BTB

My soon to be XAW were talking about reconciling. Below is an exchange of emails this morning.

Are you moving home today?

My response:

I skied with yyyy yesterday. He invited me to go to xxxx with him and his girlriend and some others. One of them mention they saw us in there Saturday. I said I wasn't there. Later I talked to the waiter who remembers me coming at getting you at xxxx the night that you were to drunk to drive home. I also talked with wwww, the owner, he says you are still coming in and drinking 2 or 3 times a week. Enough said.

Her response:

I am commited to you and my sobriety. On several occasions, I have gone to xxxx. I sit at the bar because I will not sit at a table by myself. There are people sitting all around me who are drinking. I am eating a Greek Chop salad everytime with a big glass of water. On Sat. I was there for a late lunch. I did see yyyy's friend who was there with his wife(the heavy woman who knits, she has very short hair) yyyy's friend did say hello to me. I have nothing to hide. After eating, I went home and was home all day Sunday. Last night, I thought i heard a car door slam and was waiting to hear you open the garage door, but did not hear it, so I fell back to sleep. You know how early I go to bed.

She also called my attorney today. He told her that she has an attorney and that he couldn't talk to her, so she sent him an email. My attorney forwarded a copy of her email to me.

I edited out the names and the place.

I'm interested in hearing what others have to say.

lc1972

Well I would not think an owner would lie about someone's drinking habits if he knew who she is. Not sure on that one because unless he does know her by sight then he could have been mistaken. I think it depends on the source of the information. If you want to reconcile but want to be sure she is not drinking I think you have to know these things. I also think that your gut always tells you and I am really trying to listen to mine now and not my AH.

So I will be thinking and praying for you.

lillamy

Well, I say you're a wise man to have a good lawyer.
I also think you're a wise man to not engage further, and to set the parameters for your conversation the way you did. In my experience, conversations with an A can end up with them, terrier-like, getting stuck on getting an answer to one question -- and it's up to us to guard our boundaries and say (as you sort of did) "I'm not giving you a yes or no answer to that question because it's meaningless, and here is why."

Unless she is doing daily blood tests and urine tests, you can't know she's not drinking. And no matter how wonderful a woman she is underneath the drinking, as long as she's drinking, you can't trust a word she says.

I also would really question a person's commitment to getting sober if she doesn't change her habits of where she hangs out and with whom. Especially early on in sobriety, going into a bar sounds like a really bad idea.

vujade

I wish people's noses would grow a foot when they lie. It would be so much easier, wouldn't it? The problem is that we spend WAY too much time wondering if they are lying or not. They drag us RIGHT into the crazies.

My thoughts...go with your gut and do what feels right. If you feel that she is lying, there is a good chance she is. On the other hand, she might not be but you are so gun shy, it would be hard for you to believe her if she said the sky was blue. Trust is so very hard to get back. It might just be too soon for you to consider a reconciliation.

I'm rambling. My head is too full tonight. Sorry.

BTB

A small place in a semi-rural area so the answer is yes. The first time I went in there with her for lunch, the owner said hi to her by name. A red flag went up in my subconscious saying WTF.

I love the "Zero Tolerance" at the top of the page. Even though it is about something else, it says how I feel right now.

Cyranoak

She is so committed to sobriety that she thinks it's a good idea to go to bars to eat. Oh yeah, and the owner and waiter are lying. Yeah, right.

If you believe this, then also believe that recently you inherited 10 million dollars. I'm the person holding it for you, but I can't get it for you until you wire me $5,000 so I can get the bank to release the money.

Also, I have some great real estate to sell you in Florida, as well as an incredible opportunity to buy the Brooklyn Bridge!!!

Good God.

Take what you want and leave the rest.

Cyranoak

BTB

And where should I sent the $5,000?

I needed something to make me smile.

zrx1200R

If their lips are moving, they are lying. That is what I've come to accept. I catch my wife in so many lies. I don't even try. She says she stays late after the AA meeting to help with "board of directors". Right. Then, the next morning she asks me to get 5 bucks out of her wallet for our daughters lunch money, and a receipt for a bottle of wine from the night before falls out.

Repeat this 50 times since the summer. She lies when the truth works just fine. Did yours? I bet I know the answer.

BTB

zrx1200R, Yes you do know my answer.

Cyranoak

...and from a foot away, while alcohol fumes emit from their skin, and they stand there barely keeping their balance, slur with all sincerity, "I'm not drunk, (******** excuse goes here-- tired, sick, etc.)."

It's true, unless they are actively engaged in recovery with a sustained period of sobriety they are not capable of telling the truth (even when they are momentarily sober, like my wife was most mornings).

Lie, lie, lie, lie, lie.

One of the best things I ever did was learn to accept that reality, and learn to trust my own judgement. I simply stopped questioning if she was drunk when I knew she was drunk, no matter what she said.

Take care fellas,

Cyranoak

P.s. Who the f' really believes that white wine and vodka are odorless? What a crock of ****.

buttercream

Its soooo true. Mine did too. Drives me batty.

vujade

LOL!!! Amen to that one. Maybe if you have ONE drink. But a pint of vodka smells like...a pint of vodka.

naive

i really drove myself half-crazy trying to figure out what was a lie and what wasn't. after a certain point, i decided none of it mattered at all...i didn't trust him...period...

so perhaps he was telling the truth, perhaps he was lying. he had lied so much that it didn't matter if this particular time, he was telling the truth or not.

what mattered was that i didn't trust him any longer. period.

however, i trusted MYSELF.

once i realized that i trusted myself and also that i trusted my intuition, i began to listen to myself. it frequently went like this:

xABF: i'm working until 5. i don't think i'll stop for a beer. i'm too tired today.

self : ignore what he said. what will happen? he will kick off work at 2, go drinking for 3 hours and then call me at 5, saying he's just home and going to sleep now.

it took a bit of practice to totally blank what he said and replace it with my hunch as to what would occur.

i was rarely wrong. at first, i'd check up on my hunches, but after awhile, i realized it didn't matter anymore, because i didn't trust him.

i think it's really important to be able to trust your partner. when that goes, for myself, it doesn't matter how handsome, intelligent, funny, etc. they are.

StarCat

I have discovered in my case, the "what" is the lie is not as important as the "why" is the lie.

In XABF's case, the lies are manipulations to get me back, and I am not going. So it doesn't really matter what tricks he pulls, or what stories he tries to tell, as long as I get the feeling that he's trying to pull me back in, I know there's an "untruth" in there somewhere, and I am learning to put it down and walk away, rather than try to figure out his mindpuzzles.

corkel

I'm guessing all A's "think" you can't smell vodka. After attending many open AA meetings with my AH last year, I remember one A after another speaking at the podium about how they "were beer drinkers their whole life and then switched to vodka" I wonder why? Who knows, but as many of us here can attest to, He** yeah! it stinks!