When I started Alanon, he still was drinking. Our cat died and we were fighting so I left and went to the diner and called him to see how he was doing he started screaming and yelling, so I hung up the phone and ate my diner. He wanted something to eat so I brought something to eat and when I came home he had hate signs all around the place, some of then said why did we get married, I hate you and stuff like that. He broke the cell phone. I left and went to a meeting. When I came home he had broke the house phone and his son with by his sister’s house so he wasn’t there either. At that time, I knew it wasn’t safe to be there so I left and went to my parent’s house to stay over night. It took me five years to make that kind of move. Other time we were fighting and I left and went to the drug store and called someone from Alanon and talked for a while, during the call Rick was calling me, but I didn’t answer the phone because I was afraid he was going to be yelling an screaming at me. When I got home, I pulled up to the driveway, which was blocked off by a cop car and ambulance. I walked into my apt and the emt asked me if I was his wife I said yes, and they told me to go into the bathroom and when I got there I saw Rick looking in the mirror with all blood on his shirt. I thought he cut his neck. We had a hard time getting him into the ambulance, he was afraid if he got in he wasn’t going to come back. When we got him into the ambulance, he wouldn’t let me go because he thought he killed me. The EMT told him to loosen up the grip because he was hurting me. When we arrived at the hospital, he was so drunk he didn’t know what was going on. I didn’t bring any money so I asked him if he had any money, he reached in his pocket and then was transfer to a bed. The EMT walked up to me and showed me he had drugs in his pocket. At that time, I didn’t know whether to be mad at him for being so drunk or mad about the drugs. When in the emergency room he handed me a little bottle and told me to hold it, I tossed it in the garbage. When we left the hospital, I was so mad at him that I didn’t ask the hospital for a ride. We started to walk home and I didn’t even realize what direction I was going in. I started walking toward Roselle Park when I thought I was going to be walking to dunkin dounts. I called my sister to come pick me up because he had taking off an I didn’t’. There was time when I left the house and pulled up to a building and was face the wrong way I guess because the Roselle PD knocked on my window and ask me what I was doing and I told her that I was cooling down because I had a fit with my husband, and then she told me not to go home to calm down and then go back.

You're learning. It really does not good to fight with them when they are drunk. It only makes them madder, and it can put you in danger. I know it's hard to break habits - sometimes I felt that fighting together was the only thing my husband and I were really good at. We'd practised it for so long! I was never able to calm my husband down when he started on me, there was never anything I could say. However, when I stopped yelling, at least there was a lot less noise in the house. If I could keep myself calm and compassionate, seeing how really sick he was, the damge done to me by these episodes was a lot less. When I felt less damaged, I was able to stop nagging and trying to make him feel guilty. When he felt less guilty, he had less need to drink to backout stage, and less need to blame it on me when he did. Things slowly got better.