On Friday I'm traveling out of state to visit my father and stepmother. On her good days my stepmother is extremely difficult and on her bad days she is toxic. She has been having these phony mini breakdowns to keep me and my sisters from visiting but I finally got her to agree to let me visit. I'm happy because my dad is 87 and I need to spend time with him while I can (step mom is only 68). But.....I always drank too much when I visited them before. She would make me so anxious and angry and I used too many glasses of wine to cope. So I need advice on how to cope with a difficult family member sober. I have a feeling we drinkers have lots of difficult family members!! I have a good excuse not to drink because I'm going from their house to my sister's house and I'm staying with my sister for the night. I don't want to go into the whole quitting drinking thing because my stepmother will pounce on that and make huge deal and just thinking about it makes me crazy! My second problem is my sister and brother-in-law are drinkers, not drunks but alcohol will be around. I feel really good being sober but I don't want to get complacent. Any advice would be appreciated!!
