My daughters dad just died of alcoholism
On Monday we buried my daughters dad. He was 44, he died because he was an alcoholic. I met him when I was 18, we had one child, she's now 16. He's battled all the time I have known him, I have struggled all this time on my own without help from anyone. He got completely out of control 3 years ago, stealing from me and was drinking cider in the mornings I booked up courage and I ended the relationship. Although because I felt guilty I let him live with me for 6 months. In the end I had to tell him to go, it was effecting me too much. He moved out but I stayed close friends, more so for my daughter. I even took him to hospital app, included him in events and bought him shopping when he had no money. I then met my current partner, I told him everything from the start and he is very supportive. The thing is my ex was loved by everyone, he was the life ang soul, no one had a bad word to say about him, and he adored our daughter and she loved him so much. I supported him so much, fed him still and cared for him because 6 months after he left he turned yellow, I got him admitted to hospital and even bought him his pjs, took our daughter to see him etc. he was there for a month, he quit drinking although he was seriously ill, one more drink could kil him. Our 14 year old daughter became his carer from that moment, often staying with him. I helped as much as possible but I couldn't go back.
He started to get worse, his stomach needed draining all the time, he looked so bad, he lost so much weight within months he aged so bad, I could hardly bare to look at him if I'm honest. He told his family in April that he was terminal, we had to tell our 15 year old who doted on him, she had just started her GCSEs. I was heartbroken as as much as I tried to protect her. This time I couldnt, we had also just lost my nan and grandad within 3 weeks of each other and we had a traumatic time.
When she had her prom picture done with him, he couldn't even stand up, he sat on the bed, he was gutted that he couldn't wave her off.
I had some long conversations with him recently, I asked him if he regrets the past, all the drinking and he said no, he said I am me...I enjoyed my life, but I think he was lying...he hated people feeling sorry for him and if I think about it, if he had of regretted it I would feel bad for him. He did apologise tho, for all them arguments when he wanted a drink and would leave the house, I've had so many rows about him going out sometimes he'd go the shop and I wouldn't see him until the next day, a million different things too many to mention in one post. His family all live within a 5 mile radius, no one helped it's like when he was out of their sight he was out of mind.
When he died last week my daughter picked up his phone, he had a message on there off his mum, she had been buying him Bacardi, so had some of his friends, it seems most of his family knew he had started again and he wanted to hide it from me and my daughter. Because he knew it would break our hearts.
Our daughter is so sad, she's also angry with his family, they have all hid it from us, they didn't even go and check on him, my daughter had not heard from him in a couple of hours so we went to check on him, he didn't answer and his neighbours had not seen him from the night before which was usual as he lived in flats and they checked on him. We found him, we had to have the foor broken down, the neighbours broke it down using anything they could, spades, hammers etc, all the time my daughter could hear, I had to drag her outside as I didn't want how they found him to etched on her mind forever. He was dead. Maybe I should have left years ago, I grew up without my dad, and I didn't want this for my daughter, I could have protected her from having this close bond from all this heartache. I'm so sad, angry frustrated.