caughthiminject

I'm reading a book on alcoholism and living with them. It says something interesting here - that the alcoholic always comes back. They might threaten to leave, they might even leave you, but in the end they always try to find a way to come back, because they are addicts and they are addicted to their codependent person. When my AXBF dropped me off at the airport, he cried and he said that he's addicted to me and he needs me. This is something I have been told by all his friends and family - that he would be lost without me. I find it very hard to believe. Sounds like more manipulation to me.

Has this happened to you though? Have they given in, tried to come back, done the recovery for you? I found after I broke up with him, he was better. He'd say things to hurt me, like he was going to go out to the bar anyway even though I wouldn't drive him and he might meet another girl there. And I said, "Okay, great, maybe she can drive you home instead of me driving all the time." He just sat on the sofa and didn't move after that. He had rented an expensive apartment for three nights to get away from me while coming down off his high. Then changed his mind and decided he wanted me there. He acted angrily when I didn't want to go to his shoot-up nest since I was the one who forced him to have to spend a ridiculous amount of money on it because I was so annoying apparently (as he had injected speed and I caught him). He said he was going to go back there and sleep there on his own. So I said, "Okay, enjoy, have a great time." He walked halfway down the driveway and came back. It seems like when you no longer care, when you no longer give in -- they come crawling back. It's sadistic.

I've said that before, I think he liked me to be mean to him. If I was nice, then it was some kind of license to drink more. D-Day (the day I caught him doing more than drinking beer), I had been cooking lasagna and baking muffins all day long for him (I am vegetarian). It's like when we are most happy, when things are best -- is when he ruins it. Like beautiful holiday in Vanuatu - drunk driving.

Anyway, just rambling now. But I thought it was interesting that this book said that they "need" us and we can pretty much decide to do whatever we want and they are going to cave eventually. I used to live in this fear that if I didn't let him drink that he was going to dump me. Then when I stopped caring about him dumping me, he would treat me better. Sadist.

catlovermi

I wouldn't say they're in need of the codependent person so much as the enabling provided by them. The actual person is quite replaceable, once forced to do so. We see this in a lot of break-up threads... the addict quickly hooks up with the next enabler.

CLMI

caughthiminject

You know, I find that so annoying that it's this way. I asked him all the time why he didn't just pick to be with someone who enjoyed drinking and drugs like him. Why pick out a vegetarian non-smoker non-drinker? It would make sense you'd have more fun with someone who drank and smoked and did drugs. His explanation was that he didn't want a life like that. He wanted the "clean" life that I represent. Yet all he did was dirty my life.

Freedom1990

Mine sure did. As a matter of fact, he remarried shortly after our divorce was finalized. Better her than me.

catlovermi

Because, at its core, addiction is parasitic. It's hard to suck off another who is also sucking, so to speak. You need a PRODUCER, to suck off: someone responsible who makes money, pays bills, cleans up, etc.

CLMI

Thumper

Exactly.

My xah was struck like glue. Even when he was being his worst he was still stuck. I believe that my xah might actually be way more co-dependent then I am though. It just so happens that the 'symptoms' we each have are different, even opposite. We actually seemed like a good fit at first but it was terrible at the end.

GettingBy

Another perspective on this... is that I think my AH would really like to have the "clean" life. I think he truly wants the happy family, the healthy life-style, etc... but the disease/addiction to alcoholic is stronger than his desire for all the other stuff - and thus, the drinking continues inspite of the fact that he is losing his "perfect little life." KWIM?

I think there is some truth to an addict needing an enabler, but I don't think it's a "hook-up" based on ill-intentions. Maybe some addicts who are sicker than others... but I firmly believe that in the core of every addict is a human being just like you and I. A personally struggling against what they want versus what they need (to them - the need is the DOC).

I am learning to have compassion for addicts... doesn't mean I want to sacrifice myself for them anymore though!!!

WayTooLong

Mine came back. I don't drink much, do drugs...grew up in church. That's where we met when he was cleaning up his act. I was 18...I didn't even know what an alcoholic/drug addict and their mentality entailed until I went to Alanon five years ago....20 years after I married the guy, he kicked his son and I to the curb (he was "99.9% sure" he wanted his freedom). It's funny, his "freedom" entailed hooking up with another alcoholic two weeks after I left. To make a long story short, his son and I moved 600 miles away, he called 8-10 times a day. After a year of him "working on his problem", we reconciled. I moved back and found out about this person - he moved in with her. They drank together. That didn't last long. She was on Xanax and drank vodka from a paper bag hiding it all over the house....she was passed out by ten in the morning. He would come home and find her strumming the guitar in a second bedroom with the guy across the hall....he was drunk too( the guy across the hall)...I guess singing Kumbaya or something (I think it was really a Beatle song, but I digress). Her problem was bigger than my husband's. He thought he had his act together compared to her. In the end, she called the cops in a drunken stupor. He took 16 anger mgmt classes and it's all "my fault" because I kicked him out because he had an affair while he was calling me, taking my money and acting like he missed me. ...he had no where to go he claimed....and it was also his friend's fault for telling me the truth. Now - the drunken girl has miraculously stopped drinking because she blew it with him and wants to get back together...he said she is like a man...whatever that means. I am disgusted today by these people...and they come back as long as you are willing to take them but the next time around it is always worse after the novelty wears off. Just when you think it can't get any worse, it does. Now I am getting better at detaching from him and the more you focus on yourself and disengage, the better your life is even if you can't leave yet. Sorry to rant...just in one of those moods.

Terminally Unique

Unless an alcoholic is financially independent, and can afford to feed their addiction on their own, they do indeed need you. They really are powerless, and they know it, which is why they may try to leverage the feelings of others so as to gain some power.

Mitsy

My ex-bf called me periodically...leaving me messages begging me to call him back. Usually, he was drunk in those messages; sometimes was sober. It was tempting to call him back at times after I received the sober sounding messages (I work 60+ hours a week so was seldom home when he actually called). Eventually, he stopped calling me. I occasionally run into him at my part-time retail job but I speak and don't try to get into any conversations w/him if I can help it. If he wants to talk to me, he still knows where to find me but knows I won't speak to him if he's drunk. There has been enough time & space now that he probably doesn't yearn for me too much anymore, but he knows why I walked away and he knows why he has few friends in his life now. An active alcoholic or drug user can never be truly "healthy" as far as emotionally or physically. It just isn't possible and addicts are master manipulators - that's why you read so many stories about women going back to them because they have "changed". True change only occurs when the addicts wants the change; not because the wife or girlfriend wants them to get sober.

I fell into that same trap believing "if he only loved me enough, he'd get sober". That's a lie that we tell ourselves that is not only NOT true, it's self-defeating. It's not that they don't care about other people--they simply don't care enough about themselves to want to change their lives. Most drunks know they have a problem but few really want to do the work necessary to change that. It can be done, but they must admit that they are powerless over alcohol or drugs or whatever they are hooked on. Detaching from the addict is the best thing an enabler can do. I never dreamed that I could have called myself an enabler (or that I would have dated an alcoholic even) but it happened & the label fit me as well as anyone else. There is help for that though & it's called Al-Anon. I highly recommend it if you're dealing with anyone who has drug or alcohol abuse issues.

OnMyWay11

I very much agree, but I will add that they also have associated all their 'good times' with partying and alcohol and cannot image they can enjoy life without it. JMHO They are probably right since removing the substance would make them face the realities of who they are.

FLsunshine

i honestly don't think my RAH (AH?) will come back. I think he will find someone fresh and new that doesn't know the depths of his "alcoholic history", somewhere without the pain and guilt of his past. Probably someone with a higher self esteem then i and less codyness. Someone that will be a welcoming challenge for him to conceal his true self. I knew him to well. Someone that will have a "social drink" with him...

choublak

OT, but that is sooo ghetto...especially indoors wtf

painterman

Interesting, the addict needs you if they are not financially independent. (above quote)
I just cut off the funds to my partner because of her drinking-now I have a silent housemate who very much appears to be behaving, has she seen the light or is she waiting for a ***** in my armour so she can gain access to my trust and start all over again?

Cyranoak

It is manipulation, pure and simple. His addictions are his problem to solve, not yours, even when that addiction is you.

Other addicts and what they do or don't do isn't relevant to you or your addict. What each of you does or doesn't do is what is relevant.

Take care,

Cyranoak

P.s. Good luck.

gerryP

Hi Caughthiminject,

I understand you are questioning some content in the book you are reading and that's understandable, but I'm just wondering why a non drinker, non smoker, vegetarian would be interested in an alcoholic drug addict and 'injecting' speed at that. I realize you are collecting information at this stage, but I'm thinking FWIW, that you might also what to delve deep within yourself and see if you can find an answer to that.

Wishing you well.

NotSoSmart

I remember asking my partner on several occasions why she didn't just find someone who drank and used drugs like her - rather than someone like me who was on her back about it and was a constant issue. Incidentally she could've turned that question around on me, asking me why *I* was choosing to be with an addict, rather than find someone sober.

Her response was that she didn't want that life.. and while I do believe her, I also agree with the statement that A's find it a lot harder to get by when they're with another A... my partner's prior relationship was with someone whom she considered to have a drinking problem. Someone has to play the adult and I guess its too hard when your partner is worse off than you (DUI issues, etc). It's a lot easier being with someone healthy who doesn't muck things up for their high by forcing them to be responsible.

caughthiminject

I never wanted to be with a drunk/addict. I've never been with one before and I never grew up around drugs or alcohol. I just fell in love without knowing what alcoholism was. Everything I know about alcohol and drugs, I had to read on the internet. Before I realized how much of a problem he had with alcohol, I was already in love. No, of course I don't want to be with a drunk/addict since I'm basically the opposite of that. It's not about not wanting to be with some random drunk/addict in some general sense of the word though. No one wakes up one day and says, hey I want to torture myself emotionally. He is someone I have loved and still do love, even if we are not together anymore. I know that all the advice here is that we are all sick and codependent ourselves, and we must dump this person. Perhaps I have come to be sick in these years with him. But I wasn't at the start. I'm not some abused daughter of an alcoholic with some series of mental traumas or a drinker or addict myself. I don't have a pattern of this life. I am sure everyone here knows what it is like to be in love, or you wouldn't be here.
So why would a vegetarian, non-smoking, non-drinker want to be with an alcoholic/addict. I don't. I want to be with Schmooples. It's just the unfortunate part that Schmooples is probably laying dead with a needle in his arm somewhere and I just really want to understand why because I just can't comprehend that level of stupidity yet. I want to understand this disease for my own sanity.

Seren

This is a classic post from some time ago by one of the founding members here, Jon. It is a post that speaks volumes about addiction/alcoholism.

It is part of this "sticky" that contains another classic post explaining addiction from the POV of the addict.

http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...ddicts-do.html

Although none of these are "easy" reads, I hope that they help.

Hugs, HG

gerryP

What's love got to do with it? I'm in love with him so it's too late for me. This is the life I have been given?

Either a relationship with an alcoholic/addict fuels something in you or you move on and wish them the best and mean it. Have you read Codependent No More? That's what I meant when I suggested you look at yourself and begin working from there.