pndm07

Hi everyone. I am in the unenviable position now of dealing with a stbxA who is being the quintessential "dry drunk." Background - 5 years ago we got separated after his alcoholism spiraled out of control, he lost a great job, and went to rehab. Came back, seemed committed to sobriety, went back to AA, got a great sponsor, etc., so we "sort of" got back together. Meaning, he stayed with me and our son a few times a week (with his mom across town the rest of the time), we acted like a family, and I gradually began to trust him again. He got a part time, low paying job with a family friend, and couldn't contribute financially in any meaningful way, but I was just happy he was able to get out there again and get some kind of work after his crisis.

The lull lasted for a while. FF to last summer, he started drinking again on the sly (although he admitted he had a bunch of "slips" prior which I wasn't aware of). This culminated in a full blown relapse in November, sending him back to detox. Ok - if you're still following and wonder why I didn't divorce him then, I guess that's a good question. He said he "needed" this relapse to help him refocus on sobriety and was back on the wagon. His boss even took him back, and things were ok. For a while.

FF to June. I needed hip surgery, and told him that I would need a lot of help, for me and our son, since I was supposed to be on crutches 3 weeks. Well guess what, a few days before my surgery, he relapses, again. This time for over a month. I had to call on my parents and sister to help me post surgery (which they did). So here I am, dealing with a physical and emotional trauma. At this point even a wimpy codie like me said enough, I'm divorcing. This isn't the life I want. I don't want a life where things seem to be "normal" for a while, and then the shoe drops.

After a month of round the clock drinking he checks himself into detox. I told him I want to divorce, he seemed to go along with it, but in his sick mind I think he thought that even if this happens, we could still go back to how things were (him sleeping over with us, blah blah, continuing on as if nothing happened).

I told him that while I agree he should be in his son's life, I can't handle him sleeping over. Ok - fine. Now we are in that "post crisis" period and it is getting very uncomfortable. He is sober, but a jerk. A dry drunk. Attends AA and all, meets with his sponsor, but an irritable malcontent. He is complaining that his current clerical job (which he is lucky to have) isn't good enough for him and he is angry that none has responded yet to his job apps. He is a highly educated, well spoken person who ruined his career himself. He doesn't even want to admit that. Truth is he would never be able to handle any kind of job that has any modicum of stress, given that he can't cope with anything that most people have to cope with.

Sorry if I've rambled up to now. This brings us to now. My challenge is that we can't really do no contact, we have a son. He is 7 and on the autism spectrum. While it is by no means a severe case, he can be very, very difficult, and while I am doing everything I can to find him appropriate babysitters, activities, etc until school starts, I really do need his father's help. Our son acts better with him than with me alone and there are just times I need a break. As his father, I feel he should have some kind of obligation, esp since he isn't helping much financially (save some groceries here and there) and I still need to hire babysitters since I know I can't rely on him, even though he hasn't worked all summer and his job is essentially part time.

We've been keeping visitation "loose" and he's been coming over for a few hours on the weekend. This gravitates between him being nice about 25% of the time, and a dry drunk the rest of it.

Yesterday I asked him if he could come earlier today to take our son outside in the morning (which has been a debacle for me lately) to relieve me and he said "no, I can come at 12:30. I have to do a job search. If you don't want me to sleep over, I have to rebuild my life." Then he huffed off, shook his head in anger, and left.

I could go on, but that's the executive summary. As for why we see our son together, well - I've been advised by my lawyer to keep things loose. I don't want to hand him over to him (he wouldn't have the patience for him anyway for a long time), he lives with his mother (also an A, that's another story), and lets just say I don't feel comfortable any other way. So for now, I am seeing him, such that it is.

This whole situation sucks. He is angry that I don't want to be his enabler anymore. He doesn't understand that after all this, job loss, continued relapses, complete lack of reliability, I don't want to have him stay over and resume our "normal" life which has, up to now, always ended in him being so drunk that he needs detox to get out of it. I have a full time job, and doing everything for our son, which is a job in and of itself, and he is trying to make me feel bad.

This is almost worse than when he was drinking because then I just didn't see him. I feel like I'm stuck in a situation I don't know how to get out of. I want to continue to be positive, move on with life, and this is just a dark cloud. Same time, like every codie, I still do care about him.