Letter Writing
I'm new to this group. I just left an alcoholic/addict after 6 years of insanity. He goes to jail. Gets clean & sober. Comes home. Relapses. Assaults either me, my children or somebody else & goes back to jail. He came home in May this time. I didn't have high hopes. I told him one relapse & he was gone. He seemed to be doing great. Said he knew he could never drink again. About 4 weeks he stared to say...what is 1 beer? And if I do get high, don't throw me out. Let me try again. After 10 weeks, he got high. I didn't want to go down the same path again, so I threw him out. He stayed with his daughter for 4 weeks, getting high every weekend and then drinking all week. He pushed his daughter acrossed the porch, so I knew the violence was coming back. He called me to beg me to take him back, but he was drunk & I said no. He had 2 days to find a "permanent" residence or he was going back to jail. He has a son with a woman he knew about 2 months 10 years ago. He went to her, threatened to kill himself & she let him stay on her couch until he gets it together. (He has attempted suicide, so she feels sorry for him & her son doesn't want daddy to kill himself.) He is using a 9 year old boy to get a place to stay.
Anyway, this is his pattern. He stays away for a few weeks & then he knows that him staying on her couch would be driving me nuts, so he comes home & I give in. I didn't want to give in this time because I know the outcome. He comes home. He gets high. He begins to drink. And somebody gets hurt. Or maybe killed this time.
I have always written letters to him in the past. Berating him. Telling him I hated him. Telling him I loved him. If he only would try..he could come home. You know. Letting him know I still cared & he still had a chance to manipulate me.
This time I knew I couldn't give in & enable him anymore. I moved back to Arizona from Pittsburgh. He did show up the next day & was shocked that I was gone. Good old Lynne took away the safety net. But I keep writing the letters. Same old thing. And I tell him that if he tries I will come home & we can start again. Or he can come here & make a new start.
My question...are these letters a way of continue to enable him? He knows from what I've written that he still has a chance with me. And that nothing has changed. Am I detaching if I write a letter a day? And is this still the insanity....doing the same thing over & over again expecting a different result. Will he hit bottom as long as I write these letters telling him what to do, how to do it & if he only calls me....I'll come home?
Lynne