Wamama48

I won't bore you with the details. The subjects covered were

-him not communicating with me, so I have no idea what's going on with him.
-his sporadic involvement in our marriage. He does well for a month or two, I start to gain trust, he goes back to dry drunk behaviour.
- because he's sportatic, I've detached from him. Mostly.

On my side...
-Im always mad at him. Not when he was an equal partner, but otherwise, yes. I'm mad and hurt.
-I expect him to be able to sustain the basics of a relationship. Yes, I do.

Anytime something comes up, for example I thought he was cooking dinner, I get the expectation speech. I'm going to pull my hair out if I hear that again! I tried to tell him that number 1, that is mainly for the alcohiic since it can cause resentment, and lead to drinking.

There are realistic expectations that are a part of everyday life. Expecting your kids to clean their rooms, basic relationship skills, working to pay the bills. There are unrealistic expectations, like me expecting he could be on a basic level and able to be an equal partner.

His view of expectations is from an AA perspective. As a general rule, normies know how to recognise, handle and process emotions that come from unmet expectations. If he wants to pick apart everything that is an expectation, he should be doing that with his own thoughts and actions, not everyone else's.

I did discuss with him that I'm almost done. I'm not sure if I should have, it puts more pressure on him. He has said in the past, and recently, that is his worst fear. I respect that he quit, I respect that has working on staying sober. But I'm tired of waiting. There is a limit to human endurance. Who knows how long it will be before he can be an equal partner. Who knows if he even can?

And I had a huge light bulb moment. Really huge. Before I married him I was a single mom of 2, then 3 little girls. I was a single mom for 7 years. It was stressful, but I was able to handle it fine. As the years have gone by, I have slowly been able to handle less and less. Just the past few years it has become worse and worse. I get stressed running errands for a few hours, or working one day a week, or taking care of my son when he was sick. If things are particularly stressful, when my daughter was rear ended for example, I just shut down. I can't stay awake, I sleep for 14, sometimes 16 hours for a day or two.

That may be a contributing factor to not making much progress with the PTSD. I'm not saying it's his fault, just that the resulting stress from years of this is a problem. My gut feeling is if I don't get out, something serious regarding my mental health or a serious health problem is coming.

Since its impossible to leave, I'll stay in my in my own in-the-making living room. I need to find a way to stop hoping and waiting for him to be able to sustain the basics of a relationship. I do love him deeply. Despite his off and on dry drunk behaviour, he's a good, kind hearted, devoted and responsible man who loves his family above everything else. All of his drinking years the bills always stayed paid. There wasn't much left over, or nothing left over, but we had the basics. He worked odd jobs for his beer money.

I'll go through this with my therapist, because of insurance I can only see her twice a month. I'm dying to get this out, thank you for reading! Any suggestions from those of you who have been there are welcomed. Maybe if I can figure out a way to emotionally let go, I will be able to work full time. The boys can spend the day with him, so my special needs son is cared for. I love him and in a way, I don't want to let go 100%.


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