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My wife went in to rehab last week. It's been 8 days. She's a party drunk. Her parties are herself and a six-pack on the beach. She's 43. We had been fighting about drinking for a few years, and recently (two months? two years?) she'd been getting a six-pack and riding around after she finished her work for the day. She would stop on the beach and sit there awhile. She would always come home and take care of the kids and cook dinner, etc.
She went to counseling a couple of months ago. She began taking Lexapro. I told her if she drank again that I would take the kids and leave. The lawyer says I have every right. She drank again. She begged to come back. I let her. This has been nearly two months.
Last Thursday she didn't go to a job she had in the evening. She got beer and stopped at the beach around 4 or 5 in the afternoon. After a few beers, she decides her underwear looks enough like a bikini so she takes off her clothes. She begins partying with some people on the beach. She thinks they're college kids. They're homeless people. Probably by 7 or 8 p.m. she was completely wasted. I tried calling her, and she was very drunk. I tried not to pressure her, and even asked if she was having a break down. She quit answering the phone about 11:15 p.m. at which time I left my 15 and ten year olds at home to go look for her. I returned after about 30 minutes so I could be with my kids. I called police and hospitals for the next three hours. Police did welfare concern searches on the beach and did not find her.
No sleep and, after dropping the kids off at school, she answers the phone at 7:15 a.m. She tells me she was raped by a black man. I'm freaking. She talks to police, goes to ER. I finally get to see her in ER and say we need to go to a rehab facility. She agrees, she is admitted that day. On the way and while sitting there waiting to be admitted, she starts crying and telling me all the drinking she's been doing in the past two years. She tells me she's been lying to me. She tells me she's 'xxxx' on me. She tells me she doesn't know why I'm still here. I sit and listen, as I have been trying to get her to talk for years. She has a lot of underlying issues besides our differences.
She also said she is fully to blame and put herself in this position. I have warned her that something tragic would happen, including the possibility of rape. She agreed that everything I said came true. She led him on throughout the night, including kissing hiim on the beach, and tried to stop it when it came down to it. He got physical, so she submitted to protect herself. I believe her. She is not pressing charges. I don't blame her, and support her in this position.
So I'm on the outside, no counseling, no one coming over to check on me, taking care of her job, the family, the job, the house. Everyone tells me how strong I am. A few phone calls to check on her, but my gut is wrenching. My heart is in my stomach.
Tonight in our five minute conversation, she says we have a lot to talk about and that I am why she's been drinking. I'm not calling to ask questions, only to check on her. She's making reference to our upcoming counseling session next Monday at the facility. It will be my first time to talk to a professional about this. I see no point in going to anyone until we can sit down together and figure out the issues.
This isn't fair. Please tell me that her counseling isn't letting her blame others for her actions. All I've asked from her is hope. I asked her if she was coming home when she's out. She says yes, and that there is hope. I don't think it's fair for her to say something about blame when she's getting 16 hours of counseling a day, and I'm taking care of everything on the outside with no support. I don't think it's fair for the doctors and counselors to help her find someone to blame, if that's the case.
Please tell me there's hope.
-- Edited by canadianguy on Sunday 13th of September 2009 10:39:56 AM
First of all (((((((((welcome))))))) those are hugs.......you have found a place you can get help.....we will listen...you are not alone.....You said, you see no use in going for help until you go to the counselor of hers.....well...the thing is this is a family disease....everyone is affected by her drinking....try and find a f 2 f alanon meeting in your area...I promise you it will help....
She is going to blame you for awhile, she has to blame someone usually the A blames the ones they love the most.
I know first hand how hard it is to pick up the pieces of someone going into rehab...try and remember where there is life there is hope, she is in rehab she is alive and right now today she is sober...that is a start.....
Now start on you, your kids are very lucky to have a loving father to care for them. The thing is after living with an A for so very long you are sick as well....once you start understanding t he disease then you can start working your own program....
Sounds to me like you are powerless....I know you think you can fix it, you are to blame but dear friend you can't and you are not
She is responsible for her program and you for yours......I always thought I could fix things but never could.
Anyway.........WELCOME.......I will pray for you.....and your family.......remember where there is life there is hope!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Do you (or anyone here) know of any situations where early onset of menopause causes irrational behavior? She has never done anything like I've described above. I believe her. She's always come home. She doesn't go places in the evening. Her drinking has only been daytime activities.
For most of this week, I have stopped looking for answers. However, tonight's conversation has me thinking too much again. I wonder what caused this completely irrational decision to drink 18 beers in just a few hours and befriend these people? I mean, she drove them to the store for more beer, cigarettes. Nothing was stolen from her at all. She admits to behavior that was flirty and leading to the attacker.
-- Edited by iSaint on Saturday 12th of September 2009 10:12:42 PM
I would also like to say Welcome!! If you keep coming back you will slowly begin to feel better. It didn't take one night to make all this happen so it's not going to take one night to fix things.
In my opinion I would say the counselors probably aren't blaming YOU. But I have no clue what they told her. There is a saying: How do you know when A's are lying? When their lips are moving. And I find this true more and more each day. They are very selfish people and from what I have learned they love to put the blame on others in way they can. I feel they do this because it takes the pain away from them. My A did this so often and lied so often I honestly think he started to believe his own lies. It's sad, but alcoholism is a disease and we are powerless over it just as they are.
We can't change, fix, cure or help them. They need to want to get help on their own. Look in the phone book for alanon meetings in your area. Keep posting here, visit the chat room (we have 2 meetings a day). the more and more I keep coming back the more hope I gain.
The people here are great. We know what you are going there we have been there. We wont give you advice or tell you what to do, we share what we have learn and done. You take what you like and leave the rest.
Hugs, Melissa21
__________________
"Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip." Will Rogers
I believe you won't find any cases where early onset of menopause causes irrational behavior. The fact is that alcoholism is a progressive disease. Unless it's treated it gets worse and worse. And the results are practically the definition of irrational behavior. In the early days I had a lot of "why"s too about why my husband drank and drank and couldn't/wouldn't/didn't stop despite every kind of trouble and disaster. I think for me the answer came down to: he had problems -- internal ones -- and a long time ago he'd begun to try to solve them with alcohol. Of course alcohol doesn't solve anything, it just gets you numb, and then when you stop being numb, you've got the same problems plus more problems. But the drinker doesn't get any practice solving problems, so what to do? Drink some more.
Anyway, that's the take on it I arrived at personally. After a while alcohol has its own momentum. And to the rest of us it looks crazy. The drinkers just look crazier and crazier, and we get sucked into the craziness too, to where we're going along with behavior we never would have thought we would stand.
You're right that she's not appreciating the enormous lengths you're going through to keep it all together. She's reeling under the weight of it all. But you need and deserve enormous support. Please do get to a face-to-face Al-Anon meeting. Those people will understand exactly what you're going through. We've all been through it too. You've come to the right place. Your wife has people helping her 24 hours a day. Now you deserve your own support system.
There is always hope , first thankfully your children are old enough to be left alone for an hr or two , find Al-Anon meetings for yourself fast , your going to need support from people who understand where your at and what your going thru. Blaming you is a sign she is not ready to take responsibility for her own behavior , Your not the reason she drinks regardless of what she may say , your not powerfull enough to make anyone drink or stop . We have a part in this mess , we enable it's what we do , until we stop doing for them what they should be doing for themselves nothing will change . We believe the lies , we lie for them , we make excuses for thier crappy behavior and we do it over and over again . thinking this time it will be diff . it is it gets worse . this is a progressive disease . And I doubt that a councelor would be helping your wife blame you for her dilema .if they are find a new one . Just my opinion .
Aloha iSaint...There is always hope. You're story is my own, most if not all of it. Doesn't matter right now. If I could make it out of the jungle with the help of the membership of the Al-Anon Family Groups so can you. The program turns the lights on to the darkness so that you can find the doors and windows to let the outside in and have better more positive perspectives. I've been thru the hospitals, police, emergency, missing person and more part of this disease. I've heard the report of the police rescuing her from some "Joe" who had baited her drink at a bar and was about to perform a date rape. I've looked for her vehicle maybe wrapped around a pole and I've zoomed at light speed thru most of the bar and night club parking lots in hopes of finding her somewhere. I've sat the Highway Patrol dispatch communications board and responded to the patrol office calling in her ID after pulling her over for drunk and biligerant...and I've been a member of the World-wide Fellowship of the Al-Anon Family Groups that taught me how to snatch my life back from the grips of alcoholism. There is more to the story but...the hope part comes after looking up the number for Al-Anon in the white pages of your local telephone book and getting the places and times that the face to face meetings go on. When you get there get and read as much literature about alcoholism and alcoholism and you and the family and....all of it and read it all. Sit down and listen with an open mind, your sanity and your life may depend upon it. Listen for the suggestions from the membership (we are not a cult that speaks in a foreign tongue) unless you've missed the right door...could happen I guess but not to me so far. Listen for our slogans and recovery talk and after the meeting hang around and get phone numbers of other members for support if they do that. Keep the numbers handy for when you start to fritz by thinking you're alone. You will never have to be alone again as long as you remember to come back here and to the meetings. We don't forget easily or otherwise those who need support and who support us on our journey also. More is coming and you have to come back to get it.
Thanks for the male perspective, Jerry. I think I'm looking for that. I just think this is so bizarre, beyond the actual drinking. There is an al-anon group around the corner. I went by last week to introduce myself but didn't stay. The first counseling session for my wife and me is Monday, and the al-anon is right after that. Not sure if I'll make it as I need to get home to my kids. I know it's there, though.
Welcome!! THere is so much amazing Experience, Strength and Hope before me. First, you are not alone. I would strongly urge you to try to get to a face to face meeting. Sometimes it takes ALOT of courage to get our bodies to a meeting where we are physically with people, but it does help.
Alcoholism is a progressive illness. The longer it goes on, the more out of control it gets. Our loved ones who could manage to still cook dinner when they were drunk, end up being able to do less and less and the disease takes hold. Our disease is progressive as well - we, too, keep trying to control, help, guilt our loved one into changing and build resentment and anger when they continue to do what they are doing despite OUR efforts.
I thought that when my A got sober all my problems would be solved. They weren't. Because hte problem wasn't my A, it was ME. This program is amazing. It teaches me a new way to live, so that I can take care of myself and learn to live MY life whether or not hte alcholic chooses sobriety or not. I came here confused and broken and looking for answers as to how I could ensure that my loved one would "Stay" sober. I can remember feeling so angry when my A went to rehab. I was furious that he had created this MESS and then he got to go away and be "healed" and I had to stay and deal with the mess that was our life. It felt unfair and it didn't make sense. I stayed in my anger for awhile but, I kept looking for relief. The only thing that worked was Al-anon and LISTENING to those who had gone before me. When I was in enough pain, I decided to find a better way - to try something new because what I WAS doing was not working. I was clinging so tightly to my A's rehab stay and recovery and my life was at a total standstill. All of my good feelings/peace came from whether or not HE was doing well in his treatment facility and that WE had hope for a wonderful life once he was discharged. I have learned that if two people arent' working active programs OR if one person remains sick and the other finds recovery, the relationship simply cannot work. Someone told me that if I wanted our relationship to work that I needed to get well and that this was the way to do it. Of course I needed to leave, try a few more things that didn't work, try "MY" way until I came back decided I'd give this a whirl - since I had success stories in every meeting to encourage me to try a new way. Keep coming back!!
Please understand that although she may be going thru menopause, this is a progressive disease.....my husband held down a job in the coal mine for years while practicing alcoholism, he also was a baseball coach, wonderful father and husband.
Then it happened, it got so bad he lost it all.....could not cope with any of it anymore.
Get to a meeting....make the time...it is your hope of sanity......the longer alcoholism goes on the worse it gets....and when they stop drinking for awhile without a program the disease is worse when they start using again....it just gets worse...there are 4 ends to alcoholism.....get better.....jail....institutions....or the final death....unfortunately I am living with the 4th....my husband lost his battle.....
Please get yourself some help alanon saved my life!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
To be honest, I understand what it feels like to be trapped, overwhelmed, and to feel hopeless. Overburdened. I believe that looking at the problem for what it really is (aka her alcoholism) and how it effects your family is key. It is not fair for what you are enduring, but in all reality it won't change without YOU doing your part by working the Alanon program. I agree with what has been said that you should look for a face to face meeting while also getting as much support as possible. Your higher power has not left you and I think that you are a situation where you need your HP more now than ever. Keep letting all you feel out too. The group is here for you!
-- Edited by MyThoughts2U2 on Sunday 13th of September 2009 01:26:06 PM
Four days out of rehab and she drank again. I'm not sure what exactly happened, but she picked up a guy she met in rehab. She had several phone numbers from people she met at rehab. She called to check on a guy and he talked her in to picking him up. They drank, she got obliterated. She denies sex occurred, but her underwear was gone when I found her and her bra was black with dirt. I'm certain she doesn't remember much of what happened. I found her last night then took her to the ER so she could be sobered up and evaluated for rehab again. The place where she did her 12 days wouldn't take her because she wasn't that depressed and she only drank this one time.
I guess it's time for me to start thinking about getting myself out of this mess. I wanted to be involved in her healing, but I'm tool close to help. I know she has to do it on her own. I can't stop caring at this point. I know it's a disease and the monster it creates isn't my wife. But a man needs to draw the line after two incidents of sexual contact outside of marriage.
A really big part of me sees this sick, but beautiful person that has a disease. This disease makes her do things she would never do in her right mind. If I leave, how can I get over this love I have for her? We've been married for twenty years. You just don't throw that away. I can call her brother and tell her to come get her. She has a friend or two that might do the same.
I don't believe that alcohol makes you do things you really desire. It's a disease, right?
Wow. My first counselor visit (for myself) really threw me in to a whole new realm of thought. Basically he asked: why are you still dragging your family through this nightmare? I've been defending her throughout this process. My gut has been hurting for six weeks. There are so many unknowns. I finally went to al-anon. It was good, but I had to rush out at the end to get my son to football.
I've really been thinking for about four days about how right he is. The counselor has 25 years in the business, and he has not seen many successes with couples with serious problems as we have. There have been three instances of infidelity on her part, and probably more. I tried to blame it on the alcohol. But she has to be held accountable for her actions. It does her no good to let her back into the safety of this home. She's making choices on her own. The counselor even likened her behavior to a type of schizophrenia, and that she could be ruled incompetent.
The counselor my daughter visited even said the same thing. My daughter was offended that the counselor kind of questioned the fact that I was still trying to help my wife.
Met with priest today. He divorced his alcoholic wife 15 years ago. Ironic, isn't it? Also ironic is that the wife called from rehab while I was meeting with him. I didn't answer.
