I found scott evil’s thread very moving, not only for the wonderful year that he’s had, but because I have a more personal connection.
About 2 years ago, my drinking got seriously out of hand. My husband and I both drank publicly and at home, but I started having a secret stash of my own.
As so often happens, the secret drinks began to get more frequent and larger until the inevitable happened and my husband found the stash. I swore I’d quit and did, for a couple of weeks, then I started drinking again. Well, he caught me again and confronted me–he hadn’t found any actual booze this time, but he was pretty sure I’d started drinking again. I lied, then broke down and promised to stop. This pattern repeated itself a few times with anything from about a week to three months in between.
Then about six months ago, I changed. Before, a part of me had not been able to let go of drinking. I liked it and wanted to keep doing it and just tried to get sneakier and figure out ways to hide it better, which obviously never really worked. So I asked myself what pleasure I was really getting out of it. How much time and mental energy was I wasting trying to hide my drinking and–even more–worrrying about getting caught, and wouldn’t life be a lot better if I didn’t have to spend time doing that. So I stopped. I hadn’t really been physically dependent on it so that wasn’t an issue. I just had to quit buying and drinking the stuff. So I did.
Well, maybe the more experienced and astute of you see where this is going. This morning at 5 a.m. my husband got me up and informed my that he was “100% sure” that I had been drinking last night. The problem is, I hadn’t. Not last night and not any nights in the previous six months.
What do I do now? I can’t drink less than nothing. He told me early on in the whole process that he wouldn’t tell me how he “knows” when I’ve been drinking, because he doesn’t want me to get better at hiding it. So I don’t even know what I did. I understand why he thinks he needs to defend himself this way. I told a lot of lies. He’s being loving and supportive–he just called to tell me so. But he doesn’t believe me when I tell him I didn’t drink last night. I’m not sure how to face an indefinite future of accusations to which I have no defense. How do you fight the ghosts of old lies?
I’d appreciate insight from anyone, but especially those who’ve been through something like this, from either side.