megsykreeg

I feel like life will always will a constant roller coaster with my RAH. He drank Friday night... said it was a one time deal... I was forced to leave the house that night. I have told him this will be my reaction everytime he drinks. I will take my daughter and our other child once born and leave. When he stops drinking we can come home. I just don't even know how to talk to him anymore. He's not drank since and seems to be back on track. Today he called a friend for accountability and they suggested he talk to another friend so he did. He asked his friend if he can trust him to keep what they say in confidence and not tell my dad who is the pastor of our church. He said he would tell my dad. I just pray that he will still be accountable to someone and not keep trying to do it on his own. We know that doesn't work. Just not drinking is not a solution because he will drink again. I'm 16 wks pregnant and just cannot take the stress. He said he'll be accountable to me but that's not the roll I want to be in. He has been getting up early each morning and reading the Bible and praying with me which I think is a great step. He called his friend on his own today without prompting by me. I'm just tired of worrying about him and just want to have a peace that he will be ok. I just wish it would get easier.

Kboys

Hi Megsy. I've so been where you are. Most of us have.
I don't think it will get easier until you stop worrying about him and his getting well and being okay, and start focusing on your pregnant self and your daughter, and what you need to feel better.
It's easier said than done, believe me, I know. I still struggle with it all the time.

But things for me, got a little less crazy once I accepted that he was going to continue to drink... or not, no matter what I did or didn't do, no matter how much I worried or didn't worry.

My babies are 2 and 3, and I feel regret for the times I spent worrying, crying, fighting with AH, searching for hidden bottles and hidden money, going through his phone... when I could have been present with my babies, or doing something to make myself feel better about me while they were sleeping.

They get big fast.

I'm sorry you're going through this. We are here for you

hopeful4

I second, we are here for you.

I did that for a while, I would take my kids and leave. Thing is, it happened so much that I got tired of leaving, and they did too. So then I forced him to leave. Told him to go to his sisters or wherever but not to dare come home if he had been drinking. It just lead to him trying to hide it. Ugh, I am so sorry for all you are going through.

Tight hugs.

dandylion

Meegsy......as in your other thread.....I think that getting help (support) for yourself is the most important thing you can do to lessen the stress.
There is no magic wand that you can wave and change the reality that your husband is an alcoholic and must do whatever necessary to deal with this reality.
The only thing that you have control over is yourself and YOUR actions.
It is up to you to decide what you can live with and what kind of life you want for yourself and your children. There is a lot of help available to you if you are willing to receive it. Just as there is a lot of help for him when he is ready to embrace sobriety.

Alanon, Celebrate Recovery (which is held in many churches) are the most obvious sources. Also, an individual counselor who is experienced in addictions if highly recommended. You have got to get some people on your team......

Also, there is no point in trying to hide this from your family. They already know. Alcoholism thrives in secrecy.
It is nothing to be ashamed of. Millions of people are alcoholic. The tradgedy is in not getting help......

Keep reading and learning.....knowledge is power with this disease....

dandylion

LOL!! AA is much better in keeping one's privacy than Church......
Gossip travels with the speed of a forest fire in most churches.....lol!
Maybe, you can remind him of that .......

ladyscribbler

I have told him this will be my reaction every time he drinks. I will take my daughter and our other child once born and leave. When he stops drinking we can come home.

What an exhausting way to live. You and your children's lives will be completely at the mercy of his choice to drink. It seems like an untenable situation, honestly, to be dragging a toddler and pretty soon a newborn out of the house in the middle of the night because your husband got drunk.
I know because I tried this "solution" for awhile with my ex. It worked, after a fashion, until I got exhausted, nothing changed and I realized that I might very well spend the rest of my life fleeing the house at all hours, waking the kids in the middle of the night (school nights included), in all kinds of weather (spring and summer we could always go to the beach or park, but with 2 feet of snow on the ground in freezing temperatures it was a lot harder to find a place to go) all so my ex could be home, comfortable with his bottle. He never felt one iota of guilt over it, though he frequently got angry at me for excluding him from our "excursions."
No, life with an active alcoholic and small children never gets any easier.
If your husband wants real support he needs to get it from alcoholics in recovery. Those are the people who will be able to truly help him and hold him accountable, if that's what he really wants.

NYCDoglvr

As a recovering alcoholic I can assure you there's nothing you or anyone else can say that will keep an alcoholic from drinking. I couldn't get sober on my own and went to AA, where I found the support I needed to not drink one day at a time (around 8500 days now). It's a choice the alcoholic makes, to drink or not. I hope you can take the focus off him and keep it on yourself and your children, where you can make the biggest difference. Alanon is a wonderful program for friends and families of alcoholics. A big hug.......

LexieCat

Ditto on what lady scribbler wrote. This isn't a solution for the long term.

If you feel that living with him is impossible, but leaving is unthinkable, you might want to consider a separation for a while. That might give him the opportunity to decide whether he wants to pursue sobriety or whether he really just wants to drink in peace. Nothing needs to be decided immediately, but it would be far easier to accomplish that before you have a newborn to care for. Just a thought you might want to consider.

Hugs,

AnvilheadII

if he drank Friday, he is not an RAH. as I recall by the time you took the child from the home AT NIGHT, he had bolted the door, locking you out

you are pregnant. you have a child. THAT has to be your priority, not HIM. he's already dismissed it as if he forgot to check the mail.

you really cannot keep leaving every time he drinks......it isn't fair to small children to be dragged out of their HOME in the middle of the night because one of their parents chooses to get drunk and stupid. maybe one of you needs to relocate for a while.....it wasn't JUST that he got drunk but HOW he treated you. which was deplorable.

megsykreeg

Thank you all... I know I need to set clearer boundaries and I am trying to. It is a tough situation to be in. I keep telling him that just not drinking is not the solution. He instead needs to be so far from those low places that drinking won't even be thought. He said to me this morning how sorry he is for his anger and that he knows he needs to purpose to not allow other people to get to him. He said he'll go to a meeting tonight. He even said I can come if I don't trust he'll go. I don't want to be like that.

Kboys... you hit the nail on the head... why am I allowing myself to be so worried? Searching his car, phone, bank account and credit cards.... No way to live. I need to focus on me and my babies instead of him.

He will either drink or not drink but it has to be him not me. I can't change him. I can support him in his sobriety but I need to be careful of that fine line between support and enabling. I have definitely enabled him in the past and don't want to do that again.

Kboys

"Kboys... you hit the nail on the head... why am I allowing myself to be so worried? Searching his car, phone, bank account and credit cards.... No way to live. I need to focus on me and my babies instead of him"

Yes! But it is so hard, I know, when you have been living with the crazy out-of-control chaos of an active A.
It's like you feel you need to find something to make sense of it all, and to help you feel like you at least know what's going on so you feel like you have some kind of control....... but you don't, and it only makes you crazy.

I was literally obsessed with worrying, searching, snooping. And it got me nowhere except further along on the crazy train.
I still do it sometimes, I admit.. out of old habit? I don't know, but not daily like I used to

Do something nice for you today.... the more you do, the easier it will get.

FireSprite

It DOES get easier when you shift the focus back to you & the kids. It REALLY does.

But it doesn't happen overnight, it's a slow, baby-step process. When I stopped snooping for "clues", I had to FORCE myself to change my behavior. As in, force myself to leave the house so I couldn't log in to see his phone activity. Force myself to ignore the pile of receipts on his dresser that I would normally be dissecting for "proof" of something. Sometimes I literally sat on my hands to fight the urges, then I had to fight the emotional reaction of this change. (my stomach would just churn away...) I had to force myself to sleep using OTC supplements until I got used to the routine of sleeping again.

I was a nervous wreck in my thoughts, "What if, what if, what if...?" I would answer myself, mimicking the voices of SR in my head, chanting the phrases that resonated for me, over & over again like a mantra. What did all my snooping ever help me with? Nothing. What did I lose by stopping? Nothing. What did I gain? Time. Balance. Distance to help me "see" it all better. More control over my own actions. More ability to be in the present moment vs. mentally absent with worry. ((((HUGS))))

megsykreeg

Yes sleep has been rough and at 16 wks pregnant I need it. He says "I'm fine, don't worry about me." So much easier said than done. Doesn't help that my 18 mos old senses the tension and hasn't been sleeping well either. She wants to sleep in bed with us which only makes it harder bc she likes to sleep on my head. When I do sleep I toss and turn all night. I need to just keep telling myself that it's in God's hands and I can't control it.

FireSprite

Sleep can be difficult in pregnancy even with no other stressors affecting it. Don't be afraid to talk to your OB about it, he/she might have some suggestions to help you get the rest you need. ((((hugs))))

ETA - I've found that using headphones & my cell to meditate helps me drift off to sleep more easily at night; I essentially shut the rest of the world out for 20 mins once I close my eyes with those headphones on. (I get a lot of videos on youtube but my favorite one is "The Secret Garden", which is available on it's own site I believe.)

LexieCat

Weeelll, yes and no. His drinking and behavior is something you can't control, but taking steps to ensure the well-being of yourself and your children IS something you can control.

I forget, are you going to Al-Anon?

megsykreeg

I went to one Al-Anon meeting all the way back in October but the women were so bitter and angry it was more discouraging than helpful. Now it's difficult with my daughter as meetings in my area are either during work hours which I'm working or at 7 pm which I cannot bring my daughter with me bc of bed time. I mentioned to my husband I wanted to go and he said I didn't need it. So I've instead been reading a lot on here and talking to people here. It does help. Maybe eventually I can go to another meeting and find a better one.

Kboys

Does your daughter ever spend the night at your parent's house? Maybe she could go there on the 7pm meeting nights?

I didn't start going to Al-anon until after AH stopped drinking. Only one meeting per week offered in my small town, at 5:30, and I had no one to leave the babies with at that time.... sure as heck wasn't going to leave them with drunk AH.
But I love going, and I wish I would have figured out a way to make it before.

LexieCat

Even a great Al-Anon group will have meetings where the sh*t has hit the fan for everyone at once (seemingly) and there will be negativity in the room. In my experience that is relatively rare, especially for groups with several members with a substantial amount of recovery. If you go back to that meeting on another night, the vibe might be totally different. Or if it's the same, other groups will be more upbeat and positive. I wouldn't let a single bad meeting put me off--there are too many good ones out there.

Some groups have childcare. Or you might be able to find a friend or relative to stay with occasionally, as Kboys suggested. Or you might be able to bring her to the meeting with you--some groups would be fine with that, as long as you take her outside if she gets fussy. Look at it this way--going to a meeting with you once a week is less disruptive than being hauled out of bed because you're leaving because your husband is drunk.

Think about it.

dandylion

Megsy.....it is not his place to tell you what you do or do not need.

dandylion

megsykreeg

He was stressed last night and went to a meeting without me even prompting. He simply said "I should go to a meeting." I was very proud of him. I told him I was proud of him and to keep up the good work.

dandylion

Megsy.....don't forget that he has tons of people on the stand-by to help him.
It doesn't have to fall on your shoulders. (you are already the mother of two)...lol!

dandylion

I think "Co-dependent No More" would be perfect for you to read, just now.
It is just about classic reading material, around here......