SpaSlave

I was doing so well... 6 days sober with no intention or thoughts of drinking. I was being strong. Then my hubby (and drinking buddy) says "Im having a hard time not wanting to drink tonight, I really want to party" So instead of trying to talk him out of it, we drank ... sigh.... I need to be stronger when It comes to him, I just never want to feel like Im telling him he cant or shouldnt do something he wants to do. And I do the same to him when I want to drink , and he gives in without a fight.

One thought I had was that we should get sponsors that we can call when we are "having a hard time not wanting to drink" instead of talking to eachother about it. I dont know ... Im just feeling so disappointed in myself right now. Ok Im done venting now hehe. Thanks for reading.

Anna

Hi,

You can learn from this experience.

My suggestion is to not use the 'we'. Think in terms of 'I'. You have no control over whether your husband drinks or not. What you do have control over, is yourself and your recovery.

Use this as a stepping stone to learn and move forward.

tommyk

Yes, get a sponsor.

Work YOUR program regardless of the choices of others.

four812

yes ... Learn and move forward...deepen your resolve, but most importantly it takes recovery work to change.

and your whole world is your rehab center today.

you are the creator of your recovery and lots of work needs to be done in this first 90 days..and this first one year. and today is when the work occurs. all the work happens today.

you can do this one day at a time.

keep up the good work

flutter

when I was first "trying" to quit drinking, this was also my downfall. Hubby and I were drinking buddies, and really bad influences on each other. I had to finally just sit him down and tell him I could NEVER drink again, and to please respect/support that. I hadn't really said it to him in absolutes, because until I did.. it kinda gave me permission to drink again with him. I just had to tell him how important my sobriety is, and how under no circumstances could I drink again, ever. He hasn't invited me again.. and that is just one more thing along this path that eases the way a bit for me.

ex D-Boy

This is the exact reason why I was never able to get clean with my ex and eventually had to break it off with her. We fed off each others weakness' instead of our strength like we should have. Time after time one of us would convince the other to go out and use. I dont have any real advice I just hope you guys are stronger than I was and are able to get sobriety together.

Tazman53

Spaslave good job on not blaming someone else and seeing that whether you drink or not is in your hands, getting a sponsor and a good network of folks to call is a tremendous help 2 alcoholics in early recovery do not have a lot of experience in staying sober, calling those with more experience could help you both stay sober. Who knows he may not have drank if you had said "I am going to call my sponsor because I really do not want to drink and see what they did to get past this."

You and your husband right now can be you alls greatest strength or you all greatest weakness. Learn from what happened, do what YOU need to do to stay sober, if that means calling your sponsor or going to a meeting do it!!! Keep in mind that in order to stay sober one must do what ever it takes to not drink even if the other half does drink, your not drinking when he does will give him a stronger resolve to do what ever it takes to not drink the next time.

keithj

SpaSlave,

That's a bummer, to be trying not to drink and still end up drinking. But, it's not surprising or a reason to be disappointed with yourself. All the better to fully understand your condition. I have to wholesale go against the weak/strong idea that you bring up. Recovery for me began with being absolutely convinced that I was not strong enough to stay away from the first drink. Further, that I would never be strong enough. I consider that the truth of my condition. Yours may be different.

I tried for years to not see that truth. I came up with hundreds of reasons why having a drink was OK, usually because I 'changed my mind' about not drinking that night. But your reason would have worked just as well for me.

I would absolutely recommend getting a sponsor that can show you how to take the steps. I make it very clear to new guys I work with that they should call me if they are thinking of drinking, have their head impacted between their cheeks, angry, or whatever. But I also make it clear that I'm not a relationship counselor, financial advisor, or repository for their whining. Really, all any sponsor has to offer is to show you how they recovered. A sponsor can be so much more that just a person who can try to talk you out of drinking that day. Working with a sponsor can show you how to have that thought of drinking removed from you for good. That's the true recovery.

adore79

I think we need to be smart rather than strong. I am not strong enough to resist alcohol in certain situations yet so I need to be smart enough not to get in those situations in the first place.

martha27

SpaSlave, I think I know a little bit about where you are coming from and overcoming my husband has been one of my toughest challenges in overcoming my addiction. This is my third attempt, the last two times I think I would have stayed off the wagon if there was no alcohol in my home. 7 months went down the drain when my husband popped open a bottle of Verve to celebrate my book being published, surely I deserved it! 2 months of sobriety went down the toilet when he was sitting around with all my friends and family drinking and I had no plan to cope with it.

My husband is not a alcoholic, but he really does not believe I am one, even with the blackouts, the hangovers, the embarrassing episodes, he sees me as funny, sexy and the life of the party, his best friend. When I detox as I am now, I am a miserable, sick, unsocial, bore, therefore he sees detoxing as being negative. He wants the drunk back, the one he has fun with, the one he wakes up with a hangover cure and she says "how bad I was I on a scale of 1-10" and he manages all the fall out, the one he makes phone calls of apology for, the one he loves and looks after and is intimate with.

Then my shrink said to me, "every time he hands you a drink he is handing you a loaded gun, one day that gun will go off" this changed my whole view point, I want a different future to the one I am currently facing, with or without him. This resolve, a sponsor, a plan, this website and my visualising each drink as a 'loaded gun' is keeping me going, also education that in a couple of months this detox will pass, the stories on this website have helped me more than I can tell you.

Anyway i wish you the best of luck, and keep trying don't give up, its worth it

Wolfchild

Although you drank, you can reawaken the desire to stop. Sometimes the pain felt from making a mistake can fuel the fire in us to recover. Suffering, however, is optional. Dwelling on doubt and self-pity is the equivilent of dumping water on that growing spark of sanity. Leave yesterday in the past (until you are able to deal with it through Stepwork) and live for today. Going to meetings and hanging on to people who are moving forward can help to get you through this alot easier than dealing with it alone. Give yourself a break and ask for help!

coffeenut

You're enabling each other. My hubby and I did it for YEARS.

You gotta want it, for YOU. Most important, you gotta want it.

1_day@_a_time

Lack of power, that is our dilemma.

If this was about will power, we all would have quit years ago.

My experience is I must find a power greater than myself to help me.

Tried it both ways........

Gypsy Feet

about 15 years ago I woke up and realized I loved my husband, but we did not stand a chance together with meth in the mix. I quit that day, for him and for us, for good.

For the last 10 years his drinking has at times disgusted me, although he was my best drinking bud and all of our good times involved a buzz as well. We tried quitting or cutting back too many times to count. His drinking became totally out of control, I was always the one to clean up the mess, and along the way I decided it wasn't fair that I should have to quit just because he couldn't handle his intake. He never thought there was a problem.

143 days ago I got black out drunk and the stories the next day were horrible. I have not had a drink since that night, and I plan to never drink again. Apparently he wasn't the only one in the house with a drinking problem, go figure.

The weekend after I quit, he figure out I was serious, his quit date is 7 days after mine.

Unfortunately, the damage to our relationship may be irreparable, time will tell.

I hope you find a way to be sober before it gets real ugly, and if not, I hope you find a way to be sober anyway, because in my experience it just gets worse~

VJ99

This is a good place for my first post. It's my second day sober. My wife and I spent the day yesterday on the couch watching TV because we were too sick from the night before to do anything else. I've tried quitting many times. I know that you have to avoid drinking buddies when you are trying to quit, but when they live with you it's pretty damn hard. But, like Flutter said - I hadn't approached my wife about quitting I guess because I wanted to leave that door open. Well, yesterday, with both of us in the seriously suffering we had a good talk and she has agreed to join me on this journey.

I hope that will be a difference maker for me. I'm not blaming her for not being able to quit. As so many people have said, I'm the one that puts the glass to my lips. But now I'll be able to get rid of all the alcohol in the house. It's a start. I've never been to an AA meeting but I did find one in my area tomorrow night. Here's to hoping I make it there.

Thanks for listening.

VJ

Tazman53

VJ fear of that first meeting is normal, but guess what you are going to find in that meeting? Alcoholics that know how to stay sober and be happy doing it! You will find people laughing, talking, and they will have a twinkle in their eye.

Have no fear, these are alcoholics who have found a common solution to thier alcoholism and one of the key to it is one alcoholic helping another alcoholic. Go a little early and plan to stay a little late just to chat.

You do not have to say a single word unless you want to. If you are asked to share and you do not want to simply say, "No thanks, I am just listening tonight." That is perfectly acceptable, folks with 20 years sober pass sometimes.

VJ99

Thanks for the encouragement. What does 'Closed Discussion' mean? I found a list of meetings in my area and some are 'open' and some are 'closed' discussions.

Wolfchild

Closed commonly means that the meeting is not open to visitors who do not have a problem with drugs or alcohol. Open typicaly means that anyone may attend the meeting.

Tazman53

Discussion means that it is a discussion of a particualr topic of the evening that may be selected by the chair of the meeting or brought up by some one in attendance. Topics are related to alcoholism and recovery. (Well they should be LOL)

Speaker meetings are just that, a speaker tells their story, there are also Step Studies and literature studies as well.

If it is your first meeting a speakers meeting or a beginners meeting is a good place to start out...... but in reality any meeting is a good meeting to begin with.