williamj

Hello all - newbie here so thank you for your patience ahead of time.

One month after my wife and I married, we packed up our lives and moved to help take care of her alcoholic father. Three years later, not much has changed with my FIL... except that he drinks more.

A little background on FIL: He was a very abusive man to his family as well as a daily drinker. After his wife died of early onset Alzheimers, he did change - became a nicer man but carried much denial about his past without apologies or acknowledgement and ended up drinking more and more.

He has three kids: One of whom is still scared of him, one who could care less about him, and my wife - who continues to cater to his feelings - still walking on eggshells, if you will. No one, not even his own mother, would stand up to him or ever tell him he was wrong or acting badly so his narcissism to this day remains through the roof.

Six years later and he's drinking a minimum of 1.75 liters of vodka/day straight from the bottle but in true denial form, still insists he only has a few "jiggers." We have taken him to the emergency room for his falls and many other effects of his drinking so many times we've lost count. He's had numerous broken ribs, broken several pieces of glass furniture from his falls, torn his eyeball from its socket, bleeding ulcers, dislocated shoulders (yes, both), blood clots in his legs, lungs, and heart, stage 3 kidney disease, he has brain damage from the drinking... I truly could go on and on with health problems, many of which he has miraculously recovered from. We're beginning to think he's indestructible.


He's been to "recovery" programs a few times and each time he's charmed them (did I mention he was extremely manipulative?!) to where they tell HIM he's not an alcoholic.

After living with him for one year, doctors urged us to place him in an assisted living facility because he needed more help than we could give him. Even though he has brain damage, site problems, and balance problems, apparently no doctor can forbid him to drive so he's able to drive and obtain alcohol every day, even while at this assisted living facility.

He remained (mostly) sober for many months but has now gone back off the deep end. Three weeks in a row we've had to take him to the emergency room because of his drinking. And every time he gives the sob story of "I'm so stupid" and lies incessantly to the doctors about his drinking while still using his dead wife as an excuse to why he drinks. (I know that sounds cruel but there comes a point where you have to stop blaming and defaming your loved one so you can give excuses as to why you drink. While she was alive he was extremely abusive to her so I don't buy it one bit).

Last week we got a call at 10a that nurses at his home found him naked on his bed drunk off his ass and acting nuts. We're afraid they're going to kick him out (and rightfully so!) What are we going to do with him?

No one in his family will be straight up honest with him and it's SO frustrating! He has three cars and a house just sitting there rotting and when we initially came to him, he had spent over $100,000 on scams and Home Shopping items so my wife has had to take over his financials just to keep him afloat. My wife continuously tells him they need to talk about his future because he will need that money to survive but he and my wife casually talk about ideas and have for over a year. Nothing done and it does nothing but stress my wife out because she's trying to keep him from losing everything. To her credit, trying to have a conversation with him is akin to trying to speak to a dog in a room full of squirrels. It's impossible but at what point is it okay to tell him what he's got to do in order to survive financially?

My wife says she is finally to the point where she's tired of his alcoholism, lies, and the constant denial but still refuses to put her foot down to him directly and say, "ENOUGH!" Seeing that I am not related to the man, I've been done for a while but I do understand that every person has different timelines in their own realizations. When my wife and I argue, 9 out of 10 times it's about her father OR she's getting her anger out about her father on me. She's enough "done" that we're moving back to our home state (her suggestion) in a few months but there's still a lot to be done with her father before we leave.

I so want her to put that anger where it goes but I know that it cannot and should not be forced. We visit her father in the assisted living home every week and yesterday after our visit I told her I didn't want to see her father anymore because each time my own anger for what he's done to his family, AND MINE, coupled with the fact NO ONE will stand up to him, has taken its toll and I am 100% done. She freaked. She knows that I support her in every other way but says after a few weeks he will wonder why I'm not there and she worries how that will look... to HIM. I DON'T CARE how that "looks" to him. He's nothing to me but an abusive, lying, manipulative alcoholic who should have been put in jail years ago.

I'm tired of everyone dancing around the bushes with him. I'm tired of people treating him as if he's a sweet old frail man (because he most certainly is NOT). I'm tired of having to stop our lives to take him to the emergency room every single week just so he can lie and pretend he's a victim. I'm tired of him blaming everything and everyone around him. Still - it's my wife's father so it's not my place to stand up to him -- or is it? I don't know!


How do I continue to be supportive to her while maintaining my distance from him?

Yesterday I came very close to getting up in his face and telling him off. I know all of the reasons that is wrong but we've been doing this for three years and dropped our own newlywed lives, home, and jobs to take care of this person who simply DOES NOT CARE what happens outside of his own bubble. What will we do with him if he gets kicked out of his assisted living facility? We CANNOT live with him again - it will surely be the end of our marriage. I'm not looking for Al-non suggestions (she will not go and I do not ascribed to the *higher power* thing), rather, personal experience from people who are either friends or in-laws of the alcoholic.

How do you help your sober loved one while taking care of yourself?

Again, thanks so much for your help and your ears.