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Old 11-17-2010, 07:37 AM
  # 22 (permalink)  
NoAlcoholToday
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Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Italy
Posts: 287
Originally Posted by breakingglass View Post
noalcoholtoday, tell me this, i bug him almost every day to get help. should i just not say it anymore and let him figure it out? i wish i could do that but i have this insatiable need to remind him constantly
Well I am pretty new to all this recovery game myself so I dont have all the answers. All I can say is that I was sick and tired of everyone else having a view about my alcohol use, except me. Most of the time I was explicitly using alcohol to blot out any possibility that I might have to face up to reality. I sure wasn't in any position to face my wife's reality.

We alcoholics are not thinking on a rational level about all this - most of the time we are simply using our wits to stay above water (which is one of the reasons why alcoholics can often be so manipulative)

I am so sorry he is lashing out at you and everyone around him. I did too for a while but I was NEVER violent, I just shouted at people and lost a lot of friends. I remember saying to my wife "well if you dont want me to get angry, then dont say anything to make me angry". Perfectly ridulous in hindsight but due to the distorted perception of an alcohol blurred mind. The anger is really at oneself and, unfortunately, the inner self wont allow us to target it inwards so it just getting sprayed around arbitrarily. Thank Christ my wife stuck by me and we are starting to build all over again. But she did have to TAKE ACTION in order for me to register on the radar. Its just no good threatening an alcoholic without following through. We are like small children constantly pushing the boundaries of what we can get away with. My wife actually had to miss her flight home and tell me she wasn't coming home till I DID something about it. I still didn't do anything for a couple of months (and rather foolishly she came home in the meantime)

I read today (sorry I cant remember on which thread but definitely in the F&F section today) about the difference between support and enabling. This is an important distinction. Beyond that, I really dont know what to suggest. We alcoholics are just not listening to other people's needs - we are WAY too busy trying not to face up to our own.

But on the possitive side, there are lots of us trying desperately to find a new way of living without alcohol abuse - it is not all doom and gloom!! Look after yourself as your number one priority. Shift your thought patterns away from him and onto your own well being.
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