Old 07-16-2011, 03:58 PM
  # 16 (permalink)  
adamr
Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: Oregon
Posts: 4
Girlfriend has a drinking problem

Reading what others have wrote has left me somewhat relieved to find other people out there battling with the same thing I am and also scared that it will only get worse. My girlfriend and I have been together for almost two years and we have a beautiful girl whom is about 8 months old now. We are both in our mid 20's and would drink on a regular basis and I soon realized that her drinking was more of a crutch than a good time. I would come home and she would be passed out occasionally from drinking the bottle left from the night prior or she would go and get alcohol while I was at work.
We addressed the drinking due to verbal fighting and she would quit for a while but started doing it in secret. It felt horrible but I would make sure she didn't have money to drink and she would find a way to do so anyway. Our daughter came into our lives and she cleaned up her act for the most part with small relapses here and there. She never fully committed to AA meetings or anything of the sort. I partly blame myself for not being there to make sure she was doing something about her problem. I have had alcoholics in my life that didn't make things easy so I found it easier to ignore the problem than address it.
Things were going really well for quite some time until we went to a large party where she started drinking and caused a huge scene. I asked if she had been drinking and of course that started a huge fight and she would get extremely defensive bringing up every hateful thing she could like every time I would address it in the past. I admit that I wasn't the calmest person and that I would get very angry when she drank.
After coming home from the party she felt ashamed and that next morning I came home to surprise her with a coffee and found she wasn't home. I called her to see where she was and she became defensive which always sends red flags for me. She ended up going to her sisters and long story short the cops came and I had to leave work early to pick up our little girl whom was there for all of this which truly breaks my heart.
The cops told my girlfriend to leave and I tried picking her up while walking down the road but she wouldn't get in the car. I went home and thought I could make things ok by letting her in and things got out of control. I didn't want her around our child for that (the same as her sister didn't want) so I locked her out of the house and called for her sister to come and get her. She screamed and banged on the door until the neighbors came out. They let her in and she came back and did the same and slammed her head against the door and punched herself until she got a black eye. That sounds very horrible and I didn't know she was doing so until her sister came up to ask if I hit her. We didn't talk that night, but I ended up picking her up the next day after work from her sisters.
I cannot explain how torn my soul is and how I just feel like giving up but we have a child and I want us to be a normal family. I have told her that she needs to go to AA / counseling or I can't be with her. It hurt so much, but I feel it will only hurt worse over time. I have been so stressed at times I cant eat and feel I have no where to go. She feels ashamed after episodes and says all the things that you should say (It won't happen again, I didn't mean what I said, I was drunk, I love you, etc, etc, etc...) Any advice or courage would be accepted for I feel that I am at the end of my rope. Thank you for reading, I hope it wasn't too much.
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