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I'm new here, and I've never written any of this down, so thank you in advance for reading my heartbroken thoughts.

My dad is an alcoholic. Has been for my entire life. And I can't deal with it anymore.

I'm almost 28 and my sister is almost 23. I have good memories of my dad being home and playing with me and really being a father. My sister doesn't. By the time she was old enough to really be able to keep those memories, my dad was spending time away from home. He was on a bowling league, drinking away his Mondays and Thursdays, and then he'd go to 'friends' houses on the other nights.

Then the bowling stopped and he just began spending time with another alcoholic in the evenings. This has been going on for over 10 years now. I think my mom has been in denial -- she has allowed his behavior to progress and worsen, but the past two years things have really started to come to the surface.

I had a party at my home for New Years two years ago. My parents came because my mom didn't want my dad to be wasted at his friend's house and she wanted to spend time with my husband and me. We had other friends over and a guy I've known since childhood was dancing with my mom. My dad was drunk and got jealous and tried to pick a fight with him. It got so bad that I had to have my husband make my dad leave. The humiliation was awful. I know he was verbally abusive to my mother over the situation and it took me a while to forgive him. I have never been so embarrassed in my life.

My sister and I both feel like my dad can't stand to spend time with us. When we go on outings as a family, my mom and dad always argue because my dad is constantly checking his watch and is just itching to get away to get to his drinking buddy. I know on some level that my dad loves me, but I feel like he doesn't like me very much. He certainly doesn't know me. And it feels like he doesn't WANT to get to know me.

In July 2008, my dad's drinking almost killed him. He used to be a functioning alcoholic, but the past few years he has been unable to control it. When he came home around 10 PM, he went upstairs to go to bed. My parents have a baby gate upstairs to keep their dogs from going in the bedrooms. My dad was so drunk that he couldn't walk over the baby gate. His foot got caught and he fell down the stairs. He lost a few teeth, broke his nose, and had bleeding in his brain. He was unconscious for ten minutes.

While he was in the hospital, it was discovered that my dad had an aortic aneurysm and required heart surgery to remove it. My mom likes to say that my dad falling was a blessing in disguise, and I guess partially she's right. I don't want my dad to die at all, not by his heart exploding in his chest or by drinking himself into oblivion.

My father's father was an alcoholic and at the end of his life, he had alienated everyone around him. My grandmother divorced him and my aunt and uncles and my dad ran errands for him because they pitied him. I don't understand how my dad is blind to the fact that he is following the same path.

After my dad's fall, I was so angry. I tried going to Al-anon meetings because I knew this was something that we could no longer ignore. I didn't really care for the Al-anon meetings (honestly, I only went to two, so I probably didn't give them enough of a chance). And I was the only one out of my mom and sister who thought the situation needed to be addressed. And I know it's easier for me to be ready to address it because I don't live with him. They do. So we didn't address it.

A few weeks ago, unrelated to his alcoholism (and he is not diabetic), my dad had to have his foot amputated. So now he is stuck at home and he's on about a billion different medications. My mom had a tough talk with him and told him that drinking is not going to be an option. First of all, because his leg is healing and his center of gravity is totally different. Secondly, he really shouldn't be drinking with all of the medications he is on anyway.

So my mom bought my dad some non-alcoholic beer which seemed to make my dad feel okay about the not-drinking. His drinking buddy, who is a woman, came to the hospital and made jokes about sneaking him in a beer. Once my dad got home, she came by again with a twelve pack of non-alcoholic beer but she had opened the pack and slipped in three real beers. My mom went off on my dad and poured the beers out.

Last night around 11:30, my sister called me in tears. My mom had found two tall-boy cans of beer in the trash and basically, my mom said everything she should have been saying for their entire 30 year marriage.

I don't know what to do now. I know that I don't want to watch my father die. I don't think I can stand to watch him shrivel up and turn into my grandfather, who was such a mean and condescending drunk that no one could bear to be around him.

How do I tell my dad the truth? Do I just say what I feel? Do I give ultimatums? Does it make me a terrible person to want to just say goodbye now instead of watching him die more slowly? How do I support my mom? What do I do with all of this anger and sadness that his drinking has caused me?

If you made it this far, I thank you. I'm not sure what's going to happen from here, but I am certainly open to ideas, guidance, advice, whatever.