Originally Posted by
Florence 
I've never heard it put that way before -- "vacation relapses" -- but that's EXACTLY what happens. He BUDs for months, and then when he breaks, he disappears for a long weekend to have his bender, then comes back on Sunday or Monday with his hat in his hands wanting absolution.
You're exactly right. I'm resigning the role. In fact, I'm firing myself from that role. Other than that, I'm avoiding making any other serious decisions until I'm good and ready. I feel like the friend and family circle's energy has been focused on AH and his quality of life for so long that I've got to refocus that energy on me and my kids. He's a grown up and he can have his "time off" of sobriety if he wants to, that's his business. But that's SOOOOOO not what I want my life to look like.
Here is what worked very well for me and is really logical and fair...
I told my XA that I had no more relapses in me and that I would not helicopter or put out fires if he drank. If he didn't take care of his own recovery and do the right things it was on him and not me.
He relapsed with a vengeance and I packed him up and he jumped a plane to Vegas (logic being I am in trouble might as well party, party, party before trying to patch things up and having to suffer sobriety)...
3 months later he put himself into rehab for 60 days and then into a sober living house but I was unmoved...
I promised him one thing... After 365 days of authentic verifiable recovery with your sponsor I will attend your 1 year chip ceremony in whatever state or country you are in and we will talk.
Since February of this year he has only strung together 60 days before drinking so I am in little danger of having any "talk" but if he did manage to put together a year it would be a huge milestone and I would want to share it with his family and of course... someone I once cared about deeply.
While it is loving detachment it also offers the struggling alcoholic hope that there is a chance to repair broken relationships and in your case you have children. Marriage may be temporary but divorce with children makes the A a part of your life for a long while...
There is no doubt that my XA never wanted to give up alcohol forever despite his promises that he did...it was a ruse.
Alcohol is his first love, his mistress, the siren's song of the promise that it will bath his brain and his body in a liquid bath of unbelievable bliss and and for him... a bizarre manic enjoyment that always, always ends in disaster and crisis.
No human person, no human love could offer that to him and take him to those heights of chemical induced enjoyment...and soalcohol wins eventually in his battle of his mind... everytime. I actually think that his stints of sobriety were to keep me appeased and to actually rest his liver which he has so abused in the past decades.
Why not? He had me perfectly trained for 4 years to put up with the insanity as the picture perfect enabler because I believed him everytime he promised things that he either could not do or had no intention of doing... and that was not drink ever again.