bamagirl1980

Hello, all. I am new to this forum. My husband is an alcoholic and finally hit (what I consider to be) rock bottom. Like...the police and fire department had to come to our house kind of rock bottom.

He was so ashamed the next day and I, of course, was livid. I told him I was on the verge of taking my daughter (from a previous marriage) and leaving him. Enough is enough! He was so remorseful and sorry, but guess what? The very next day he comes home with a big ol' bottle of vodka. I went berzerk. I called his parents to let them know what their (perfect in their eyes) son was doing and to implore their help. They know he has a problem! They are the ultimate enablers and are exquisitely talented at sticking their heads in the sand.

My MIL ends up sending me this long barrage of texts that basically said that I just needed to go, that her son was fine before "I crashed into his life" and that he'll be fine afterwards...that it was my fault, that I'm a bad mother, etc. etc. etc. She prefaced it all with "you'll probably hate me after this, but that's okay"

Well...I don't hate anybody, but needless to say, my feelings were hurt and a relationship that was never warm and fuzzy to begin with is now completely nonexistant.

I'm trying really hard to make sense of it all and to find forgiveness in my heart, but less than a month after all this, I'm just not there yet. I will say that my husband has started going to AA and that after "The Big Bottle Incident" he has not had anything to drink.

Thoughts/Advice/Anything to help me? I know it's unrealistic and unhealthy to just sever this MIL/DIL relationship for good. At the same time, I don't feel the need to apologize for speaking the truth!!!

Gottalife

There is a freinds and family forum that would be worth a visit. A lot of people there have experienced just what you are going through.

It seems that it is a good thing for the partners of an alcoholic to get help for themselves.

Recovery of an alcoholic can be an uncertain thing. It may take time, there may be failures, he may go further down. It is best not to expect too much. Even when it is going well, he may have his priorities mixed up for a while. Patience and understanding is what is required.

If you have a read of the "to Wives" chapter in the AA book, you would find some useful ideas.

All the best.

bamagirl1980

I put my thread in the families section. Sorry...it was 5 am and I put it in the wrong place.

Dee74

I have no real experience to share but sometimes inlaws and spouses simply don't mix I think.

I understand that you can't sever the connection but I hope that maybe you can keep contact to a civil minimum?

To me the really important thing here is your husband is working on his recovery - that's great

D

zjw

You dont owe her anything. She obviously has her feelings about you and who knows if she will change or not.

I dont have a good answer but. I've been in a situation iwth one of my in-laws for years. I basicly cut contact with him. My wife will answer the phone talk to him etc.. I will not. lucky for me there is a godo distance between us. And when he comes to visit or i visit there I'm usually ignored anyhow which works out well. but if there are no other people to distract him I feel I have to try and make an effort to have some dialog. But this past visit I noticed they kept trying to tune me out get ingulfed in there phone so everytime he'd look down to go back to his phone i'd strike up a conversation again . I was doing it just to drive em nuts lol.

Also in my case my wife and her family didnt belive me when i stated I dont think he cares for me much. So one evening because I was pushed into it and such I had a ophone call with him for like 45 minutes i was told how stupid i was essentially. They where all floored I was see? told you so. So from that point forward I had there backing in my stance as well.

From my view its probably not worth trying to convince these folks of anything or get them to side with you or something. Its a lot easier to ignore them / tune them out.

I also have the issue of this particular person still seems to think i'm miserable drunk thats just not drinking. He barely ever talkes to me so how would he know otherwise? But when someone just automatically treats you that way right off the bat it leaves you kinda disgusted and you dont have much to say. Which of course in my case can make it appear that I am indeed still the miserable drunk.

But again if my 5+ years sobriety among many other things doesnt convince this guy otherwise nothing will so whats the point in trying to kill myself for his favor?