Every situation and circumstance is different for every person - so there is no one size fits all answer. Also, laws vary by state regarding divorce and separation as well.
My situation was complicated. When my AH's alcoholism grew unbearable and out of control ... I had to insist he move out of our home. The tension and atmosphere in our home had become debilitating and toxic. Having him live elsewhere solved the majority of the problems. However, due to a long marriage, property, a mutually owned business that provided income to support our children and required both of us to be involved ... and the overwhelming fear that my children very well might be forced into unsupervised custody led to my decision to just separate. However, if I did not have children, I would likely have proceeded forward with a divorce. Under those circumstances, you have the opportunity to move on with your life totally breaking free of the destructive insanity of the alcoholic relationship. However, this is not the case when children are involved. My husband hung onto the hope that he might find sobriety and to eventually move back home ... this hope kept him from aggressively demanding a divorce or unsupervised visitations and kept him somewhat placated.
Sharing children can make all the difference in making a decision. Sadly, our courts do not properly protect our children when divorce involves an alcoholic parent. And because of custody, we still end up in a long frustrating relationship with the alcoholic even with a divorce. My AH had proven in the past that he would drink and drive - and act irresponsibly while our kids were in his care. This would include passing out while caring for a sick child and erratic mood swings including unwarranted angry outbursts. My kids had always counted on me to intervene on their behalf, to be their advocate, when my husband was obviously acting inappropriately around them. I just felt I couldn’t willingly put my children in such an abusive situation with no supervision. Once I realized how out of control his drinking had become around my children, he was no longer allowed to drive them anywhere and he could only come over to visit when he was sober - with unsupervised custody all bets were off. Even with our situation of living apart, there were times where my AH had sounded sober on the phone and I agreed to let him come over to see his sons, but by the time he showed up he had become loud, obnoxious and offensive turning our quiet home upside down. Looking back ... my sons were never upset because they didn’t see their dad that much, however, they still remember and resent the times I allowed him to come over when he was drinking and obnoxious. I can only imagine their resentment if they repeatedly were forced to be left in his custody unsupervised. I can still remember terrifying situations when brother and I were left in with my alcoholic father’s care - it was rare, but dangerous and filled us with fear as he drove around with us blind drunk.
In our case, our finances were better protected by staying married. If we had gotten a divorce it would have given him half our assets to squander away instead of being used to support our children, and save for college. It would have destroyed our business and our income. I maintained legal rights to our assets, property, business and when he finally became sickly, confused and helpless, I could help manage his medical decisions when he could no longer handle it. Also, there also would have been a nice chunk of money used for attorneys that I preferred to use for college expenses . By the time we had reached this situation, he wasn’t lucid enough to try and take control of our money, but an attorney would have protected his potential assets. You would probably want to see a lawyer about things that can be done to protect your credit cards, debit cards, bank accounts ... and liabilities due to driving recklessly. One thing I was told to do was to put his car in his name only to help protect our assets in case of an accident. If we had divorced, in our situation, it would have created a big financial loss regardless.
When family members keep asking me what the best solution was to the nightmare we were living .... my answer was, there was no ‘win-win’ in a situation regarding kids and an alcoholic parent. I would have had to stay actively and anxiously involved about my children’s well being, whether I would have divorced or not. The only happy ending would have been would have been for my husband to find life long sobriety and return to the decent responsible person I married. It had happened with my father and it changed my family’s life dramatically - but I came to realize, my AH was incapable of this type of recovery. He couldn’t even stop drinking when he became profoundly disabled - eventually leading to his tragic untimely demise.
Like I mentioned in the beginning - every situation is different. Sometimes divorce is the best solution. Sometimes, the alcoholic does not push for custody or the courts provide for proof of assuring sober visitations. Sometimes it is better to just separate. Take some time and do some research, ask questions and seek recommendations from professionals.
And keep coming back to SR ... it has a so much information from those that have had to make the very same tough decisions that you will have to make. Maybe someday there will be better treatments and recovery for alcoholism - and we will have the third option ... keeping our familys intact with 2 sober committed loving parents.