Sorry CD-I think I see in another thread that you suspect he is using again.
In my journey I have learned that A's tend to follow a spiral path. If I made a big deal about the drinking, he would change-cut back, moderate better, give it up for 30 days, etc. So we'd be going down hill, and then when his hand was forced, he would reign it in for awhile. The thing was, that never lasted, eventually, at some point things would go back to the way they were, plus a little worse, so we were perpetually in this downward trending spiral. I was always filled with hope during the upswings, and it wasn't until the end that I really grew to understand the progressive, "It always gets worse" part of the disease, because I was forever HOPING things would get better.
My hubby went thru OP treatment about 2 years ago, and steered clear of alcohol for over a year, but eventually his attendance at Aftercare group dwindled to monthly and then petered out completely. He wasn't going to AA or working any kind of program other than the White Knuckling It method. He learned a lot in treatment, but fast forward, especially once he stopped going to aftercare/relying wholly on the WKI method, and there came a stressful time where he decided to test the waters with "a drink" and while he didn't turn into a train wreck overnight, after a few months of these stollen, hidden from his wife moments, they went from stollen moments to daily moments, and then from 1 or 2 a day to worse...
From there he did IP treatment, is full on doing AA, steps, aftercare, etc. and this "quitting" looks much different from the previous "quitting" so for that I am hopeful (again)
He was never "in recovery" before, but I can see that he is now. Also different for me this time is that this time I am working on MYSELF.
A person might not need to "work a program" to quit, but I really think that for most people, they need to work a program to stay quit. Quitting is a stop behavior, but recovery is a start behavior. It takes a real mindset change to be able to stay quit and be in a good place (in recovery).
Hugs...