The material presented
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information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
I am a double winner, in both programs,...AA and Al-Anon. I am 7 and a half months sober and my boyfriend is 5 and a half months sober. We actually both joined AA at the same time and since then, he has relapsed. Of course we have both lied to one another about each other's vices but a couple of nights ago, I woke up in the middle of the night and he was in the bathroom, and as he walked out of the bathroom, he ran into the door. I was freaked by the situation and kissed him to smell his breath and he kissed me, with closed mouth. I asked him what he was doing and he said he was going to the bathroom. There was one other time where he was with his kids a few weeks ago, at their home and I thought I may have smelled something on him. So,..the next day, I obsessed about it all day and came home and looked under the bed in the guest bedroom, where he slept to watch the football game,...plus he likes to fall a sleep to the television,..which I don't like and I found an empty bottle of selzer. I opened the bottle and sniffed and of course, smelled alcohol. I confronted him about it and he says that he hasn't drank in 5 and a half months. I also know that in the past, it was quite obvious that he had been drinking...bloodshot eyes in the morning, blotchy skin and the smell of alcohol oozing from every pore. So,...it is suspicion, of course. He says that it was an old bottle and I haven't really looked under the bed in months. I have been reading posts and I have been praying. I have been praying for my higher power to show me what I need to know, when I need to know it and I have been focusing on myself and my own recovery,...but I am having trouble really letting go.
The problem is that it takes me to my dark place. The way I used to cope with his drinking was that I drank and used myself. That is how I dealt with my father's drinking. I have been trying to practice detatchment with love but I am isolating from him and he may not have even done anything. I can't be with an active A,...I did threaten him when he relapsed last time and told him I would leave if he did it again so I fear that he may lie out of fear that I will leave. I am really serious about my own recovery and sobriety and I am afraid that being with someone who is active will jeopardize my own sobriety so I have been praying for my higher power to protect me.
Some days I don't feel like I double winner, sometimes I feel like a double loser. Are there any other's in both programs?
"I have been praying for my higher power to show me what I need to know, when I need to know it and I have been focusing on myself and my own recovery,...but I am having trouble really letting go."
I prayed for the same thing, show me what I need to know, when I need to know it. That felt right at the time, in hindsight my focus was still on my AexH. My prayers have changed some, when I have those suspicious, frustrated, scared feelings I release them to my HP, asking for them to be removed from me and allow me to let go as gracefully as possible.
Your BF may relapse, or he may not. You may relapse, or you may not. There is no certainty either way. The only thing you have control over is yourself. Past behaviors and fears may be that drinking is how you dealt with it before but this is not before. Repeating the same behavior is what you are now attempting to change. The awareness that this is a behavior of yours is a chance to make a plan for yourself now. Listen to your inner whispers. You are powerless over what he does. You are NOT powerless over your reactions. Nothing he does can make you drink. Just as you can't make anyone else drink.
Your focus on suspicions are understandable. Almost every person in Alanon has went on the obsessive hunt for bottles. You know what it accomplishes? It makes us even more upset, more insane, more insecure, more focused on something totally out of our control. It's a huge waste of time and mental angst.
People come to sobriety/recovery at their own rate. Accept that his recovery (or lack of) may be different then yours. Some relapse a few times before finding their way, some spiral downward back in to being active, some never relapse. No matter what, he has to do it his way, not yours. That being said, you have every right to whatever it is you need to do to protect your own sobriety (and yours only) in a healthy manner.
Keep coming back, Christy
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If we think that miracles are normal, we will expect them. And expecting a miracle is the surest way to get one.
I too am in both programs. My situation is slightly different as I have a 20 year old AD at home who binge drinks, and there is no alcohol allowed in my home ever, nor does she come home when she is drinking.
She often goes months at a time without drinking, but tends to engage in unhealthy relationships in between weekend binges.
I can tell you that early in my sobriety my sponsor warned me to stay out of relationships, period, and I refused to listen. The end result was in my 4th year of recovery I got involved with someone else sober in AA, he was not healthy, I was not healthy, he relapsed, and I went down the tubes shortly thereafter.
Over 18 years later he is still drinking, and is still married to an active alcoholic he met after he relapsed and left me. He couldn't have cared less that I threw my own recovery out the window.
Today I will do whatever it takes to ensure my own recovery. No one is worth throwing my recovery away over.
-- Edited by Tenderheartsks at 11:06, 2008-12-11
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"If a dog will not come to you after having looked you in the face, you should go home and examine your conscience." - Woodrow Wilson
congrats on your sobriety , liv u know there is nothing u can do about him so stop trying to second guess yourself trust what u see . kissing him to see if he has been drinking ,looking for bottles etc is such a waste of time I am sure u can find something better to do with free time - like getting a good nites sleep *hugs* Look after your own sobriety it has to come first , I hope yor going to diff meetings than he is you need space to recover . If you have an Al- anon daily reader go to page on July 14 do what it says to the best of your ability and your life will get better . there is alot on that page work what u can that page kept me busy for 6 months until i was doing what it suggested . good luck Louise
the A (who never even attempted sobriety) used to hide his stuff. He hid things in the shed (which I never had a key to). He also hid it in a whole series of lies.
I know for me the statements if he does x I will do y set me up a lot. I wasn't in a space to do y. So I sort of set myself up. For me it was about what were my limits. Personally I have my own limits on what I'll do these days. Snooping around after people is out. I did that, read the phone calls, obsessed, obsessed some more and all it told me was that I had come off the rails.
For me personally the issue wasn't so much what did he do it was what was I doing, snooping around made me crazier. Obsessing made me plain ill. Denial didn't help either of course and then there was the obessive investing more and more into the relationship. Clearly the relationship came before my sense of "me".
Being a double winner can be a great thing. I know I've plastered myself with labels, these days its numero uno "human" rather than pathological mess. So I do try to behave with some dignity no matter what's going on arund me. Of course I was once the screaming banshee that many label the alanoner. Screaming is no longer my forte. Detaching is.
I just love this post and all the shares that came back. Program and program people, for me are the best in the world. Program people are so very human expecting to be something more. I think that tuning into a meeting of either program from time to time is God's way to catching the humor channel.
I am also a member of both programs. In early Al-Anon the info was be one, marry one or do both. I did both. I got into AA 9 years after continuous membership in Al-Anon and that's 9 years without a drink. Relapse is not an option for this alcoholic if he wants to enjoy a future in the program with all the miracles to witness yet.
I've done what you related, the kiss and smell game. Why didn't I believe after she would fall thru the front door of the house at 7 in the morning and 1 hour before she made it to work. A part of cunning powerful and baffling is that I change my expectations in the face of other evidence. An alcoholic will drink...especially if not working a program as I know it is suggested. An Al-Anon will continue to check up and demand "do it for me because I want you to or else..." It wasn't even hope that I used with my alcoholic...it was denial. When I accepted that the disease moved the way it did because that's the way it was I stopped checking up on her and....I stopped trying to teach her how to drink. Insanity!! I hated when she binged, when missing for days, the infidelity (I happened to be one of the "guys"), the theft and all those other judgments and rationizations and experiences I used to support my superiority and make demands and set boundaries for her. I was brain dead when I gave her a demonstration on how to really drink after finding her in a bar and then sitting her down with me and cramming 7 scotch neats one after the other to "show" her how it's done. What boundary was that? She told me just after that "I wish I could drink like you." Of course she did everyone wishes to drink without negative consequences. I just did not know what was happening to me. I knew what was happening to her and to us because of HER drinking and I wanted her to change it...not me. I didn't know and didn't know that I didn't know. Dumb as a stick.
AA is about not drinking...for me. Al-Anon is about changing my power and control thoughts and feelings and behaviors. I haven't drank in 30 years. The last time I tried to control and manipulate a situation to my favor was this afternoon. In Al-Anon we don't get anniversary chips with roman numerals on it and we don't stop counting when we relapse. We dive into the suggestions and the literature and leave everyone else escape from our grasp. We're already too much to hold on to and new help.
There are so many members of the other program coming into Al-Anon for qualifying reasons. Most I've talked to just love the growth spurt.
Keep coming back. Let go of your drinker of choice.
Thank you everyone so much for your replies. You all don't know how much you have helped me. A lot of praying has helped too. After praying over and over and over for the compulsion to go through his things, question him and look for bottles to be lifted,...my prayers were finally answered. I basically prayed that my higher power lead me through this, show me what I need to know, when I need to know it, without action on my part and I think my prayers were answered. After a night "with the kids" he comes home smelling like beer. I could smell it from the next room actually, and earlier when I talked to him on the phone that day...he was slurring his words. What is weird is that I started to question him, asking him why he was slurring but I stopped myself and figured it wasn't worth it. What is strange is that I haven't even confronted him about that day yet. Things seem a bit different...Sunday night he went over to his sponsor's house, like usual, and is going about everything like usual but it seems like the more I am ask for help from my higher power, the more I get and I have decided that I am not going to confront him until I find out how I am going to do it and what I am going to do. If I confront him now, it could get ugly. I do want to leave because of this but I am not ready. It is almost like I need more convincing. I was talking to my AA sponsor about it and I was telling her that the more time that goes by, the more I second quess myself,...like I ask myself,.."Did I really smell all of that."...not to mension the fact that I asked to borrow his laptop when he returned and found an instant message to another female that I find totally inappropriate,...but I didn't say anything. I want to make a decision, but I am not sure I want to make it before Christmas. Plus,...I am trying to get some more meetings under my belt and talk to some more people...and pray...before I make my move. I want to approach him with love and understanding...but I also need to leave if he is really back out there. I am finding that obsessing over his behavior is almost as bad a obsessing over the drink and the drug and I don't want it to lead to relapse for me.
I am baffled myself. I am tired of second guessing the whole thing. One would think that smelling alcohol on him would be enough but I guess I would like to see another episode to be sure!!
