New Member: Looking for a place to vent, and for advice.
My husband and I have been married for 4 years, together for 7.
He has an 8 year old son from a previous relationship, and we have a 2 year old son together.
He has been an alcoholic for longer than I've known him. He was highly functional for several years after we got together, and it was good. I didn't see it coming.
He lost his job about the time that I got pregnant with our youngest, and was basically out of work until about a month ago. He's had jobs in between, but never lasting very long, and never giving us more money than he could spend on booze.
During the time that I was pregnant, he was drinking about a gallon of whiskey a day. He was jaundiced and spent most of his time throwing up. Toward the end of the pregnancy he decided to quit. After a couple of days of hallucinating and other scary behavior leading up to him hitting me in the face, he ended up in the ER for 4 days.
He got out, said he was done with whiskey forever, went and bought a bottle of wine, and carried on.
Then the whiskey came back.
His parents paid his part of the bills for over 2 years, and paid to send him to school. While, I was left to pay the rest of the bills, groceries and daycare for the baby which runs about $800 a month. (I only make $12 an hour, and the math NEVER adds up.)
Fast forward to present day.
He quit school and went back to construction work.
He quit whiskey again about a month ago, but is now drinking 2 large bottles of wine a day +/-. Spending probably $300 to $400 a month on wine.
He skips work, and goes in late. There is always an excuse as to why, and thus an excuse as to why he doesn't have the money for his part of the bills. AND his parents are also still giving him money. AND paying his child support for the oldest, which they have done for the last 8 years, and I have NO DOUBT will do until he's 18.
If I mention the drinking, he says he "quit drinking". He doesn't see the wine as a bad thing. Just the whiskey. He's in complete denial.
We are STRUGGLING financially. To the point that I've been considering cutting my losses and moving home. This month, for example we don't have even half of the rent payment which is due tomorrow. He says it will be okay, something will work out. It doesn't.
My parents have quit giving me money because they don't want to enable anymore. His parents, I don't think will ever stop, though I am considering asking them to.
There is so much in between that I just can't fill in without writing a book.
I love my husband. I don't believe that he will ever quit drinking, no matter how much it ruins his/our/our childrens' lives.
I'm losing patience, but I still have that part of me that wants to make this work. The good days are so good. I feel like if I leave, it will make me the bad guy.