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I have been coming to this board off and on for about a year and I have posted a couple of times in the past and I know that you are not supposed to give advice, but I am needing some help from some you that have gone through this before. My husband is an alcoholic and he got a DUI on his birthday at the end of March, this was his first one and I told him that in order for me to stay with him he had to completly quit drinking, he said okay. I told him that he needed to go to AA meetings to get help with this and of course he does not think he needs that. Anyway long story short, I know that he has been drinking, not a lot but he has and he has not gotten drunk, usually just has a few and there have been other times when I have smelled it on him and he denies it. I have already told him that I will leave at the end of May when my son finishes school, we would have to move to a different town and I don't want to pull him out of school. Anyway do you think that he is just drinking the bare minimum now just to get by and that if I stay it will get worse and he will go back to his daily routine eventually which was about 12-20 beers in the evening after work. Now he seems to be drinking 1 day a week and it is only a couple. I guess what I am looking for is someone that has been in this same position before and what happened, did the alcoholic go back to their old ways. I just always thought he would not be able to control this well for so long, I though as soon as he took that first drink after being sober for 2 weeks that he would get drunk, he did not he was able to stop after only a couple. Any insight into this would be greatly appreciated! Thanks
Aloha Cassi ....You are not going to get a pat answer to your situation. 12-20 beers a night I'd say from experience, means the man has a problem. Thats 12 20 ounces of alcohol per day and a load for any human being. On the other hand you have a problem also...a problem with his drinking. No one in Al-Anon will give you advise and MIP isn't exactly Al-Anon. There are suggestion. The best suggestion from me and from my experience is before you make any major decisions about anything is that you start attending face to face Al-Anon meetings in your area, regularly for at least 90 days (my experience, my suggestion) and learn as much as you can about the disease that is destroying you marriage and life and may just end up taking your husband down. You will not get solutions over night. It didn't happen over night. Go get with other people who have been where you are and will share their experiences, strengths and hopes with you.
There is much literature on alcoholism at the meetings. I would suggest the dark brown pamphlet about what you should know about this disease. Go get it read it and think about it. Discuss it here if you like also. The Al-Anon hot line number is in the white pages of you local telephone book.
You have answered your own question, u sd he drink & you can smell it & yet he denies it. He lies. A's lie to themselves & everyone else. The fact that he said he's stop drinking for you but then is already doing it again, shows he has a problem. If he could quit so easliy he wouldnt be an alcoholic. It is a progressive family disease. You do have a problem & it wont go away if you leave this man. Your problem will follow & it is quite likely that you will attract another A.
You are making demands on him to get to AA & not drink. He will put your demands (& you) between him & the consequnces of his dui. He will blame you for asking him to stop drinking & be a part of AA. This will allow him to not deal with his issues but just be mad & resentful at you.
I learned that if I wanted something, like say forgiveness, then I had to be forgiving first. You want him in AA, then go to Al-anon & get to work on a program for yourself. Who knows, maybe he will take your lead & do it too. But A's have to do it on their own, for themselves otherwise it usually does not take. They just resent that person & then have an excuse to go back out.
Do not focus on whether he is drinking or not, focus on YOU. Change your own life. This is the most empowering thing you can do for yourself. Looking to someone else will never bring us happiness. Al-Anon meetings will give you support & an understanding. Pick up pamphlets, read & study them. This program does work if you apply the very simple steps & suggestions. I was in a long time b4 I surrenderred to it, I really thought it was so simplistic, it wouldnt work. A member said, "try it & prove me wrong".
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Light, Love, Peace, Blessings & Healing to Us All. God's Will Be Done. Amen.
My EX AH was a binge drinker so he would be sober months and months and then go off on a drunk drugging spree for days on end. Sure there were times he would have one or two but that wasn't the norm.
I saw him last Sunday and he jokingly said that one of his old buddies told him that when he was drinking either something was getting stolen or there was going to be a fight. I don't know because he kept that from me. I only saw him before when he was getting irritable and picking fights (then I knew it was coming) and after when the consequences came raining down (job loss, damaged vehicles, legal issues, hundreds of dollars on the credit card, disappearing for days, etc).
It IS possible for an A to just have a few but that doesn't mean it's "controlled". Either way, ultimatums generally don't work and just cause them to hide the problem from you or lie about it and make you question yourself. You have to focus on YOU and what YOU are going to do despite whatever he does because you can't control that at all. You can't make him drink more or less or not at all, he's an adult and he has his own decisions to make here as do you.
Controlled drinking is a dichotomy if you consider that the point is to stop drinking. If someone that wants to stop drinking is drinking, the stoppage itself is out of control.
In my experience the "control" never lasted, although there were many attempts. Alcoholism is a progressive disease. It slowly and/or abruptly rose it's ugly head. You will never meet an alcoholic that is a controlled drinker for any length of time. I almost smile when I think of my husband's attempts. "I'm controlling it again"..oops, that didn't work. "I'm controlling it again...oops, that time didn't work either"...over and over..
Think of it this way..Does someone that has stopped smoking always smoke one day a week or occasionally smell like cigs because they are in control? That never would work :)
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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.
Go to al anon. That will give you the strength and tools to look at these issues. Al anon has a suggestion that when we make an ultimatum we mean it. Of course some of us have other issues and I think its very valid you don't want to pull your son out of school.
Making a plan be is also a key tool. I think when I made the plan be it actually clarified for me what I needed to do and how. I stopped being obsessed with "him" and started to focus on me.
My husband or ex who is an A would say to you,"do you follow him into the bathroom? Are you will him always in the car?
We have zero control how much they drink. It really doesn't matter. He is an A, any alcohol or other drugs are poison to him.
When we make ultimatums we want to be sure we can stand behind them. Boundaries must have consequences for if they are broken.
No A will go into recovery because someone told them too. His disease is his own.
Our decision is are we willing to accept them as is or not be with them? We all want to be unconditionally loved, an A is no different.
You are asking very wise questions.
Are you going to a face to face alanon group? The more you learn, it will answer so many questions. Getting Them Sober is a great book that will answer almost all your questions.
CBU, I entered therapy in December. It's marriage counseling. I also entered individual couseling and am SO lucky for both different and unique counselors.
I am greatful my husband found a counselor (who is also our MC) who specializes in addiction. Again, this is his opinion, but he said, "Someone who may drink one time a year, can be an addict"
This was at a point when he first suggested my husband was an alcoholic. I wasn't even sure he was right. I thought, "This guy is loony."
After a lot of therapy, books and al-anon, I have come to a LOT of realizations. My husband was a wonderfully high functioning drunk and has almost all the characteristics of a typical drunk. He is now 4 months sober, and still has a WHOLE lot o fthe characters of the disease. He's a great liar, manipulator, controller, and self depricating...the list goes on.
I am sick too. I obsess about him. My thoughts are "what is he doing? Why can't he do things the way we need? Why did this happen?" So many others. The drinking drowns out the real pain for him.
My only other thought is I too set very clear boundaries for my husband. One of which was already crossed. He is sick with a disease, and I have to keep that in mind sometimes. Are you prepared to follow through if your husband crosses any of your boundaries?
