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Old 03-17-2009, 09:15 PM
  # 24 (permalink)  
ICant
Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2008
Location: Australia
Posts: 167
My husband is 2 months sober and going to AA. Yes, he is still suffering mood swings and apparently that can continue because his body is still withdrawing from the alcohol for up to a year. I would have left already if it wasn't for the step work I am doing in Al-Anon. I'm learning that his mood doesn't have to be my mood, his opinion of me and my shortcomings is not fact. He hasn't thrown himself into recovery and the negativity is still there in him but I have finally learned that I am not responsible for his happiness. Likewise he is not responsible for my happiness.

To give a concrete example. He'll say I'm fat. In the days before I realised he was an alcoholic, I'd think: I am fat. I've got to exercise more. In the days after I realised he was an an alcoholic but before Al-Anon, I'd think: What a jerk. Why am I still married to him? NOW, he says it and I think: Actually, I look great and if he can't appreciate it, it is his loss. Leaving my husband won't make me look any different. Sure I won't hear the negativity but nowadays I don't hear it anyway.

I don't know how long I want to live in my bubble of detachment but in the same way he takes his sobriety a day at a time, I take my marriage a day at a time and today, I don't need to take any steps to leave it.
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