Thread: Denial
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Old 05-11-2015, 02:05 PM
  # 3 (permalink)  
Stung
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Join Date: Dec 2013
Location: Silicon Valley, CA
Posts: 2,066
Well, my family isn't like yours but my RAH's family sounds identical to yours. RAH is the youngest of 5, FIL is an alcoholic and ACOA, MIL is an ACOA and super codie, the 2 oldest children are alcoholics and RAH is an alcoholic too.

FIL is very clearly an alcoholic, he's neglectful, he's arrogant and when RAH goes into no-contact mode with his mom (who is constantly calling RAH and telling which family member he needs to call and what he needs to say or what gift he needs to buy a certain family member) FIL will call RAH and leave nasty voicemails threatening him to do what his mother tells him to do and call her IMMEDIATELY. He also likes to talk about his drinking non-stop, it was seriously his favorite topic. RAH still wrestles with whether or not its "right" to call FIL an alcoholic.

The denial and the sickness in families like this are commonly talked about in my al-anon groups. Specifically I hear that alcoholic family don't talk about anything. You, on the other hand, are pointing directly at the elephant in the room and expecting someone else to comment on the elephant too. Your family members have lived a lifetime ignoring the elephant in the room, it's wonderful that you're noticing it, acknowledging it and trying to have a conversation about it BUT I wouldn't expect anyone else to suddenly have the realizations that you've had. You've changed but this is how your family has always likely been. My RAH has some lofty ideals that as he gets better then his FOO will maybe hopefully become better too, I personally feel like that's a whole lot of expectations to put on people who are not interested in changing.
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