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.
On Friday night I had a feeling it was beginning again. I didn't search but I just got that inkling. Saturday he went to a meeting but left half way through and came home early. He keeps finding reasons not to go. That night he went to sleep and I was awake at 12:30 searching the entire house. Finally I realized just how insane I was and went to sleep. I already knew he was drinking again, I was just on this compulsive drive to prove myself right. For what purpose?? What would it change?? The next day (Sunday) he had some inconsistencies in where some money went and finally I said "just stop lying." He admitted he bought a bottle. So now it was confirmed and did I feel better--NO. He dumped it out (I did not ask him to or where it was or anything, I just saw the empty bottle in the recycle bin-maybe he finished it, I don't know). It is a cycle we have fallen into. He is sober for a week or month, then I either walk in on him drinking or find a bottle, he stops for a short time, then it resumes. It just goes on and on. In some demented part of my mind I still believe I can reason with alcoholism. I am afraid to not know if he is drinking or not, I am scared to not know if it has started again. Somehow I feel that if I know it is going on I can protect myself. That is a delusion but I am having so much trouble giving it up. He has told me himself that it is better to just assume he is drinking, what more do I need to hear?
Thank you for listening to me vent, I feel like I am still trying to sort this out in my mind and make sense of what I need to do and what I can control. Any ESH is appreciated.
Give your mind some rest and let your heart find some peace in face to face al anon meetings. It is understandable that you may feel broken and desperate for your husband to give you comfort and safety...he cannot do that, so search out kindred peeps that can (like you did by posting). I can't send you a dusting of comfort (I wish I could), but your HP can. Big hug.
-- Edited by PP on Tuesday 8th of April 2014 04:36:41 PM
I have done a lot of bottle searching in my day. It is insanity. I know when she has been drinking. In fact, I know when she is dry yet still not sober. So it doesn't matter all that much.
I like the "just stop lying". At least it gets some truth out. But it won't last long if he isn't in recovery. Mine would tell me all kinds of crazy things to get me to think she wasn't drinking. And sometimes she wouldn't lie, but I couldn't tell when she was not lying to tell the truth, and not lying to manipulate me anyway so I would think she had started to tell the truth. So I gave up eventually.
Keep working on yourself. That's what I had to do. I had to ignore the drunken tirades, and the next morning apologies, and the next afternoon tirades. it just wasn't worth my emotional energy. That helped my peace of mind quite a bit.
Thanks for the ESH. He is planning on going to a meeting tonight and while he is gone I am going to take time for myself to read my Al Anon books and journal. I have to keep my focus on me, I know that.
My experience with my exAH (divorced for 14 years) was he would say he was going to a meeting and walk in at 2:00 am. He would say, "I fell asleep in my truck, the cops woke me up, call them if you don't believe me". Which I never did. The final event was when he called from the police station at 3am asking for his lawyer's phone number. I called back the police station and they told me he had a woman there to bail him out. That was the straw that broke the camel's back. Restraining order, changed the locks. I had 2 kids age 4 and 9. Made just enough to pay for daycare and groceries...but I made it. The kids are now 17 and 23, one about to graduate from college. My exah is still drinking, no license, no child support nada.
So glad I left. It took about 4 years to feel better.
I am sorry you are having to go through this. luckily you are in the right place. I have done more than my fair share of searching and proving. it was all twisted up anyway. was it worse that he was drinking or that he lied about it? Do I feel worse knowing with proof that he is STILL a mess or would I have rather just not wasted all that time rummaging? ick, ick, ice. even now sometimes I have the urge to search. Lol. its funny cause its no secret! He's always drinking. that is what a hold this disease had or has on me.
I still want him to go to meetings, want him to do this or that. Bottom line is. He is going to do what he is going to do - whether I agree or not. and if he knows I will disagree he WILL lie about it. So I am trying (trying is the operative word here) to stay out of his way. the sooner he falls on his face or the sooner he gets sober (whatever his HP leads him too) the sooner I can move on - one way or another. My influencing him isn't HIS truth.
I have been trying to work on figuring out what MY truth is. Slowly as I have moved towards finding, feeling and then committing to MY truth, I have found happiness. I am not sure If I have ever been this happy to be honest. Even through my blessed youth.
I;ve been trying to get to the bottom of my feelings, actions and reactions. And they are very fleeting and often contradictory, which is frustrating because I really want it all to make sense. lol, I am sure It might eventually make sense, but right now I'm okay with things being a bit wacky, as long as it is my truth. Like I love you so much, but I hate you. I stopped trying to waste my energy trying to figure it out, I just say - it is what it is. I don't need to understand it to have a good day.
Many blessings
I think you stated in here that you know the truth. You don't need to prove it to yourself.
I found one of the many challenges of living with an active alcoholic was being able to trust my gut instincts on things. It was difficult because the exAH just always poured out lies on top of lies and more lies to me. Small wonder I doubted myself. I really wanted to take the A's word for it but all his actions contradicted his words.
You're right that it's sick, insane behavior to go on a hunt for empty bottles and any other evidence we feel we need. I had a very hard time with those behaviors, myself, when I lived with the exAH.
What it all boiled down to for me, however, was my trying to catch the A red-handed was just more of me not focusing on myself - stopping and asking myself what did I want that would make me happy and doing it. It was way more convenient and easy to zoom in on the A's problems than to figure out what was going on with me. It still can be that way for me, and I don't even live with an A anymore. I still find it's easier for me to look outside and expect other people to behave differently than to stop and ask myself "Hey, what can I do to change things for me so that I can be happy?"
Keep getting to your meetings. Thanks for coming here to share.
I have to say that my x never lied and he never hid his use of alcohol or drugs, so I never had to search for them. It was always very obvious that he did what he did because he did it with no shame, guilt or deception. Regardless, I kept trying to prove to myself that I could change him from being a man who used drugs and alcohol and abused me into a man who didn't use drugs or alcohol and didn't abuse me. That was my insane behavior - believing I had the power to change another person. Whew! Talk about an ego trip. Fortunately, I kept doing the same thing over and over until I got tired of it and stopped. That's when things changed for me. I started doing what made sense and did work by focusing on the truth that I wasn't happy, I was scared all the time, I didn't want my kids in that kind of home, and I didn't want to be around somebody who used drugs, drank, didn't go to work, didn't treat me with any kind of care and occupied so much of my thoughts and actions. What a relief when I could drop the belief I could do anything to change him and started changing what I could. Keep coming back - a return to sanity is a promise in our program.
