abstainer
nounUS /æbˈsteɪ.nɚ/
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.1920, Sigmund Freud, chapter V, in M. D. Eder, transl., Dream Psychology: Psychoanalysis for Beginners, New York: The James A. McCann Company:
- 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.1949, George Orwell, chapter 4, in Nineteen Eighty-Four:
1 more example
- 'Never himself touches a drop of the stuff, you understand. Having been an abstainer since the age of seven or something. A clerky figure even as a child.'1990, William Trevor, “Family Sins”, in The Collected Stories, New York: Viking, published 1992, page 1105:
- Synonyms
- Nazarite, teetotaler
- Derived terms
- nonabstainer