Originally Posted by
Alone22 
WTBH- he does have a long way to go, but I have a feeling part of the selfishness is just simply who he is. He even admits to thinking selfishly and how he is trying to work on that. What I am really concerned with is him not being honest with himself which seems like a slippery slope into a relapse.
It does sound like selfishness is a problem for him and it seems to me that honesty (or dishonesty in his case) is directly related to the selfishness and vice versa. Someone who is primarily concerned with themself, isn't going to have a hard time justifying dishonesty to himself.
I agree that his lack of honesty with himself is a VERY fast and slippery slope to relapse.
I was told during AH's first stint in outpatient rehab that relapse happens LONG before the drinking part of relapse occurs. The mind set is what leads to the drinking relapse, and it sure sounds to me that your AH's mind set is in a pretty close to relapse place. Still telling stories about money, selfishness about sex... sounds very much like relapse thinking to me.
I hope he has plans for his recovery (just leaving rehab with no plan isn't a good idea if that's what he did) but more importantly, I hope you have a plan for you-- even if it's just that you try and get through each day for now.
No matter how right you are about AH's thinking not being clear and how right your concerns are about whether he might relapse, you're not going to be able to prevent it (I learned this the hard way like every other lesson I've learned). I tried just as hard to try and stop my AH's relapse (when I thought he was sober- turns out he never was) as I tried to stop him from lying, from drinking, from blaming me etc... And I was not successful even once at any of this.
Have you told him what your boundaries are? You have a right to set your own terms you know right? You can tell him what you will and won't tolerate and what you will and won't do in response to those things occuring. You are under no obligation to sit and wait and see what he chooses to do. You get to live your life and if he wants to be a part of it I think after a stay in rehab he's heard plenty about what's required for recovery. Now it's up to him to decide whether he's going to do it. That's all on him. I remember how much I wanted to MAKE my AH want to be better after each of his stints in outpatient rehab and how crazy I made myself by paying so much attn to his non-recovery.