The material presented
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My AH has been sober three years. Everything seemed to be going on okay and then a situation happened in the family and my son DIL and 8 month old moved in about two months ago. I guess the stress of the new family in the crowded house and no time alone has upped his symptoms of anxiety, isolation. tiredness and zoning out. AH just has shut himself down with all of us. I suppose he is not doing well with the family here but does not want to say anything to hurt anyone. The problem with that is he stopped going to his meetings, he had a couple of projects to do and never did them or never reported he did them so he could get paid, he has sat and watched tv or played on the computer all week. He is not drinking and that is a good thing. He started falling asleep outside in the chair or on the couch and won't come to bed. Whenever we try to plan something to do as a family, he bugs out on us. Says he wants to stay home and have some time alone. When I try to talk to him he says he will think about it but he does not want to talk about it right now. This is not a good sign of things to come if he is putting up a wall around himself and shutting everyone out. I still go to my meetings and do things but it is a major downer to have hubby acting like this. He says he is tired and I suspect that is a symptom of the underlying anxiety he is having and building up in his head. I pray a lot. But you know I can only take care of me. When I talk to him I try to frame it out of concern for him instead of angry or smart alecky. Most times I just ask have you talked to your sponsor about it. (He has not talked to one in a few months.) Then I go about my day. When I find my mind moving in that direction, I call my sponsor or another Alanon friend and talk. Getting it out seems to help. But sometimes I just get plain tired of the excuses and the pussy footing around to try to get him to understand without giving him a major cow. Dry drunks suck almost as bad as actives do.
somethig I have learnt is that alcoholism is for life and the drinker needs to take their AA medicine to get better. They have to work their programme stopping drinking is just the first step if they stop taking the prescribed medicine then they slowly go backwards.
The same is true for us. I try and take my al anon medicine even if my ABF is not taking his. At tye moment he is osber for 2 months after a big slip; we are seperate while we concentrate on our own recoveries.
When I notice him slipping if we are around each other I up my meetings chat on the phone more , read more , pray more take my medicine more. So if the disease starts to attack him cause he is not taking his medicne it can not attck me too as I have wrapped my al anon blanket around myself. This is why I am seperate from my partner at the moment although he has stopped the disease is on the attack he needs to totally concentrate on his recovery and taking his medicne. Stres is part of life and our drinkers have to learn how to live life dry and AA is a big part of that, that is their job not ours we have been here before with the drinking, it can swop to minitoring their recovery. Thats why I am trying to focu on mine. They say when you share with someone you tell them hat you need to do yourself. Thanks for posting today and helping me get the focus back on to me I was starting to slip into the poor mes going to ring an al anon friend and take some al anon medicine .
Scary. He is on the verge. I am 3 years sober and have started to get to the point at times but I never stop talking to my sponsor. My sponsor IS the person that is able to tell me "You are about to relapse and you better get your butt to a meeting!"
This is going to take all your alanon tools to deal with in a sane way. At 3 years sober, he might be able to handle some sort of counseling with you or on his own. It's not the same as dealing with an active drunk. You are also describing symptoms of depression that may or may not be related to his alcoholism and that is something serious to consider also.
Not sure what they best way for you to proceed is, as you know we are powerless over what others do in response to our actions.
Going through a similar issue, except mine is coming off another relaspe-during his sober period we got custody of my 15 year old grandson and my 35 year pregnant daughter has been staying with us-she will be moving out next week-but he seems to resent us all-talking to himself and saying things like these people, bunch of assholes-not directly to us-but hurtful the same-it is like the world is suppose to revolve around him-it is getting harder and harder to feel any love.
