well I couldn't say that he maliciously intended to leave me in the lurch, or ever intended anything but love and good things for his baby. But, a big BUT, he couldn't help himself because the booze satisfied such an intense itch that he just had to scratch. I'm sure he felt that his behaviour had no effect on his daughter - he's just having a few to unwind, and sometimes takes it a bit too far. Nothing more or less, I was making a bigger deal that it ever was. Their thinking becomes distorted and self-serving. He could bend any situation to make it sound justifiable and rational to himself so that he could go and get drunk with a clear conscience.
One other time, we had friends over and he passed out by the end of the evening. And by the time I went to bed, I realized I had a stomach flu. Baby woke, crying. Also stomach flu. I was literally crawling to her room, nauseated, and had to leave her screaming and vomiting while I did same in the bathroom. Calling out for him to wake up to help and of course he was sleeping like the dead. Fast forward through a terrible night, until finally at 5am he emerges from the room, wondering why the baby is crying and I'm hugging the toilet. I was enraged - just another example of how I could not depend on him and the only thing I could depend on was that he'd drink again. The string of small events like that really did it, rather than huge drinkfests out to all hours in the bar. At least with those I knew it was game over for the night. I heard once in these forums something that stuck with me - alcoholism weaves itself into the fabric of our lives. It's not just when they drink, it saturates all aspects.