Psalm5110

I feel really stupid sometimes, not having know that my husband, who lives in the same house as me, was secretly drinking on a regular basis. We both come from happy, Leave-It-To-Beaver childhoods, and expressed the desire to raise our family with those same values. We both work outside the home but had dinner together nearly every night. We read our son stories together every night. We spent almost all of our time together, or at least in close proximity to one another. It seems like I must have been willfully ignoring the problem, right? But:

1. Alcohol abuse had never been part of my life. I didn't recognize the signs as being those of alcohol use, and never even suspected that my stand-up husband could have a drinking problem.

2. I trusted my husband completely. Our relationship was built on honesty. He helped me understand God and His love. I never for a moment thought he could keep anything from me...especially something like a drinking problem.

3. Like most addicts, he's an extremely convincing liar. He attributed his "symptoms" to other medical issues and went to a variety of specialists seeking "treatment." He is high functioning and successful. Even his parents, who were there the day I discovered his stash of empty bottles; his brother, who is a recovered alcoholic; and his sister-in-law, who is a social worker and works with addicts daily, did not believe he had a drinking problem until he got arrested for OWI.

I simply didn't know. It was happening in my basement, in my garage, in my backyard, and I never even saw it. I am intelligent, professionally successful, rational in my decision-making and highly educated. But my trust in him and my naivete combined with his deceit and manipulation made the perfect environment for two years' worth of secret alcohol abuse.

(And yes, I smelled it. He is a competitive athlete and attributed the sweet, fruity body odor to ketosis. Hmph.)