hey everyone, new here - Al-Anon Family Group

macintosh · Member

hey everyone, new here

hotrod · ~*Service Worker*~

Dear Macintosh

Welcome to MIP It sounds as if you know a great deal about alcoholism.
I am so sorry that you and your family must deal with this dreadful disease.

The disease of Alcoholism is very cunning and powerful. It not only hurts the alcoholic but as you have noted, everyone in the family.

Alanon suggests that alcoholism is a disease and that we did not cause this disease, we cannot control it and we cannot cure it.

Alanon and this board are excellent resources that will enable you to find HOPE and TOOLS so you can live your life even though the alcoholic is still drinking.

The tools: Meetings, Living one Day at a Time, Focusing on Yourself, Sharing will give you the means to live your life without anger and resentment.

    Many of us who have lived with Alcoholism in our lives have been affected by it without even realizing it ourselves. Not just in the sense of having to put up with the alcoholics behavior, but in the sense that we ourselves have become irritable and unreasonable without even knowing it. Having our own program of recovery allows us to take the focus off of the things in our lives, which we cannot control, such as the actions of others, and onto the things in our lives, which we CAN control, our actions, our thoughts, and our happiness.

Help with finding local meetings near where you live may be found at the following web site:            http://www.al-anon.alateen.org/meetings/meeting.html            Or call: 1-888-4alanon

Online meetings are held in the Al-Anon chat room associated with this site.

From the board click on Al-Anon Group Meeting/Chat Room in the yellow box in upper left of the page. After clicking on the link please be patient, sometimes it takes a while for the window to open.

PLease keep coming back There is Hope

-- Edited by hotrod on Wednesday 5th of May 2010 07:37:43 PM

Mattie · ~*Service Worker*~

Welcome, and so glad you found us.

Some people do integrate the alcoholic into their lives, treating him, I think, as if he were a kind of wayward family member or someone with an unarrestable disease. Like if you had a family member with narcolepsy who kept falling asleep in the living room, you wouldn't ask them to move out, you'd treat them with kindness.

That isn't an approach that I myself was able to take, and I did ask my A ex-H to leave. A friend of mine who grew up with an alcoholic dad once said, "I just realized that it isn't normal to have a parent pass out at the dinner table." I didn't want my child to grow up thinking that was normal.

But everybody's family and every alcoholic is different, and there may be some boundaries you can draw and accommodations you can make if you want to continue to live together. How to do that would be particular to your own situation. The best way to approach it, I would think, would be to learn all you can, go to meetings and listen and read the literature, and read lots on the boards. Taking care of yourself and your kids, whatever you decide, is the most important thing.

macintosh · Member

Thanks for responding Betty,
It is nice to know there are others out there going through similar problems. I will probably go to a f2f eventually, but am not really one to broadcast my feelings so am not sure if I would be comfortable talking about this yet. I will check out the online meeting because I do understand how we have to recover for our own sanity.

Bettina · ~*Service Worker*~

I too have lived with an A that snored so loud, it sounded like a freight train was coming right thru the middle of the house. It became unmanageable, I had fitfull sleep for many years, even though we slept in our own rooms for years, my door was closed and I could still here it. It raised by blood pressure literally. One time we went away for the weekend and we were in the pool for most of the day, it was a natural spring water. He fell asleep in a chair near the pool , which was the middle of the Motel and that echoed thru out. I just left him out there, I figured if he bothered somebody they would come out and tell him. That was only one of the many problems. We have parted after 26 years of marriage and I love the silence in the house.

Another problem that needs to be addressed is the incomptetence or ignorance about the disease of Alcoholism. Our general Dr. knew that my husband had a drinking problem. When the A became depressed and the Dr. gave him prozac and said "Now you promise not too drink" Oh, yes Dr. "I wont drink" two days later, my husband said, I like that buzz, he was only a drinker, but now he liked the high of drinking and the prozac. He was falling all over the place and one night, he choked on his vomit in his sleep and almost died, the paramedics got here just in time. Im not trying to take the responsibility off the A, but there needs to be more of an understanding of the disease of Alcoholism in the Medical field. I threw the prozac in the toilet. I didnt need two problems.

We do have the choice of what kind of life we want to live and how much do we want to detach. What are our boundaries, how far are we willing to go. The Xa and I are friends, he has been sober for the first time in his life and he has been drinking for 36 years non stop. That didnt happen til after we parted. Yes, I felt bad over the years that he was afflicted with this disease, since both parents drank and he had a horrible childhood. But truth, I didnt cause his disease and I cant cure it or control it. We have to look after ourselves and our families, they are priority. Every situation is different. I know men that are recovering alcoholics and have not had a drink for many years. One thing we have to make a change in order for the situation to change, we cant keep doing nothing. One you can do is keep coming back and join a face to face alanon meeting. It will be the most important step you will ever take in you life. Luv, Bettina

-- Edited by Bettina on Wednesday 5th of May 2010 08:03:59 PM

-- Edited by Bettina on Wednesday 5th of May 2010 08:04:24 PM

-- Edited by Bettina on Wednesday 5th of May 2010 08:05:54 PM

macintosh · Member

Hi Mattie,

This is exactly the way i feel right now. don't want the marriage to end, sober he is a person of integrity and morals BUT, if this disease has taken him and he doesn't fight with everything he has, there is no sense thinking of a future. Reading the books he was given in rehab, I see that AA is not as much about quitting drinking as it is about changing your mindset and I have used some of the tools in my own thinking about day to day living. Although it is not his fault he has the disease, it is his choice to stop it. I was a stay at home mom for many years and have only worked part time for the last four. I am in the process of trying to find a full time job, so that I will be able to support myself, should we divorce. Both boys will be in high school this fall and becoming less dependant on me all the time, (except when looking for socks,lol!) or drives.

macintosh · Member

I agree with the lack of knowledge on the parts of doctors as well. Even though he told him he was drinking too much, he gave him these drugs, and during that phase he was high as a kite when drinking. He actually got a dui while on the combination. When his brother went to pick him up, he didn't know what was wrong with him. He said he didn't appear drunk, but was completly off the wall. In the 25 years I have known him, he has drank two times in the morning, both times on camping trips and a bunch of the guys did as well. Once on this combo, he started drinking by 11 everyday. He is doing very well with his recovery, but if he constantly slips he will eventually be back where he started. I know I should go to a meeting and will have to muster up the courage soon, if nothing else than to learn more in case, god forbid, one of my son's follow in his footsteps

Jerry F · ~*Service Worker*~

I don't know if it was learning how to tolerate as much as it was accept that the behavior
and others was part of the toxic chemical on the body and mind and that is what over
drinkers do when they drink themselves into passing/blacking out.   If she drinks this
and/or that has and can again happen. You can wake him and tell him to go to bed
without the long explanation or go somewhere else with the kids yourself. You cannot
protect him from the consequences of his choices and you should not take responsibility
for them. What ever others think about him is none of your business really and that one
takes practice because I use to feel responsible for my alcoholic wife.    Bad career that
one was until I stopped and got into the program, sat down, listen, learned, practiced
and followed the suggestions including keep coming back.   Best suggestions I ever
got.     You can have them also.   (((((hugs))))) smile

maresie · ~*Service Worker*~

please try to get a hold of the book offered above, Getting them Sober. That will help you a great deal. I'm glad you are here.

Detaching is a lot of work and sometimes in the beginning we detach with anger, the main thing is we are not overinvolved with the active A.

Look forward to getting to know you.

Maresie.

The material presented here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method to exchange information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal level.