The material presented
here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method
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level.
I struggled with that for a while too. I had to detach to the point where I thought what was the use of the relationship anymore? To me, that wasn't a marriage and he wasn't even someone I would have chosen as a friend. The decision to leave was made for me when his verbal abuse became physical and I was afraid of him. My thoughts are with you. It's a hard, hard decision to make.
-- Edited by WornOutMrsFixIt on Sunday 23rd of December 2012 12:01:13 AM
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"Just being there for someone can sometimes bring hope when all seems hopeless." - Dave G Llewellyn
This may seem like a very odd question. How do you wives live with an alcoholic husband and live your life without having him affect you. I have used detachment but that makes me feel like we are roomates, not husband and wife. What's the point? I have been to Al-Anon meetings and many wives cannot live on their own financially so they decide to "settle." It seems like a terrible decision to live the rest of your life unhappy doesn't it? I know many of you live with alcoholics and are happy and read all the Al-Anon literature, for example, The Courage to Change. It is helpful but I guess I need to know some suggestions and counsel on staying happy when your AH walks in the door and you know he's been drinking and then falls asleep the rest of the night. I never ask him if he's been drinking anymore because I know the answer and I don't start a fight, but unfortunately, I've had so many nights like this just ruined and I am so unhappy.
I can't answer how you stay with an AH. My AHsober walked out of the marriage eight years ago. I question myself about what I could have done better, differently, sooner. I look at other marriages and some women have stated that they can't make it financially or they don't want to be alone so they "settle" for this life. I found that I had to change in order to have a life that wasn't in reaction to what "crumbs" my AHSober offered me. It was always on his terms. That seems to be what your AH is offering you - his terms of drinking, falling asleep. You deserve a life but you will have to take action for yourself. Baby steps.
I am not married so can only speak from the outside looking in. 2 theories come to mind.
1) I don't think that people can't support themselves, it's they can't support the lifestyle they've become accustomed to. Even if you don't make a lot, a double income is more than 1. I'm assuming these women have also been married 20+ years. Maybe these women think that scaling back and ending a marriage would result in others seeing them as failures.
2) Just as the alcoholic has a disease, so does the Al-Anon. Al-Anon's become accustomed to thinking, acting and reacting a certain way. The alcoholic enables the Al-Anon to keep that going as some are afraid to change.
I think if you stay with an A, you have to accept that he's not a person who can meet all the needs that are supposed to be met in a healthy marriage. Yet we still have those needs. So we find friends to do things with and to talk about our problems to, and we find other interests in life and hobbies, and we accept that there is not going to be the same kind of closeness as we might have if their primary allegiance were not to the bottle. Some people would rather do this than break up altogether. Some people would rather break up. There's no one right way. Working on our own recovery helps clarify which way is right for us.
I often use the Abby test-am I better off with him or without him-maybe it could also be am I able to be all I can be with him or without him-just a thought.
I too had no choice but to leave once my A got violence but I know I stayed far past what was healthy for me. I allowed him & the crazy life to do so much damage to me in the process. I am still a shaddow of who I used to be as a person.. I allowed his to rob me of my strength, independence, and so many other thing that I never even knew until o left. Towards the end I told him I felt like a bird in a cage... I felt that for so long but once I met others I. Alanon who had left & lived thru it ( and thrived!!) I knew I too could make it to the otherwise again. It will take awhile for me to become the person I once was & I may have
Lost some of those characteristics forever but I know I am better off not living that achoholic- codependent lifestyle with him anymore. I do still have him in my life ( I know I'm a fool) and that too may change in the future but talking with him & seeing him on an infrequent basis has allowed me to "move on" better than when I tried to just cold turkey it.. I couldn't function. As I get stronger I do notice I have less tolerance or sympathy for his old ways ... But that too has been good for me.
Most importantly - take care of yourself 1st!! Stop allowing you to be on the back burner ( at least that is what helped me most)
I wish you well. Its such a hard thing to deal with, but alanon makes all the difference, you see that others are all walking in the same and simular shoes!
Food for thought- This was posted earlier this year on this board:
"God takes people out of our lives for a reason, so stop trying to pull them back in." If we believe that God will take care of us then why would we not believe that this is one way of him helping us out. I constantly prayed for the craziness to end and for God to stop the chaos, and even though he didn't do it the way I had planned (miraculous instant recovery), he did it by giving me the strength to finally leave. I now know that just because it is not how I had planned, it doesn't mean my prayers weren't answered. He led me and my kids out of the chaos, and not a day goes by that I am not grateful that my prayer was answered.
We try so hard to make our alcoholics see how great things could be if they just change, but have such a hard time following the same advice for ourselves.
Keeping your family in my thoughts and prayers- Green Eyes
In our meeting it may be the newcomer greeting or it may be the first page, I can't remember, but we are told that we can find happiness and contentment whether the alcoholic is drinking or not.
I thought that this was impossible. But I chose to keep going back to meetings. I chose to find a sponsor. I asked someone who has a lot of years in Al-Anon and who did eventually decided that leaving was the right choice for her because of her situation with the alcoholic in her life.
I choose to take life one day at a time. I have boundaries. I don't have a high tolerance for unnaceptable behavior.
I chose to leave last march and I was gone for 2 weeks. I gave my AH a choice, you can stop xy and z and truly show me that you are making an effort, or I am done.
It takes 2. It took my AH making choices to do better. It takes me actively working my program. I don't need him, I love him. It's not my job to fix him. There is a reading in Courage to Change that talks about how being married to an A isn't the end of the world, it's just a part of the picture. I wish I knew where this reading was so I could repost. I think it's very true, my husband has the disease of alcoholism. I choose to work a program, and work on me, and as long as he continues to treat me with dignity and respect I stay.
We have our moments. The overall change in both of us in the year and 2 months that I've been in this progarm has, for me, been such an amazing incredible experience and I am forever thankful!
I think detachment is a great skill to have with or without a marriage. Detachment helped me to learn to be independent as I was completely dependent emotionally in so many ways on other people. If some did not like me or had an issue with me that was seen as a calamity for me. Nowadays I can have relationships where what the other person does or does not do isn't the pivot point of my life.
I know well the stay/go dilemma. In al anon some of us do an exercise called looking at what we would need if we left. That exercise helped me to stop being so absolutely obsessed with what the alcoholic/addict was doing. I did not have to act on it at all but in looking at it I could indeed look at the option of what leaving might be.
I well understand the issue of going to al anon and not wanting to be like the people there. My obsession was with the now ex A (and others before him) I did not want to be in reality on any level. After all he was the problem I wasn't. When I got to the point of not being willing to go on as I was I was indeed willing to look at what other people suggested. Until then it was all about comparing, judging and not feeling part of. I had a huge fantasy about what marriage should be like and no tolerance for anything that didn't at least imitate that.
Coming to al anon is indeed a hard step. No one wants to go through the doors. I felt a tremendous sense of failure at not being able to make my relationship work but I also felt that I could no longer carry on as I was. That sense of defeat was the opening for me to be willing to look at other ways of being. My life is far from rosy today but I don't live on tenderhooks I am capable and independent and not obsessed with what anyone else does in my life.
