That’s the issue. He won’t seek help as long as he doesn’t perceive that he “has a problem”, and even if he admits he does, he won’t rectify it without prodding.
You are at a crossoads, IMO, becuase you married this guy and see his good traits outweigh his binge drinking behavior.
YOU have to make a decision on whether or not this arrangement is acceptable or not, and encourage him that he needs to seek help or you’ll leave him. And you have to mean it.
YMMV, of course, especially since this advice comes tainted by an alcoholic’s perpective.
What the hell. I shouldn’t let mere ignorance prevent me from spouting my opinion.
I was on the fence until I read this. Things are not going to get better for you. They are only going to get worse. He has lied to you and betrayed you, and doesn’t see this as a problem worth addressing. If you stay with him, things are at best going to continue to be terrible, and more probably things will get worse. DTMFA. It fucking sucks, but better just one life is ruined rather than two.
What, exactly do you think is “working” about this marriage? This quote is extremely telling:
I have no experience with addiction, but I do have experience with bad marriages – not mine, but my parents’. To put it succinctly, my dad is a self-centered asshole. My mother has spent 40+ years hoping he’ll change. What a sad waste of her life.
I think Red Stilettos has (if subconsciously) already made her decision and just wants confirmation.
Here’s a vote for “leave him.” The writing was on the wall when he drank on your honeymoon. Now he refuses to get help in any way. And (like my dad; why yes my opinion is colored) he’s a master of the empty apology.
One person does not a marriage make, and can’t save it by herself when it goes down the shitter.
He refuses to go to AA? He refuses to get any help at all?
You poor dear I say this without any snark. You want to help him, you want to make things work… but if he won’t help himself, I see no other choice than to play your hand. Tell him he either gets help or you’re leaving. Loving somebody means doing the best thing for them. If you stay, and he won’t get treatment, this cycle will just continue.
This is all just IMHO, but I stand by it. Please PM me if you need a shoulder to lean on.
(Coming from a grateful recovering alcoholic). Dear child, it seems that to you everything you think is all about him. What’s he doing? What’s he drinking?
If you step away, he promises to stop, then renigs on his promise.
I agree with the majority. Get away from him…divorce him…make a new life for yourself. In the process, go to a few alanon meetings http://www.al-anon.alateen.org/ Red, honey, it’s the best favor you can do for yourself.
Red, repeat: “I “Red” am worthy of love & respect. I deserve the best.”
You’ve a rough road to hoe. but you have support (both us dopers and alanon friends).
On the No side, we have dominion over ourselves. This is my life, this is my mind, these are my choices. As long as I realize that I own my mind and I own my consequences then I can start to regain power. A craving is a feeling, it is an intense desire to satisfy an urge but our feelings are in our mind and we can tell our mind what to do. We can change, we can become sober, we can rehabilitate. There is no reason that our past has to define us, each day is a new day to make new choices and to try.
Unfortunately on the Yes side, addiction can set a person up for a lifelong battle. Sometimes there are chemical changes that permanantly debilitate our bodies and our minds. Sometimes there are psychological changes that we can overcome but doing so seems like chopping down an oak tree with a pocket knife. Sometimes that chemical change may already there from birth waiting to be triggered. (Cite, although I have to say that this is contraversial.)
So yeah, addiction is something that is always going to be there but can always be fought against. We don’t have to give it control and we don’t have to let it define us.
IMHO, the important thing to remember is that we are not alone, that none of us is as strong as all of us and all of us deserve a long and happy life. We are all worthy.
Thank you all for your thoughts and support. This is really the first time I’ve been able to talk to anyone about this and it really helps. It hurts, but it helps.
He’s not totally averse to treatment. He just won’t do AA; he says it makes him uncomfortable. God isn’t the problem; he’s very religious. I think it’s just his pride telling him that he shouldn’t be dependent on strangers, most of whom are dependent on alcohol, not abusers (his view, not mine). And, quite frankly, the numbers on AA success rates don’t look that good.
I’m not trying to defend him as much as explain the situation. Right now, he is totally committed to quitting. He has substituted daily journaling for AA. He’s picked up more hours at work. He’s looking for ways to get involved in our community, which is new to him but not to me. I’m already in the trap of “this time it feels different. Maybe he gets it. How can I leave him now?” How do people ever make these decisions?
Some of you do.
Some do not–of that I am sure. My MIL for starters. Of those steps listed, she has done exactly none. She is what I believe is termed a dry drunk. She hasn’t touched a drop in a decade, but all the patterns, pathology and issues are still there.
# Step 4 - Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
She thinks she’s great.
# Step 5 - Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs
No idea if she’s done this to herself or God–she has not done this to me or anyone else I know. It’s the “time” a ways back that we never talk about and if you do try to talk about it, the others circle the wagons and oust you. Welcome to my life.
# Step 8 - Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all
Um, you probably won’t believe this but I was not included in whatever confrontation they did at her rehab. I was only her “new” DIL, dontchaknow. When I brought up the issue, I was smacked down not just by her, but also by my husband and his family and her “therapist”. This is one helluva an alcoholic family I married into. It’s reason # 5 for leaving (I don’t really number my reasons. ).
# Step 9 - Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others
Injure them? Does this refer to minor kids who have been abused by the drunk parent? Because that’s the only situation that makes sense to me right now. She has never apologized to my husband for locking him out of the house at age 6 so she could drink. He denies that it happened (an aunt told me about it). The sexual abuse of her daughter by her maternal grandfather that went on for 6 years? No mention. Nope–she got “sick” for a bit, but went to rehab and then she went to “I’m out on Thursday nights”(she would never admit to going to an AA meeting!) and now she doesn’t go at all.
*# Step 10 - Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it *
Her admit she was wrong about anything? It is to laugh.
Part of my rage (for rage it is) is directed at her son, my husband, who has colluded and enabled all this shit for many many years. She has interfered in our marriage in more ways than I am comfortable relating. She continues to do so, as much as she can, which is not much because I am the gatekeeper, a role I dislike and resent having to enact, day after day. He won’t, though, so I must. So, some of this is fallout from others in the alcoholic constellation. Nevertheless, while she may not be responsible for all of it, she sure is responsible for a great deal of it and all of it stems from her drinking.
Red–don’t become me. I am looking back on 21 years of drunk MIL who made my life hell. I wasn’t married to a drunk, but in a way, I married into alcoholism–silly naive 24 year old me thought that we would have our own life. I never in my wildest dreams thought that this miasma of shit could spread so far and never wash off. Alcoholic families seem not to have any boundaries or at least this one doesn’t. It is not pretty and I have deep, deep regrets and bitterness about the whole thing (not that you could tell or anything! ). I stayed. This was a huge mistake.
Keeping himself busy at work etc is NOT the answer. There will always be an excuse/reason/need to drink. AA doesn’t work for everyone and I believe there are other approaches out there that don’t invoke a higher power. But he needs support of other people (as do you). That “pride”? That’s not pride–that’s arrogance. Until he sees it for what it is, he will not change.
FTR, just so those in recovery here know that I’m not a complete bitch, I know of 2 alcoholics in RL who are wonderful. One (an RN) went on to counsel recovering nurse addicts and is in private practice and doing very well. And one is a dad who holds a steady job, is emotionally involved and present in his daughters’ lives and is over the moon about his new granddaughter. These are people I admire and respect very much. Those who haven’t done the work and expect the credit can go hang, IMO.
Look, until HE wants to change, he won’t. And the only thing you can do to want to change is help him hit bottom. Move out. Talk to an attorney. Make him think about what the rest of his life will be like if he chooses alcohol over you.
The sooner you do this the better. You can’t help him. But you can help yourself.
A SDMB unacknowledged fact; nobobdy expects to persuade the OP, just the viewers. Double-especially when the topic is about love and addiction.
Red Stilettos is 2 years into a marriage to a drunk. (No - not drunk all the time, but enough to fuck a good thing up). AFAIK, they haven’t brought a child into this situation. She rejects the tennet of Alanon that his drinking isn’t her problem. (an insider’s parsing of that tennet: you have your own problems - stop smokescreening by letting the drunk’s sidetrack them) So why should it be ours? It’s not. No advice from me will follow:
If I could get back 18 of the 20 years I lost to an alcoholic marriage, of course I would. I knew I could walk out in 1988, but I didn’t. If the decision had been made for me by a meteor hitting my alcoholic in 1988, knowing what I do now of who I was at that time, my next act would have been to find a new marriage. To another alcoholic.
But that meteor didn’t arrive, so it took 20 years. But I’m not looking for another alcoholic. And that isn’t because of the 20 years experience. It’s because of Alanon.
Every single time he gives you his word he’s done with it, then, within 14 days, goes on another bender, that diminishes your relationship and your self respect. A little bit every time. Soon, you won’t be able to believe anything he tells you. Only you can decide where the line in the sand lies.
I understand it’s hard when he’s in the reformative 13 day lead up, but you should be making arrangements for the next bender right now. Rent a room nearby, take over some clothes and things you’d need to be there a few days. When next he falls off the wagon, pick up and leave, do not tell him where you are, leave a note asking him to choose between committed on going sobriety or separation/divorce. Let him think about it for a few days before resuming contact. Line in the sand drawn.
I understand you could go around this track a few times, experiencing long periods of sobriety, then he may fall again. Perhaps he wants to lean on the discipline a zero tolerance policy, on your part, would provide for him. Anything is possible, and you love him, so I know you’ll try anything to help him.
You have clearly been gifted with insight and intelligence. I think you can sense you are standing on the edge of a precipice, few people are afforded such an opportunity. And I think you know which way madness lies. Love does not demand “Standing by your man,” in any self traumatizing fashion. You do not have to wade through an ocean of ugly before you draw your line in the sand. Misplaced loyalty should never trump intellect.
To disregard the gifts, to ignore the precipice, to wade into the ugly, none of it will change the facts as they stand. Announce a zero tolerance policy. Stand by it.
And never forget; “You can’t help someone by doing for them what they should, or could, do for themselves.” Say it aloud everyday, it’s your new mantra!
And good luck to you on covering the difficult ground that lies ahead.
That doesn’t mean “his drinking is not a problem for you.” It means “his drinking is not something you can control.” Or, as QtM put it,
The same applies to lots of other… personal traits. If someone is overcontrolling, if they’re sloppy, if they worry too much, if they never worry enough - it can’t be changed by anybody other than themselves.
Your thirteen days in between sound like us going anywhere with The Grandfather From Hell. It’s been at least two years since the last time he got banned from a store for trying to grope the cashier :smack: but every time we are with him or go anywhere with him, we’re completely tense, prepared to attempt to forestall “whatever shite Gramps is going to come up with this time.”
I put up with that about once a year for family’s sake (I’m not planning on breaking up all contact with my family “just because” I’d like to throw Gramps from a high building after making sure there are no innocents at the landing spot), but - one. Day. A. Year. Please don’t spend your life like that!
AA is certainly not the only game in town but all of them have at least one thing in commom - a reliable support network. Uncomfortable with AA? Is that because of the AA or because of admiting that we sometimes need other people, we sometimes can’t do it on our own?
His pride telling him that he shouldn’t be dependent on strangers, most of whom are dependant on alcohol? And this matters because… ? Pride is important because…? He gives two shits what strangers might think about him because… ?
It’s good to see him changing up his non-abusing habits, that’s a start, but without a network of support, without the safety net behind us, without replacing foolish pride with honest humility these changes may well be short lived and difficult to maintain.
Of course these questions are not for you to answer, just consider. Feel free to ask them of the appropriate party though.
I think it’s at least time to step back and evaluate your situation. Go to your parents or a friends house for a week or two, and really take stock of what your relationship means and what is likely to happen going forward.
Success rates for overcoming addictions are not great period. Sad. And the afflicted are truly sorry afterwards, and can do well for a while on their own, and be good people otherwise, but so often it’s just not enough.
Be mindful of your sanity, and don’t get used to it, and let it take over your life as well. It can happen so slowly you won’t recognize yourself at the end.
My sister married an addict, who could go 4-6 months without caving, so she was always in the “This time it feels different. Maybe he gets it. How can I leave him now?” mode. And her life was destroyed by inches for it. She did leave him eventually, but is now a most bitter woman.
So what did it take for her? And how much are you prepared to take for love?
Spouse binges every so many months. Nope. She could live with that.
(good period)
Spouse tries several rehabs, but whenever he’s out he’s just not that interested in attending meeting. Nope.
(good period)
Spouse loses a job because he was a no-show out on a binge. Nope. He gets another job.
(good period)
She starts asking employers to give her his paycheck, cause it’s a trigger for him. Surprisingly, many places did this for her.
(long good period, cause he doesn’t control the funds)
Spouse disappears on a binge for 3 days with her car, selling the airbag for money. Nope. She stayed.
Rehab again.
(good period, but she routinely hides money in the house from him)
It’s summer and she’s pregnant. She comes home and find a stack of cold food on the floor cause he dragged the fridge down the block to sell it to a used appliance store for $50. Nope. She’s become used to the pattern but it’s clearly getting worse.
Rehab again.
(good period)
She comes home one night to find him high, watching their toddler, and that he just found some money in the house and was preparing to leave. Was he going to leave the kid home alone? Was he going to take the kid with him on a drug run? Nope, still not enough for her.
Spouse vanished 2 days before Christmas with a paycheck leaving her unable to pay the rent if he doesn’t come back with any of it. She was having our family over for a Christmas eve party and was still going ahead with it. Just part of the normal routine now. She’s got her toddler and my mother there, in the kitchen cooking for the party.
He comes home without any money.
She said she actually saw red. A red haze over her eyes.
Rooted through a drawer to find the largest knife in the kitchen.
Stabbed him in the stomach and punctured his liver. In front of her kid and mother.
Ambulance takes him, police take her.
He wouldn’t press charges because he knows it all his fault. Only good thing about the whole situation. My mother died two weeks later, and sister has guilt that the stress and worry over this was a factor.
Finally, she left him for good.
I say this without any snark. You want to help him, you want to make things work… but if he won’t help himself, I see no other choice than to play your hand. Tell him he either gets help or you’re leaving. Loving somebody means doing the best thing for them. If you stay, and he won’t get treatment, this cycle will just continue.
).