ForeverAlways

I am new to posting here although I have read tons of threads here and they have helped me so much. Here is what I just posted on the substance family board. My AH was addicted to everything so I could post in multiple areas here but this might be the best fit.

I married a guy that I just thought partied a little. Two weeks after we married he started coming home every night drunk and I found out later he liked a little cocaine with his beer. I told him it had to stop and he stopped. I had no idea he was addicted to everything at that time. He stopped for 8 years. After 5 years of him not drinking or doing drugs and he quit smoking too -- we decided to have children. I really never gave a thought to him ever drinking again because he stopped on his own.

In his 8th year of not drinking or using when I already had two babies and twins on the way (after our anniversary when he told everyone that he loved me dearly) he decides to drink. He said he could handle it and for me not to worry -- he was just a normal guy that liked an occasional beer -- I immediately knew he would end up dying of this thing and he did last March.

He became possessed with figuring out which high was the best high and he drank constantly. Turns out he had hidden the fact from me that he was addicted to drugs and drank from the time he was 13. I had never been around anyone that got drunk or did drugs so I did not pick up on signs other than he was moody from time to time and loved attention on him, but we had friends, traveled, laughed, loved, and were best friends to each other for 8 years. I am heartbroken that he decided he could handle just one drink and he was just gone.

A year after that we found out that our two oldest had a fatal disease and were not expected to live past their teens. He totally lost it and blamed the diagnosis and me for his drinking. This was a guy that I know was crazy about me and loved me. His drinking buddies all said it was all about drugs for him. As his disease progressed he started stealing from his customers, shoplifting, pawning everything, sleeping in houses that were up for sale, living in drug houses, etc.

He went from a sweet guy into a horrible, vile monster. He would say the most hurtful things to me and posted how horrible I was to his high school buddies on FB. He died of COPD and an enlarged heart (crack, booze, meth induced) before he totally went crazy. One of the neighbors told me he did not understand why I thought he had a drinking problem (he did not know him and AH was an expert at hiding it from people that had no clue). He even managed to have his FB crowd come after me after his death when I was on his FB page. I was called the "c**t that caused his problems and crazy. I felt like I was punched in the stomach. On FB he honestly acted like he was in HS again and wanted to reconnect with the girl he dated back then.

His doctor told me after his death that he really had a brain disease caused by his drinking and the beating he took when trying to steal drugs from some drug dealer on the street. He was left for dead after taking multiple kicks to his head. My SIL told me last week that they had a gun but decided killing him was bad for business. He never came back from that IMO. If I had known he was an addict as a teen I might still have married him and given him a chance, but I hope I would have decided against children.

I am really struggling with his death right because I never stopped loving him but I hated his addicted side. He started down this road and no one could ever talk to him again. His line was, "nobody tells me what to do" and no one ever did. Talking to him was completely pointless -- I should know I did that for 5 years and finally I got a clue -- it only made things worse. It helps me to know he was really sick and it really didn't have anything to do with me at all. He told me once that I had to be crazy to think he liked being so screwed up and depressed. As it turns out he was the crazy one and if he had not died of his COPD he would have completely lost his mind. You go crazy, die, or recover from this -- my AH gave his life for it. Thanks for reading.

Chino

That was terrible to read and I'm positive it was 10000x worse for you and your children to live it. How are your twins and your other children, too?

Lady, I'm sure you still have a ton of grieving and healing to do and I sincerely wish you the best. I'm sorry I have nothing more to offer than that.

ForeverAlways

I almost lost my second oldest last week in the hospital when he coded. He survived but I was angry that my husband could not do the hard work he needed to do to be there for us. He always told me I never finish anything -- well, I am there for our children. My children are doing the best they can. They don't understand that their dad was ever a good person but he was once. I do have a very complicated type of grief -- I was never able to have a REAL conversation with him after he started drinking or even tell him at the end what he meant to me at one time. I lost him twice -- when he decided he could take that drink and handle it and when his body died last year.

greeteachday

I'm so sorry for all that you have gone through and continue to experience. You have many different losses to process - losing you husband to addiction, his death, losing the man you once had, the diagnosis with your children - you are a very strong person to work through all this and to reach out for help and support.

I found it helpful when others encouraged me to take the time I needed to grieve and to understand that no two people walk that journey following the same path. I hope in time you can work through the pain and find comfort. SR is a great place to be to find support.

ForeverAlways

Thank you for your kind words. I don't feel very strong at all. I go to his grave and yell at him when I get overwhelmed. I was thrown under the bus for nothing. My family loved him so much and to see what he became is very difficult to process. He even started barking and growling when ever he would come into the house. He also was bad at setting fires when cooking and I run O2 for my oldest son. He had to be supervised at all times. I let him live in the garage at the end because he was so sick with his COPD that even his druggie friends no longer wanted to be around him. I didn't know the guy at the end -- he lost his personality, looks, family, respect all because he wanted to be drunk and high. Maybe wanted is too strong -- his brain was locked and loaded on these substances and he had no will to quit. He needed his substances like I need air to breathe in his mind. I am hoping to be able to process all that has happened -- I was never able to do that when he was alive.

chicory

I am so sorry for your loss. I can surely understand and imagine your anger...even though your late husband was sick, you were angry at the disease, not so much him, as I am reading it.

wishing you strength and peace ,
chicory

irisgardens

ForeverAlways...so sorry that you are going through this...and so glad you are here. You have so much on your plate...and will be accompanied here as the things that need to be faced unfold in their appropriate order for you and the children...it is really hard...my heart is breaking for you...and know that you are not alone.

ForeverAlways

I am not angry with AH I have come to believe he had a real disease but I am very angry at his disease. I found the disease tiresome and the insults that came with it annoying. I had a lot to overcome because my sons have a disease with no cure and AH could have done something about his. My boys want to live and his disease didn't care if AH lived or not. His disease did not care if my boys lived or died either. His disease never gave a damn about anything. My husband never raised his voice to me or ever called me a name until he decided he could drink that one drink and his disease took my strong husband and gave me back an immature brat. Once disease was back he progressed into every drug, gambling, porn, food, internet, etc. I have no clue what his DOC even was. He liked it all his friends told me. It just takes my breath away all the addictions. I told him before we ever married I was not interested in any one that drank in excess or did drugs. He told me he wanted the same. I kept my end of the bargain. I many times wish I just had never met him, but it is what it is and I loved him and plan to be buried with him. I honor the good times and despise the bad times. Forgiving him has helped me a lot on my healing journey.

greeteachday

I lost one of my daughters to addiction. Her time lost in the disease was fairly brief compared to those of many that I read here, but during that time I was pretty much in constant crisis mode and pretty numb as a form of self preservation. It wasn't until she died that I could start processing all that transpired. I suspect that this is part of what you are trying to wrap your arms around now as well. Being angry about what his disease did to you and your family seems very healthy, even if it probably is quite uncomfortable too.

ForeverAlways

How long did it take you to process your daughter's death? My mom told me she was over my father much faster and thinks I am taking too long. My mom and dad knew where they stood with each other and had no conflicts at the time of his death. My AH was not so nice to me and I was tired of his disease. In the end I did not know him -- this disease really does progress and he became someone so different. He used to care about his appearance and would make fun of people that dressed as he did at the end of his life. His speech patterns changed -- he was mainly vulgar in what he said to me and he would give me that sly look out the corner of his eye to see if he drew blood or not. He took endless pictures of himself when he was alone in our detached garage that were just odd. Like a little kid playing in front of the mirror trying out faces. He would play dirty tricks on me just like the ones that got him kicked out of the apt. where he was living. For some reason if you helped him once and didn't again he would want revenge. He did not like living in our garage so he wanted to get back at me. He simply could not be trusted. Not like my guy at all. He used to be honest and had morals -- drinking and crack took all of that away. With all due respect to my mother -- she has no clue what I am going through after years of his addiction. He went from a guy that protected me to someone that didn't give a damn. That is how I ended up here. You have a wonderful community here and so many stories like mine -- you all "get it" and I appreciate you for all you do here. Thank you all for your kind words for me. I hope I can be a help to you as I know you will be to me. I know for me I am at least now able to free to love the good in my husband again. I had started to forget he ever was good and decent.

GracieLou

You helped me today. Thank you

RedDog735

I too, am new here. I am so sorry to hear all that you have gone through. I hope that you find some peace. It's interesting because I have been with my boyfriend for a little over a year and I can already see a common theme here with reading everyone's posts. At 23, It is my hope that I can get thee support and comfort that I can now, while learning everything I can about this terrible disease. If I can do those things, I can one day "seee the light" and get out of the relationship with my Abf. Welcome to SR, and I hope you find it as useful as I do. Hugs**

ForeverAlways

I was 26 when I married my AH and 34 when he took that one little drink because "he could handle it that time." I never expected he would drink again since he told me he had no desire. I really thought it was a will power thing. When we found out we were having twins instead of just one baby it was very stressful. We had a small house (I still have) and now we were going to be a family of 6. I will never really know why he took that stupid drink but I do know that he had a disease and there could have been a dozen reasons or no reasons. I absolutely hated his disease - it took a good man and twisted him in ways I could never have dreamed of. He was the guy that held my hand when I was giving birth to our children and cried with happiness when he held them for the first time. Why did he have to leave us?

You are so right to educate yourself about this. Up until his death there was a lot I did not know about his disease. I had counseling and read some books but I was so overwhelmed with my children and their disease that I honestly found his problems tiresome. I mean I thought we had REAL problems with the boys and I resented that he took away from their needs with his drinking. Now I totally get that he had a disease too -- only difference was that he took the first drink with his own hands and what I thought was a sound mind. Within a year of that first drink I barely knew him -- he started up with emotional blackmail and never coming home. Still, when he was here he was able to help me with lifting and keeping the house maintained so I could help our children.

In the beginning he was still helpful and I have never in all of my years been able to count on help from anyone but him. I found that when my children were diagnosed that many of my friends dropped out of sight. They had no clue what to say to me and AH was becoming more and more difficult. AH and I used to be the couple everyone envied -- all said it was so wonderful that we found each other and then all hell broke out in my life and everyone bailed. This is a hard life -- just learn all you can and think about what you want for your life and your future children. I feel for my AH because he gave up on life and as it turns out with all my heartbreak I have had a good life in so many ways. My AH was my rock for years -- he could have let me be his rock and his life could have turned out so much better. I mourn for what should have been.

greeteachday

I'm sure your mom just wants you to feel better, but I hope she understands that you can't have a time schedule for your grief. I think that adding the nature of addiction into the mix also creates a really complex set of feelings to work through. In some ways I'm not sure I have finished processing it all. I do know that with support and lots of work on me that I'm actually in a better place than I was before her death, but I am not the same person either. There are parts of me that have changed forever, and I had to process that too. But I am definitely at a place where I can look back with love and treasure the pre addiction times with her, and also where I have a much greater appreciation of life itself.

I think the first year was more a state of getting through all the firsts than it was of actually accepting what happened. I experienced a lot of different emotions - sometimes I still do. I think coming to acceptance is what finally helped me most. She had overdosed once previously and would have died if her father had not found her, so it was really hard to understand how she could make a choice to go out again knowing it could easily mean death. That brought on lots of different feelings - sadness for her, anger that she made that choice, anger at heroin, feeling in some odd way like she abandoned me, feeling like I didn't do enough to "save" her...Just lots of things to sift through. It is like having a huge box of racing thoughts and feelings and taking them out one by one, holding them, spending some time with each one, and either putting them back in the box to examine again another time, or being able to say, okay, I'm done here, I can let this one go.

I hope you will let yourself take the time you need to get to your place of peace. It really does help to be able to talk about it with people who understand. Just writing this to you has helped me today as well, so thank you.

ForeverAlways

Thanks for sharing about your daughter. I am so sorry she took the path my AH did.

I am still remembering good times a little at a time and then I get slammed with a bad one that I have to process. The first birthday without him is tomorrow, the first year of his death is on the 16th of this month, first anniversary was very difficult. These are days I would not have been thinking about all that much of with him alive and bad was in my face and good was a different life.

At times I would forget how I met the monster it was so buried and then I started to remember how great it was in the beginning and how much we enjoyed being with each other. Renting movies and back in the day renting a VCR, picking up a pizza and staying home to watch movies. Going out with friends or having them over with AH cooking on the grill, fishing with my family. It was a different life and one I miss. He used to have eyes that smiled and in the end it was either a crazed stare or the one I hated the most -- the blank stare of no one is home.

I like the way you mentioned taking out feelings and spending time with them. At times I pop in a home movie so I can remember that I am not crazy and he was the good person I remember.

irisgardens

Forever, you are dealing with this in a pretty awesome way. My son died of SIDS at 2 months--24 years ago...and my Dad had a massive stroke which I felt compelled to be Mom/Dad's support on...and then followed by my 3 girls using drugs...each one harder than the last...ecstasy/cocaine; crystal meth; now an active user of heroin.

I became completely focused on 'saving their lives'...as I couldn't contemplate the loss of another child...and it took years...between the battle...and the very short respites. What I did do, though, is get grief counseling that went into codependency counseling that turned into family of origin counseling and it all helped.

You saying that you forgive him and you know it is a disease...those are all things I 'had' to learn in counseling...and the way you speak about it shows a strength that is so deep...although this situation you have dealt with is so hard...and continues with the illness of your children.

As greetteachday mentioned...the first year anniversaries seem to be the hardest...although I went through a massive down at 5 years and 10 years as well.

Sending you prayers and love as you process out your grief...it takes whatever it takes based on the individual and talking about it can help many...it did me...spent years processing it out.

Take good care of yourself.

greeteachday

Those bad ones really do feel like someone very strong punched you in the gut very hard, don't they? it takes your breath away.

Please be very gentle with yourself this month - you have some particularly difficult days to get through. I found anticipating (well really dreading) those days was probably the worst part. I was interested in your comment that they are days you wouldn't normally have noticed so much if he was alive - I hadn't really thought about that.

ForeverAlways

Irisgardens, you have 3 daughters using. You have it tough one top of losing your son to
SIDS. How are you?

My AH's lawyer back 20 years helped him with what I thought was his first DUI. I have since found a boat load of them in a box as I go through his things when he was first out of HS. His friends and family told me he did not want me to know he was a drinker and addicted to cocaine because I would have never married him. He knew me well, but I was 26 and probably would have thought I could save him. I will never know because I was in the dark about that. Besides he quit all of it for me, for 8 years he quit.

I had no idea I was co-dependent until his lawyer (I hired) told me after the 2nd DUI. He told me he would no longer represent my AH because he would not take any more money from me. His lawyer did not believe that AH had a disease, but he did give me good advice about detaching and it took me several more years until I got it. I always thought that if AH would just remember the good times and the babies we wanted so badly he would stop. Never happened. He did go to rehab and sent me letters of how he would stop for me and the kids and he meant it, only to relapse shortly thereafter. He was able to stop cold for 8 years and after rehab could not even make a year. I never understood that. Now I do. He had a disease, but it took his death to realize that he had a fatal brain disease. I just remember in the last few months that he was more horrible than usual and then one of his parting shots was I would never have married you if I knew you were not a party girl. What a crock! I knew that was a lie to hurt me. When he was in jail his cell mates asked him if I could find them good girls to marry like he found. AH knew it was too late for him once he got COPD and the beating gave him more brain injury so he was as nasty as he could be to me. He also trashed me on FB -- I cried for days over that until my daughter closed the page down. I never thought that loving guy could ever do that to me. They were all lies so he could have the useless group of loser HS friends hate me and call me names. How could they believe a word out of his mouth and none of them even knew me? That was low.

It actually helps me to understand the progression of his disease and even the nicest of guys or gals can become monsters. It means I did not drive him to that -- his disease was in the drivers seat. He tried to lay the blame for his addictions on me to our children and my dear children never bought a word of it. They knew what was going on and we have a very strong bond. I would be heartbroken if my children ever went down the road their dad chose. Their dad wouldn't want that for them either. I know in my gut that my guy was sorry and I will see him again and this time he will be healthy and the smile will be back in his beautiful eyes. He told me a very long time ago that I was the only girl for him forever and always and all I can say to that guy is ditto!

ForeverAlways

He was so unpleasant that I found it hard to celebrate anything about him during that time. He was a tiresome, immature boy in a 50 plus body.