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.
At what point did you folks know that the person (or perhaps people) you are here because of...where alcoholics...and not someone who simply had a bad habit of drinking too much, too often?
I am really struggling with finding the fine line between someone who just unknowingly drinks too much and with some knowledge and support can function in a relatively normal fashion....vs....someone who is an outright alcoholic and requires the treatment and help that goes along with this disease.
Basically, is everyone who drinks too much, a lot of the time, a full blown alcoholic who can never drink again...or is it possible to NOT reach a point of no return and actually show improvement in their drinking habits?
I guess I am just confused as to what to do and how to feel (which is probably the answer to my question anyway), but I was wondering if anyone else ever had these same feelings...and if so...what they did about them.
I knew she was an alcoholic when she couldn't stop drinking for more than 24hrs without withdrawal effects (terrible itching, insomnia, loss of fine muscle control, etc...).
That made it pretty clear. The blackouts, being crazydrunk before lunchtime, freakouts, secretly drinking before going out drinking, carrying around booze in a waterbottle in her purse, and all the rest should have been a clue, but I didn't want to think it.
The withdrawal stuff sealed it, there was no more denial possible.
-- Edited by B_L on Monday 23rd of May 2011 12:15:28 PM
How much time did you spend BEFORE that saying to yourself...this is something she can control?...she's not gone over the edge?...its something that just takes a little help?
Alanon is for anyone who is affected by another person's drinking. It doesn't say that they are alcoholic, just that their drinking bothers us. I know that for me, I can't label anyone. My bf has admitted he has a problem, so that is his stuff. I have a thinking problem. I tend to obsess about him. Alanon helps me to focus on me. And do things for me to feel better. The AA big book was something I started reading, (if you google it, its online to read for free) there are a lot of explanations in there about the different types of drinkers. I haven't read the whole book, but it really made me understand things a lot better. I think Bill W. said that people who are alcoholic cannot stop drinking. They get that one drink and they keep on going. Its an insatiable thirst. My bf gets into blackouts just about every time he drinks now, which is another indicator. Have you gotten to an Alanon meeting? Getting myself to the meetings has made all the difference. I don't feel so alone and the people that are there are so kind and talk to me afterwards so I feel enveloped in love. Take care of you :)
__________________
-youfoundme
Let go and let God...Let it be... let it begin with me...
How much time did you spend BEFORE that saying to yourself...this is something she can control?...she's not gone over the edge?...its something that just takes a little help?
8 months, the entirety of our relationship up to that point. We had been having tons of fun drinking at bars and socializing, but while I would take frequent breaks from the sauce she would keep right on going. At home, at work (she worked at a liquor store at the time), everywhere, almost all the time.
We tried stopping drinking dozens of time. I would stop easily, she would be drunk within a day or so. Really really drunk, usually.
I didn't even know how bad she was until her most recent "bottom" when she ended up in the hospital. Found out there that if she was under 0.35 (over 4x legally drunk), I couldn't even tell she had been drinking. She walked into the ER under her own power, not even stumbling, at 0.5 (risking sudden death drunk). That's pretty messed up. She was probably completely wrecked a lot of the time I thought she hadn't been drinking at all.
If you think there may be a problem... There could be a problem.
But unfortunately there's nothing you can do except work on yourself. Oddly, that sometimes helps an active drunk see the light and seek help themselves. I don't know how it works, but it does. Check out some Al-Anon literature and get to some meetings, you'll be glad you did. Even if they keep boozing, you will be better able to handle the ride (or the escape; whatever you need after some sane contemplation).
Good luck.
-- Edited by B_L on Tuesday 24th of May 2011 08:56:42 AM
I suggest reading the STICKY post at the top of the message board ¨Why Alcoholism is "categorized/listed" as a disease by AMA¨ It may help you to understand the subject a little better. And keep coming back. Reading the posts and replies here can be very educational.
Aloha Sisyphus...The qualification for you to come and find help is only if her drinking affects you negatively. I've done what you are doing now...trying to fit my alcoholic wife into a certain alcohol-ism mold and never could. I even went to college while attending Al-Anon meetings so that I could come to understand. I could have saved the tuition with the exception of technical stuff about the chemical.
I learned in Al-Anon that alcoholism is a disease of the mind, body, spirit and emotions. It can n e v e r be cured only arrested by t o t a l abstinence. It is a compulsion of the mind and an obsession and in that the alcoholic has lost control over when and if they will drink. Alcohol does that for them. Alcoholics affect everyone they come into contact with...family, friends, associates, co-workers and is a progressive disease. If not arrested it will progress. If the alcoholic quits for a time and then returns to drinking they will progress as if they have never stopped and often it will be worse. Alcoholics have three choices...sobriety; insanity or death.
We the family and friends of alcoholics are affected in much the same way as the alcoholic except we don't have the anesthesia of alcohol to block out reality. We go thru the problems wide awake and become as sick or sicker than the alcoholic. We also affect others we come in contact with and have much the same three choices - Serenity, insanity or death.
Your partner drinks inspite of the "to much" experience and awareness. She knows and has known before you came along that she has a problem. Alcohol is running the show and telling her when to drink. She cannot not drink no matter what she says or tries to alter the course. Drinking too much once in a while is subterfuge...Alcohol abuse vs Alcoholism...the chemical doesn't care about definitions. It will do to the mind, body, spirit and emotions the very same thing each an every time it is ingested and will scratch for more unless totally arrested. I've seen people die on their very first drinking event...accident? abuse? ism?.
Today I don't much get into the discussion...I go with Alcohol can and will destroy the drinker and others around the drinker whether they think not or not. It will.
Accept the reality of it in your life and the first part of the first step...Admitted we were powerless over alcohol and ... (second part).
Keep coming back ((((hugs))))
Leave the boulder at the bottom of the hill and face the other way.
I have to agree with B_L here, that my bf can be in a black out and has been to a doctor's appointment and no one had any idea he was drunk at all. He acted like a normal person. No slurring or swaying or falling down etc. I could tell because I know him well enough to know. They can be drinking more than we ever know and not even seem drunk...
__________________
-youfoundme
Let go and let God...Let it be... let it begin with me...
Hello Sissy , it dosent matter how much or how often he drinks what matters is how it affects you when he does- that Al-Anon can help you with . He is the only one who decides if alcohol is causing him a problem . Learn to take care of you , he is gonna do what hes gonna do nothing you can do about that .
My husband, when I look back, always had a problem with drinking. He would always be the 'drunk guy' making a fool of himself or barfing by early on in the evening or passed out or acting weird and awkward or making no sense.
Only, in the beginning, this happened only about once every 3-4 months...and it went on like that for a year or so. (so it was so infrequent I thought nothing of it, I'd be irritated and pissed off the day after the drunk escapades but then he'd return to being the sweet person I knew and I'd quickly forget all about it).
Gradually once every 3-4 months became once a month or every time there was an event/party/wedding/gathering/family dinner ect to go to. It wasn't until it became about once a week, every weekend, that I started to wonder...but even then the word addiction or alcoholic never crossed my mind for a good 6 months after it was happening every weekend.
I remember thinking: "oh, he's just stressed with school, he has a lot going on, he didn't eat much today" ect.. I justified it away hoping that he would learn his lesson. But even after making a HUGE fool of himself at wherever we were....it didn't stop him from doing it again the following weekend, and he had no idea (or admitted to having an idea) that he acted like a fool, or embarrassed himself, or was mean to his friends or mean to me, or that he fell and broke stuff or whatever... Finally , I started thinking: alcoholic, which was around the time I started finding water bottles full of vodka in his school bag, in the middle of the week.
After I found the water bottles full of vodka, it took about another year to progress from weekly to daily to suicidal thoughts, total despair, a stay in the psych ward, almost dying and a 911 trip in an ambulance, out of touch with reality, and basically total insanity and delusion. He was drunk ALL the time, every day and passed out almost every day or every night. (he went to detox and rehab twice and is now living in a sober living home and has been sober almost 100 days).
I've heard it said that if the person can stop drinking and put the drink down (controlled drinking)...they are likely not alcoholics. My husband was never that because every single time he drank it changed him - he acted like an idiot or made no sense, or passed out or puked all night or made a total fool of himself...and the RARE occasions he did control his drinking, like if he was the DD that night, he was MISERABLE, bitter, resentful and complained the entire night that he couldn't drink or just acted like an ass. He could not stand NOT drinking.
I have a friend who I used wonder about. Whenever we used to go party (this is back 5-8 years ago), she would always get ridiculously drunk almost every time. It got so bad I eventually stopped hanging out with her at bars and pubs cause I didn't want to deal with her, worry about her, and make sure she got home safe - she'd almost always end up passed out someplace, or she would run away and no one would no where she went, or she would be falling all over embarrassing herself. I no longer party with her, those days are over for me, but we do hang out still, usually have dinner or watch some of our favorite shows together, walk or go to the movies....and she's fine. We can have a glass of wine on a Monday night watching a show and she drinks no more than that, acts fine, appears normal, and sometimes just only wants half a glass of wine then switches to water cause she'll be driving - so that seems like controlled drinking to me, which would mean she is not an alcoholic (from what I've heard although I know only the A's can say whether they are As or not)... but having been through what I've been though, if I could travel back in time and see her in a bar, I would have sworn she's an alcoholic (not that it's my job or right to label people...just sayin').
I've learned though that it doesn't matter what whoever else is doing as I can't control them...rather, what am I doing and how can I help myself.
In my experience with family, I have to say that I think there are a lot of people out there who fit the bill of: controlled drinker or alcohol abuser. I think my husband's entire family fits the alcohol abusers category as well as does my father. My dad was able to quit drinking cold turkey back in January with no ramifications physically to his body or his mind. He was funtioning throughout our lives as kids and hardly ever would be seen drunk as a skunk at home(at the bars in his later years was a different story). He's blacked out at the bar and fell off his bar stool(that was 3 years ago) and he refuses to get tile floors in his kitchen because he says he drops stuff when he's drunk and doesn't want to risk breaking all the glasses in the house, LOL.
I think the issue that AlAnon addresses is whether you are bothered by someone's drinking. My sister and I were very much affected by dad's drinking. So much so that it's causing major problems and trust issues in our current marriages. Everyone else in my family would drink including my mom but what we both remember is dad's drunken tirades and slurring of his words, etc. Now, was he or is he an alcoholic? By society's standards he probably could be classified as an alcoholic but he didn't need to drink all day, he never got a DUI, he didn't go through any physical withdrawl when he quit. So, what is he? Quite frankly, after months of analyzing all of this and talking with my sister, we've decided that a label doesn't matter. What matters is how we felt about it, how it affects our thinking today, and how are we going to approach tomorrow to fix our marriages and to trust again. I'm glad that my dad quit drinking but he did it because he has a spinal cord injury from a tumor surgery last year and is now paralyzed. He had to stop drinking because the alcohol interfered with his anti-spasmodic medication. So, he was able to stop drinking altogether without complaining. Unfortunately, the damage to my psyche is done. Now, I have to work on forgiveness, peace, and I have to let go of my husband and let him make his own choices without controlling. I've got a long way to go!
