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.
My husband and I have been married for 7 years. He's always been a drinker, but I've never really seen him act drunk. I also remember being engaged to him and having taken a look in his medicine cabinet and thinking, wow. That's a lot of drugs. (He has back, neck, and knee pain, anxiety, depression, sleep apena, so some legitimate health concerns.) We now have a 3 and 6 year old, and the past two years I've noticed a lot more drinking. He works in a city two hours away - he's a professor, so during the school year, he spends four days/week in an apartment out of town. I don't know how much drinking goes on there, but lately here, a box of wine, many beers, and a 750 ml bottle of vodka disappears in about 1.5 days. He starts before noon. He's also been taking a lot of meds for a knee surgery that was just done, including narcotic anti-inflammatories and pain killers (in addition to his benzos, antidepressants, sleep aids, etc.) I also think he's smoking pot. We have some friends who do, and on occasion, they have given my husband some. I'm just also going to mention, because addiction takes many forms, that he spends an inordinate amount of time on Facebook. I've peeked (I'd rather be called suspicious than naive), and he's really only there to rant about politics. He's just there. all. day. Last bit of background before I pose some questions: our relationship has not been close for a couple of years. I won't go into details about that, but we have not been intimate in a long time. He'd like more, but I'm afraid I've lost my attraction for him. He's become disinterested in taking care of himself physically (wears ratty shorts and polo and flipflops to wedding, wears torn, stained clothes to church, has gotten very overweight, rarely gets a hair cut, does not shave, etc.) and there just isn't much joy between us anymore. We look like a fairly normal family. He doesn't hit or yell at me. He provides for us. We do a lot together, for our kids, and in several ways, is a great dad, if not somewhat neglectful, with all that time on Facebook. BTW, his mom and maternal grandfather were alcoholics. Brother has been through rehab for Rx abuse.
If anyone had asked be six months ago, I'd have said that our relationship was fine. EVEN THOUGH, I've been feeling miserable inside. So my first question is: What the heck is that? It only recently occurred to me (in a chat with my counselor, who husband insisted I see regarding the intimacy thing), that the drinking could be the cause of so many problems in our family. Is this what denial and codependency mean?? It's like: I knew he drank, but aside from occasional requests to tone it down, I never questioned that fact that he would drink while caring for our children, sometimes driving them places, nor did I ever let on to friends or family that I've not been happy. I lied without ever realizing I was lying. I accept my part in growing distant from him. I own the fact that I have not felt compelled to initiate more warmth between us, but I'm afraid I do not love him anymore.
Because I care about his health and do not wish to see him die like his mom did, and I want to make sure my children have a good dad in their lives, my next step is to intervene. Do I: threaten to divorce unless he goes to rehab and starts doing AA? Or do I just tell him that he needs to quit, or he has to leave (and he'll go to his apartment and continue to drink, possibly.) The first option seems harsh. The second seems lazy and ineffective. Do I tell him that I'm having doubts about our marriage now? Or after he cleans himself up? I don't want to end up in this same place a year from now. I need to either get this fixed or move on with my life. Or both. Do I involve others in the intervention? I'm so over my head here...
Thanks for taking time to read. I appreciate your advice and respect your honesty.
Sounds like you need advice on what to do, but only you can answer that. In my experience distance can take a lot of formsdrinking, abusing prescriptions, lying.none of them are good things for a relationship. listen to the little voice inside. Maybe the distance started a while ago and you are just starting to notice it now because it has slowly increased over time. Maybe before you lied to yourself but now you are ready to face the truth so things are coming to light. I don't really know of course I am just giving suggestions to see if any of them make sense to you. Get yourself to some AlAnon meetings or try to talk things out with a counsellor. Your feelings are real and there is a reason you are feeling this way. I'm sorry you are going through this.
Kranio Welcome to Miracles in Progress. I am happy that you reached out and shared your inner most fears. I can so identify with your discovery of being in pain and fear while pretending all was well. Denial and pretend were my go to tools as I tried, unsuccessfully to live with the disease of alcoholism .
AMA has diagnosed Alcoholism as a progressive, fatal disease over which we are powerless. AA helps the alcoholic and Alanon recovery program is for the family who live with the disease. Be cause we interact with the insanity of the disease we become irritable and unreasonable. We use denial as a go to tool to protect ourselves and our lives become unmanageable. Search out alanon meeting and attend It is here I learned new constructive tools to live with and break the isolation that is so crippling to the family. The # is in the white pages. Keep coming back There is hope.
Probably most of us have tried the threats and ultimatums; I know I did. They don't work, and only make us crazy.
AlAnon taught me how to get me well. And I learned (and am learning) about the disease of alcoholism every day. What I can do and what I can't. What works and what doesn't. AFter years of ineffective counseling with people that did not understand alcoholism and treated our case as "marriage counseling" I found AlAnon and that has literally changed everything. It did not make my alcoholic sober, but it changed me, and is changing the way I think and act. They have many good books and literature as well.
Glad you are here. And hope you will seek out face to face AlAnon meeting(s) in your area.
I so agree with blessed. You can spend years trying to change an alcoholic and unless they want to it won't work. Go to Alanon and learn how to take care of yourself and your children first.
I would spend some time in alanon...work with a sponsor, develop a more spiritual center....THEN, speak your truth. After gaining more alanon tools, you will be able to progress in a way that is more confident and less chaotic and confused. Yeah...you have a right want and demand better in a relationship. You also might as well call a spade a spade (in terms of that so much of this is caused by alcoholism and it's him having it and the way you have chosen to respond to it....it's not healthy). For now, I imagine it's such a mess and there is no quick fix. He thinks there is and that he can send you off to a counselor and you will come back happy and wanting to have sex with him....um...not.
So, before questioning the exact boundaries you will set...give alanon a real try...delve in!
My husband also thinks that I need to see a counsellor in order to fix his intimacy problems!!
I really like the awareness that your post shows. It took me a long time to realise that I had been telling myself that all was ok whilst at the same time I was distancing myself from AH. It is up to you to choose what feels most comfortable for you. You can't unknow what you now know so what outcome do you want? You have every right to lovingly explain how you feel about intimacy with your husband and what you need for it to be different but if he is drinking a lot he may not hear you. I found it very frustrating and belittling while I was trying to explain my needs!!
If you can get to alanon face to face meetings as well as joining us here at MIP it will help you to understand your choices more. It may also help you to develop a support structure of people who understand what is going on. I hope you stick around. It is not easy (and somewhat crazy making) trying to deal with alcoholism on your own. ((((Hugs)))))
Wow. I'm touched and a bit overwhelmed at the care that those who have responded have shown, so quickly and with so much sincerity. Honestly, I expected a lot of: Stand by your man. I am listening, friends, and I am grateful for your support. The road is about to get bumpy, but it's a long and winding road which eventually, I believe, glides happily into the sunset. :) Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. KG
I'll be following because I'm in a similar situation. I'm sorry to read about the situation you're in And hope you can find the help you need to take action. It seems our family member addicted to alcohol thinks their drinking only affects them and mine at least gets defensive when I tell him it makes me sad And sometimes feel lonely. He can't understand that. I'm hoping that coming to this forum will help me cope.
Lovemyhubby
Feel free to start a thread of your own and tell your story. Just telling your story and writing it down often brings a new level of clarity.
Hi "Lovemyhubby." Isn't there comfort in knowing you're not alone. I'm planning my confrontation, and I'm worried that he will be defensive too. I've been having conversations with my SIL, who is married to my AH's twin brother, who went through all of this 10 years ago. It took Y E A R S for him to get clean. And then he started abusing prescription meds. Took Y E A R S for him to get over that. And now he calls himself a dry drunk. Still carries the behavior that he did when he was using: neglectful, not productive, zoned out on computer all the time. And, she told me that although she holds the family together, it is not a happy marriage. I refuse to have those years taken off my life. If that sounds unsympathetic, sorry. I'd rather be on my own with my kids, where I can steer them away from the same habits (behaviorly, not genetically, of course).
I understand the loneliness you express. I'm going to make a trip to a meeting this week before I have The Big Talk with my husband. I need strength to do this. Withdrawing from my own friends and family has made me feel very weak and helpless.
Oh boy, I wish it would just glide into the sunset happily, LOL! My AH is working a recovery program but after all the years of abuse, neglect, distance, DUI and jail time, and various other things related to alcoholism, I'm not sure it will save our marriage. When you start working a program yourself in Al Anon, things will be revealed about yourself, about your marriage, and about the families of alcoholics that may change your perspective and open your eyes to what reality really is for us.
A lot of the advice out there like 'stand by your man' is great when you are just hitting a few bumps in the road in a normal marriage. Marriage to an alcoholic is not anywhere near 'normal'. I agree with Pinkchip, try Al Anon and if you find a meeting that you don't like, then try another and another. It took me 9 months to find my home meeting where I felt I belonged. I still go to other meetings, but my Friday night meeting is where I participate, do service work, greet newcomers, etc. Al Anon will offer a support system to you that you can't find from your friends and family. My friends, outside of program, are supportive but since they don't live with alcoholism they truly don't understand how far reaching the disease is and how it truly affects so many aspects of a family's life.
Once you find a meeting you like, I suggest working on finding a sponsor or at least getting a phone list so that you can call someone you connected with or met at a meeting. I kept those phone lists close in my purse in the early days of program because I needed to call someone who would just understand, even if just a little bit more than my other friends. And, of course, you can always come here, too. Welcome to the boards, I hope you find support and kindness here. We all have been where you are to some degree and some of us are still there, too.
__________________
Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be!
Here are some things I wish I had realized before I started trying to convince my AH (alcoholic husband) to go into recovery. I didn't realize that denial and defensiveness (and deception) go hand-in-hand with alcoholism. Because they never would have gotten this far if they weren't into denial even to themselves. There's the kind of joke about confronting an alcoholic with a beer in his hand and he says "I'm just holding it for a friend!" and he gets as defensive as though he really were wrongly accused. The denial is so strong because the disease does anything to defend itself. It drags the drinker and the people around him into a kind of topsy-turvy world where up is claimed to be down and left is claimed to be right.
For these reasons, talking to the drinker is very much like talking to an insane person. Their brains are really not functioning like those of sober people. We expect them to see logic and it is very frustrating when they don't. So we can get entangled in horrible conversations where we just can't get through to them. Of course it's in the interests of the disease, this stonewalling.
It got so I was spending my days and nights in endless practice conversations in my own mind, trying to come up with the words that would finally get through to him. That would finally make him realize what the drinking was doing to him, to me, to our family, to our relationship. I had a dream that I could just come up with the perfect words, and the switch would flip and everything would start to be all right.
My A was trickier than some. Some drinkers just deny it straight through. But my A would fake-agree. That is, he would say, "Well, I really don't think I'm an alcoholic like you say. Not like those guys who [behave in various extreme ways]. But okay. If it bothers you, I'll just stop drinking. It's easy because I'm not an alcoholic anyway."
So I'd cautiously start to think our troubles were over, until after a certain time -- from a week to many months after each of these conversations -- I would begin to suspect something was up, and I'd find the huge trove of hidden beer cans, or the buried vodka bottles, or whatever had been hidden from me all this time.
Then I'd try to explain and get through to him again.
What I wish I'd done earlier was to go to Al-Anon. I tried a couple of meetings and those particular ones were a bad fit and I thought "This sure isn't for me" and I wasted years. But now I know that Al-Anon has the tools to help us know what's possible in those conversations, to keep our cool when the drinker is being difficult, and to make good decisions about how to move forward.
Aloha Kranjo and Lovemyhubby and welcome to the board. Mattie I think has found my pre-Al-Anon diary and my alcoholic/addict wasn't a hubby...she was my wife. The disease has more similarities than differences and you can come to understand that by coming back to MIP often. Al-Anon saved my life in spite of me. It took me two attempts cause that is what I needed to get over myself; my pride and ego and to get humble and sit down and with the fellowship and listen and learn and then be helped to practice the principles of the program. My alcoholic/addict got clean and dry and then dry and clean and then dry and then clean and I went legally insane. I didn't know and didn't know that I didn't know anything about the compulsive non-curable, progressive and fatal nature of this disease...and I thought it just should stop because.... Simply what worked for me was to stop my defenses and reach out for help and then spend time with those who knew and listen, learn and practice what they were doing. What I did was went to over 100 meetings in 90 days (on suggestion) and didn't think about anything I should do with or about my alcoholic/addict spouse and boy did I learn. So I will stop with that first suggestion that worked for me and for those who gave it to me when I first arrived. Go to as many meetings as you can over the next 90 days and then decide if Al-Anon is for you and has solutions. If you decide it is...sit down and stay and keep coming back. If it isn't you can leave and try anything else that you think is available and I got a trailer to that last statement, "we will gladly refund your miseries" ...I left my miseries back at that location of what became my home group in Fresno CA. on Fresno street in 1979. It works when I work it and it will do the same for you. Keep coming back to this MIP family...were here 24/7/365 (((((hugs)))))
