Stayingsassy

My husband opened up to me tonight about what it was like. How he was preparing for divorce because it was like living with a crazy person, that I was paranoid, delusional, and he felt like a "constant target for good and for bad." He never knew what would set me off, and I would go off on him then act like nothing was wrong, probably because I remembered none of it. He was surprised that sobriety calmed me down, that when he realized the chaotic behavior didn't seem to be returning he was able to put his shoulders down and relax.

I told him that I would ecpect him to leave if I had continued drinking and that I would never expect him to have to live with that for the rest of his life.

I also told him that being that way is misery, too....and no matter how hard sobriety gets I'll never stop being grateful that I can begin to put my shoulders down and relax, too.

It just takes not picking up a drink, for a long enough time and then if that stops working and i cant deal with life on my terms I find other ways to help me not pick up a drink. Key issue: never picking up a drink.

Case in point: if you cant control your alcohol and you can't quit, chances are everyone in your life is feeling that same sense of chaos and misery. We have to quit and find ways to stay quit.

ohwonder

i absolutely love this:

"it just takes not picking up a drink."

NYCDoglvr

Took me a while to get this AA saying: "it's the first drink that gets you drunk" Well that's certainly true since this alcoholic can not drink one day at a time. But when I pick up the drink I have no control over the quantity or what happens.

Doug39

I am 14 months sober and my wife still drinks alcoholically every day.

I too am sick of this nonsense; it is only a matter of time until we split up because I refuse to live like this forever.

I started a new job working nights and weekends - she works 9 to 5. I purposely took this position so I wouldn't be around much when she is drinking.

I will keep you posted on how it works out.

Stayingsassy

Hoping the job helps ground you and also gives you a welcome escape. Maybe all those hours on her own will cause her to pay more attention to her problem. I hope she has the wake up call I had.

Excessive drinking is really normalized out there, it just feeds an alcoholics denial.

I do believe that no matter the situation, no one has to live with an alcoholic, life is too short.

Doug39

I was out with our 21 year old daughter last night and she told me I should leave my wife to give her a wake up call. But I told her I don't want to leave my house. My grandfather bought the house I live in back in 1974, my aunt inherited it, and then when my aunt died in 2012 I got the house which is now titled to half me and half my daughter. Why should I leave and get screwed?

The wife is drunk now. got a long 3 day weekend of her drunkenness in my future.

Stayingsassy

I totally understand. Sometimes the tradeoffs of divorce sting a little too harshly to justify the outcome.

I also totally get the attachment to a house. I feel the same way about mine and I've made similar decision at times in the last 21 years. It's been up and down.

Has she talked at all about quitting or tried? Drinking can be pretty miserable, she hasn't talked about her hangovers or her withdrawals at work? Maybe she feels just as trapped by it as we all did.

JJ991

"Excessive drinking is really normalised out there" - spot on. This is the problem.

My husband still drinks quite a lot. He will have some days off now that I'm not drinking but then will have a night of beer, wine & whisky... Whisky makes an appearance many nights in fact. His dad was an alcoholic, whisky was his drink of choice, it ruined him (he passed away 5 years ago). I don't want to dictate what my husband does but I think things would be easier if he drank less.

Sorry to jump on in here, it just resonated with me.

Doug39

She knows she drinks too much and doesn't want to talk about it. She claims drinking is her way to fight stress; yet when something good happens she drinks to celebrate. All lame excuses - we have all used them.

On the occasions that she gets really drunk and we fight about it, she will be good for a day or so, start hiding the booze, eventually start heavy drinking again out in the open, we fight and then the cycle starts all over again.


She won't admit she is hungover because she doesn't want to admit she drank too much. After 23+ years with her I can tell when she is hungover. It is the price we pay.

silentrun

I'm sorry you are having to deal with that Doug. Thats got to suck especially having your own sobreity to protect. I married a non drinker because there is no way in he'll I'd live with an alcoholic. When I finally figured out I was I dropped the bottle. Who knew it would turn out to be me? I do remember be pretty darn annoying back in my drinking days. I'm so grateful neither myself or my husband has to deal with that drama ever again. When I was newly sober I was afraid I wasn't going to make it. I was starting to get a little mental clarity and I told him to run if I ever went back under.

waynetheking

Drinking destroyed my relationship of 20 years. It's part of addiction. Alcoholism causes us to go insane. Just another reason to never touch another drop. Never.
Hang in there Doug.
Thank you for your post stayingsassy.

SoberCAH

I grew up with an alcoholic mother (out of her mind every night) who never sought help, notwithstanding our begging her to quit.

My first wife and i were both alcoholics, although my alcoholism was far more advanced when we got married.

I got sober after 3 years of marriage, and i remember thinking in the treatment center that i really didn't even know the person i was married to.

She quit drinking for 10 years, which helped me immeasurably during my quest to get and stay sober during that time.

Then she started back by sneaking around to do it.

Her alcoholism got bad and we got divorced 13 years ago.

I wish her the best with getting and staying sober.

I haven't seen her in quite a few years.

Getting divorced was my ticket to not being dragged down by a drunk and unstable spouse.

I'm not faulting her, i was certainly drunk and unstable for quite a few years.

I wish you the best with whatever exit strategy you pursue, Doug, and i know you'll keep us posted.

Doug39

Believe me, now that I have been sober for over a year, these types of thoughts cross my mind often.

My wife and I met in a bar 23 years ago - we were both drunk. The first year we were together was based on whiskey drinking and a lot of it.

She got pregnant with our daughter and I did the right thing and married her. We spent the next 20 years drinking every day.

Drinking was the main thing my wife and I had in common. In 2013 I tried to get sober and we almost broke up - I started drinking again to save the marriage.

We fought about her drinking on Christmas Eve but it got brushed under the rug on Christmas Day because we didn't want to fight in front of relatives - she is in the other room drinking right now as I type this. She has no intention on being sober - I do not currently have an exit plan - I will leave it in God's hands.

calvinm16

Stayingsassy I'm very happy for you and your progress.

Stayingsassy

I always knew getting sober was like shedding an old skin and building an entire new one. I'd been sober before, I know how it changes me. For a long time, my husband often missed the "wild wife" when I got sober, the good time girl who loved dressing up, going out, tying one on, chatting up all the men, then going home with him. So I always went back to it but I knew inside me always that I needed to be sober, that I had no control when I drank and it was a ticking time bomb. Things progressed. The good time girl definitely still had a draw for him but the scales slowly began tipping in the other direction until it was very clear to everyone that my drinking was totally out of control and changing me in very bizarre ways, when AA talks about it causing insanity, that is NOT hyperbole, it is the truth.

Things are peaceful with my husband, but I've again become a different person in sobriety. He would never say a word now, knowing how important my sobriety is to all of us, but I know what goes unsaid. It's a change we can live with but it is still a change.

I look forward to finding out what that means a year later. Its going to be interesting.

Your wife may have lots of fears about sobriety, some she can't even articulate to herself. Huge changes to the self can be frightening. This takes an enormous amount of courage.

Doug39

I work evenings now and yesterday when my wife got off work at 5:00 she went to the bar - then came home and continued drinking.

When I got home she was wasted and obnoxious - I refused to even have a conversation with her and that pissed her off.

We are both 54 and nothing is more pathetic that a 54 year old woman going to a dive bar alone to drink on a Wednesday afternoon.

I don't know how this will all play out but something has got to change.

Stayingsassy

That was something I was more and more acutely aware of also, how pitiful it is the older we get. What can be cute or at least overlooked in a 25 year old is really just sad in someone middle aged. It wasn't so much that others expected wisdom from me, it was that I expected it of myself and it wasn't possible with any alcohol in my life.

Push will come to shove with the wife. One thing alcoholism never fails to deliver is a day of reckoning.

biminiblue

I found a dive bar that catered to 54 YO women (and older; and men) so that made it okay. Pfft. Happy Hour, nearly everyone was in their late fifties and older.

It was pretty sad and disturbing to me that men still hit on older women at bars. I have stories. They aren't pretty.

I somehow managed to save myself from any poor behavior I would regret, but it was just a matter of time if I had kept going there. ugh. Thanks for the memories. Not.

Doug39

To sassy: I can't wait for that day of reckoning.

To biminiblue: my wife and one of her twice divorced friends (who is also 54) think going to a dive bar is fun.

My wife's friend still picks up guys (or tries) and sleeps with anyone and is proud of it. I used to go out with them to the bars and after a few drinks they get loud, slip into some fantasy or illusion that they are hot chicks and everybody wants them. It is so pathetic - I have caught people making fun of them behind there backs.

It is a sight to see.

biminiblue

The first time some guy hit on me was the last time I went there. Not cool. I just wanted cheap booze and Happy Hour appetizers. A chat was okay, but putting a hand on me was not.