasium, and had taken a vow of celibacy, believing marriage and the care of a family to be incompatible with a twenty-four-hour-a-day devotion to duty.