asl, glad you made it over to this part of the forum. I think you got some words of wisdom here and hope you find them helpful.
Reading around the F&F section here as much as you can, as well as checking out the "stickies" at the top of the page, will give you a good overview of alcoholism and life w/an alcoholic. Alanon can be a great in-person resource, too. As one of our members here likes to say, "Knowledge is power!" It's so true--when I was in my own little tiny world w/XAH, everything was an n of 1. I had no way to reality check what I was seeing, hearing, feeling, being told. I felt alone, scared, and constantly off balance and confused.
Once I got started in SR and Alanon, I began to see the patterns of behavior that A's seem to share. I felt a lot less crazy and alone. Then I began to see the patterns of behavior that I shared w/other spouses/partners/etc. of A's. Now that was truly eye-opening!
To me, the strength of SR is the tremendous diversity of our members. Sometimes folks come in w/blinders on and only ever read/post in their own thread--they are missing the biggest part of the benefits to be gained here. So again, I will urge you to read widely and to post in other people's threads.
Hope to hear more from you in the days to come!