hopeful3

Hello. I am new here. I have been married for 18 years and have 3 children. My husband is an alcoholic. He has been drinking the entire time I have known him. I did not know the signs of it early on, because I was still a teenager and didn't know any better.

This disease of alcoholism has progressed through the years, and is pretty bad right now. He drinks 30-40 beers at a time (yes, that many), and can sometimes stay up for days while drinking. When he does this, he calls in sick to work. His work knows he has a problem, but has not done anything about it yet.

My husband is verbally abusive when he is drinking. He will yell, and rant and rave for hours. He blames everything that goes wrong or bothers him on us. My oldest son and I end up with most of the verbal abuse. He will get upset over nothing, and rant about it for hours. His language is awful, and the kids often feel upset and scared during these episodes. So do I frankly. I have reached out to his family and a friend of his has tried to help. He will stop drinking for a few days, and then find a reason to start back up again. I constantly worry about what is going on at home when I am at work. I worry about whether or not he will be in a good mood, or will he be angry? Will he keep me up all night with the yelling and blaming? Even when he is not drinking, he is so angry all of the time. We are constantly walking on egg shells. I don't want to tell him about problems I am having with the kids because I know how the conversation will end up.

I am worn down. I feel hopeless, and I don't know what to do. Our families live too far from here for us to go there. I don't fear for us physically, but I am fearful of these situations. I experience anxiety, depression, and panic. I guess I just need to know that I am not alone. I want to believe there is hope that he will heal someday, but history and reality tell me this will probably go on forever. That leaves me feeling so helpless and hopeless. The thing is, I love him deeply. I know that he wants to change and I know that he loves us. He is sick. I want to help, but I feel so worn down by all of this. How do I deal with his moods in a healthy way without being afraid?

theuncertainty

Welcome to SR, hopeful3. I'm a little short on time this afternoon, but didn't want to log off without saying hello. I'm sorry for what brings you here, but glad you found this board. There are so many wonderful people here. You are definitely not alone in this.

itsjustme1968

I really Hope they get better for you. I know My husband of 25 years most likely will never do it. He has 4 days no drinking right now. We had a big fight last week. I think it was our biggest. I have stayed away for the last week.
Today he had to go to the VA because his back went out. He could not drive so I took him. He asked me if we are done or could we get help. I said I would think about it. I dont want to give him a reason to start again. I know its over but I still want him to stop. The last 5 years has gotten really bad.

Your husband has want to stop him self. You cant make him. I wish you the best hun. You need to do whats best for you and your kids. I stayed for far too long. Think about the kids. I know 2 of 3 of mind dont want anything to do with him right now. Please read all you can and learn what you can about this. Take care of yourself.

Hopeworks

Sometimes we are stuck and find it hard to take action but I hope you will strongly consider seeking help for your child's sake... as an ACOA who still suffers from the scars of my traumatic childhood after YEARS and YEARS of therapy.

Please try to find some support near you... couselors, alanon and even your family... how far away can they be that you could not get yourself there somehow for at least a break in the madness.... sometimes seperation or even divorce can be redemptive and the catalyst for change.

Even if he did not change the seperation... temporary or permanent... would give you a much needed rest and time to think.

Pelican

Welcome to the SR family!

Your story sounds a lot like mine. I was married to my alcoholic for 14 years. I remember the egg shells, I remember the angry outbursts, I remember the alcoholic rants/rages, and I remember trying to orchestrate life so he wouldn't be as mad, wouldn't get as drunk, wouldn't get drunk till later in the day, etc....

I became as crazy acting as the alcoholic.

I came to SR and discovered something about my AH (alcoholic husband) alcoholism: It is progressive and it does get worse.

Okay, now I really felt the need to fix the situation.

Then I learned about the 3 C's of addiction:

I did not Cause it
I could not Control it
I would not Cure it

That's right! You and your children do not cause him to drink! He chooses to drink to excess. He is an adult who is active in alcohol addiction.
Nope, you can not control how much he drinks, how often or the reactions to his drinking. We are powerless over alcohol.
And lastly, I had to realize that I was not superwoman, a messiah, or a miracle worker. I needed to put all those magical thoughts of fixing another adult away. I needed to let the addiction belong to the addicted. All aspects.

When I finally learned to accept the 3 C's (easier said than done) - I was able to take the focus off of my alcoholic and begin to focus on myself and my children. (that was painful)

I decided my life was important.
My happiness mattered, too.

SR, Alanon meetings, and self-improvement books have helped me get control over my life and begin to make healthy decisions for myself and my children.

Yes, there is still hope!

Sending you encouragement and support.

fedup3

Hello hopeful3 I'm glad you found us but sorry for the reason why you came.

Read as much as you can from this site, it will give you insight on what is happening with your husband, family and alcoholism, what others have found to help them and most important that you are not alone we are here for you so please keep posting.

marie1960

So sorry to hear what you and your kids are living.

Everyday that I chose to be involved with an active alcoholic got me exactly that,........ a drunken out of control man...... if nothing changes, nothing changes..............

Your husband is an addict. Until he chooses to stop, and commits to recovery, nothing different is ever going to happen. I had to make choices based on facts. I had to save me and put an end to this madness. I was so wrapped up in his issues I was forgetting how to breathe on my own.

Is there hope ? you asked. Yes there is, but it starts with you, not your husband, every small choice and decision you make regarding the well being of you and your children puts you one step closer to your recovery............

Please continue to post, read the stickies at the top of the forum, the great wealth of knowlegde is an eye opener and I also found a sense of comfort in knowing I was not the only one living this daily hell.

Wishing you peace in the upcoming new year.

nodaybut2day

This. x 100.

Being here on SR, going to Al-Anon or counselling...it's all about you and what YOU want.

Is this the life YOU want to live? Is this how you want your children growing up (walking on eggshells, being subjected to verbal abuse, thinking that this is how normal human relationships are)?

Start thinking about yourself and let the addict do what he will do, because in the end, you have no choice in the matter. The only power you have is over yourself.

Tuffgirl

There is always hope.

Reaching out here was a hopeful action on your part!

Keep reading and posting and talking about your situation - the more you do, the more hopeful it will become.

Stay strong!
~T

sesh

To be honest I don't think anyone can do that. Even if you could detach so much I don't think your kids could.
You're right, your husband is sick, but unfortunatelly you can not help him. He is the only one that can.

The funny thing with alcoholism is the more you continue this crazy dance of your family's daily routine ( and I'm not judging, god knows I did it for years) the less you're helping, or contributing to solution of the problem.
In my experience the only helpful thing we can truly do for an alcoholic is to stop playing that role we're casted in.

You and your kids deserve better life. Your AH has to learn that his action have consenquences. Only when suffering consenquences of his actions he will be able to take responsibility for them. He might not, but he'll stand a better chance. Right now it is almost like he doesn't really need to, as he gets away with everything he does.

I'm not saying your AH is a bad person or that you shouldn't love him, I'm just saying nothing changes if nothing changes and the only person that can make your own life better is you.

There is a great thread on SR that you'd maybe like to read
http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...l-problem.html

take care

NYCDoglvr

I am so sorry you are in this painful situation because I have been there. I felt hopeless and helpless. In the end I had to understand that there was nothing I could do or say that would change his drinking. Al-anon taught me that I have to save my own life and sanity by leaving. But to get to that point was a process, one I couldn't have done without the support and love of others in Al-anon. You've come to the right place so keep posting about it...

jessiec

My heart goes out to you and your children -- and your husband too (like you said, it is indeed a disease).

I am still new to addiction (with my ABF -- we do not live together and I do not have kids) and don't have much to offer you on that end.

That being said, I was in an unhappy marriage (alcohol wasn't the issue, everything else was) and I know how it feels to be "stuck." It took me a long time to realize I couldn't fix this very broken situation, I could only remove myself from it. But once I finally let go, I never looked back! I have never regretted the decision.

I'm not advising you what to do. I just want you to know that you *do* have options. You and your children deserve the happiest and best that life has to offer!

hopeful3

Thank you so much for all of the responses. As of this moment I don't know where he is. He left without telling me a couple or hours ago. I am sure he us out drinkin
g. I am anxious and worried. It is after 2 in the morning.

Kingman063

Hey Hopeful,
I wish i could tell you without a doubt that everything is going to be alright, but you know as well as i do that would just be lip service...The bottom line is your husband is going to have to realize that the booze is killing him and he's losing his family life...I know you said all your family lives to far to go to but to be honest you and your kids should try to get away for a while and let him feel the emptiness without you...I only give that advice because my wife left me once and it was the kick in the butt i needed...i wish i had more and better advice for you...good luck to you and your family.

painterman

I can't give you any better advice than the above good people 'hopeful' but I can reassure you that you are not alone, and it certainly is a rollercoaster ride. I have been feeling all of the emotions you mentioned this past week, and I don't know why-all the teaching tells us to detach from the problem, but I have been feeling quite empty and anxious.
I think it's really the lack of having a sane intelligent person there to share everything with, and as you will know, being around a drunk is more lonely than being alone.
Go with the programme one day at a time, and stay positive.

Eight Ball

Hi Hopeful3 and welcome to SR,

I haven’t been around the internet for the Christmas period so wasn’t able to reply earlier. I read your thread and got goose pimples because I could relate to how you are feeling and what you are dealing/coping with because your story is extremely similar to my own story of about 2 yrs ago now.

I have been married for 23yrs, having met my husband when we were both 15yrs old and married at 22yrs. We were childhood sweethearts. We have two daughters who are currently 21yrs and 24yrs old and have both left home.

My AH was a beer drinker (very occasionally red wine and whisky). My AH was also verbally abusive when he was drinking and verbally abusive from when we were first married and I was too young to realise it was not ok and would excuse it on the drink. I often cried myself to sleep and told myself that he was only saying those hurtful things because it was the beer talking, he didn’t really mean it.

My AH was a ‘functioning’ alcoholic (although I don’t personally like that term). He worked hard, never took sick days, worked plenty of overtime and did private weekend work too. He also did more around the home than me. He drank around 4-8 bottles of beer a day, for pretty much most of our marriage. His behaviour got much worse as the years went by and his drinking slowly increased.

I know that this is very different to your AH in both quantities of beer and work ethics but that doesn’t really matter. What mattered was the effect my AH drinking and behaviour was having on me and our daughters.

I was constantly worrying what mood my AH was going to be in that day. I started to suffer from stress and panic attacks /anxiety feelings on my way home from work. I developed a stress cough. I checked the beer fridge on my way into the house to see how many were missing from the day before, so that I could gage his mood before I went in. I would feel sick in the stomach when I heard the beer fridge open. I was watching the bottle shop payments coming out of our account. I kept an excel spread sheet with money spent on beer. I stopped talking about anything important with him as I often heard extremely negative hurtful things about me or our daughters from him and this upset me more.

About two years ago now, following a particularly nasty argument about his drinking, my AH said that he was going to drink for the rest of his life and if I didn’t like it I could leave. I was devastated that he was choosing beer over a 21yr marriage and as we had immigrated to Australia, I posted a thread on a British Expat website entitled, ‘How much beer was too much?’ Quite a discussion pursued, but one person sent me a private message suggesting that I try Al-anon as it had helped his mum. Up until that point I hadn’t even thought that alcohol could be at the route of many of our problems and my husband might be an alcoholic.

I went to my first ever Al-anon meeting shortly after with my youngest 18yr old daughter, who was also being verbally abused, bullied and controlled by her dad and was also fed up with walking on eggshells. From there, we both went to see our doctor and got some personal counseling organised for us separately. It was around this time that I found SR too.

My eldest daughter left home at 18yrs to return to the UK.

As my AH alcoholism was spiraling out of control, myself and my youngest daughter bore the brunt of his verbal abuse, moods and controlling ways. My youngest daughter did not feel safe in her own home. Particularly if she was left on her own with her dad and he had been drinking. She increasingly started to stay at friends and was looking into moving out.

I talked about moving out with her but was too scared to leave. I loved my AH, I feared that he would find someone else; I feared not being able to afford to live on my own and support myself or giving up the lifestyle that I enjoyed with us both working and earning. I had emigrated from the UK 6yrs previously to NZ and then onto Australia and had no family or friends on this side of the world, only work colleagues and Al-anon.

In the end my daughter left home just before her 19th birthday and it wasn’t in a way that I would have liked because she felt forced out of her own home. I regret not moving out with her when we first discussed it and I still feel as though I let her down. She should have been my priority but I was still too deep in survival mode to realise. I was pleased though that she was happy and away from all the madness.

With the help of Al-anon, SR and my therapist, slowly my life improved. I started to find my own hobbies outside of the home. I joined an A Capella choir who were busy and active and I went to my Al-anon meetings and for lunch or the cinema with my Al-anon friends. I stopped checking the beer fridge but although things had gotten much better, unfortunately I was still stressed out with it all.

Two things happened that changed the way I was thinking – firstly, I was explaining to my therapist how my AH would upset me the most when he was negative about our daughters and she said ‘sure, that’s because they are important to you, but you are important too’. Something clicked inside me and I started to see myself as important. Up until then I had been a wife and mother and now I was ME! I could make choices in my best interest because I was worthy. My self-esteem returned. I called him on his verbal abuse or passive/aggressive behaviours and told him to ‘stop’ and he did. Secondly, I had a health scare due to my stress, anxiety, medication and cried all the way home from the doctors, thinking to myself that my AH drinking could end up killing me. I could have a stroke or heart attack at a youngish age through living in constant stressful environment that I was choosing to stay in.

That night when I got home from the doctor, I told my AH of 23yrs that I was going to leave him. I said that he had told me that he was going to carry on drinking for the rest of his life and that was his choice but I had a choice too and I couldn’t carry on living that way and so I was choosing to leave. I loved him but had come to realise that I loved myself more. He wanted to remain friends but I told him no and he was a bit shocked by this. I was so angry with him that I needed to go ‘no contact’ for my own well-being.

It took a few weeks to find somewhere to move to that I could afford (rent) and I left about 8 months ago. I live on my own for the first time in my life. The stress disappeared after about 4 weeks. All the things I feared didn’t happen. I can afford my home, it’s a lovely home, its peaceful, it’s relaxing, and I can please myself. I have a busy life with all my hobbies and new friends.

My AH reached his bottom and found sobriety about 2-3 months after I left. He has been sober for about 6 months now and is working very hard to stay that way. We spend weekends together and have a date night mid-week and I am currently very blessed.

I didn’t leave him to ‘wake him up’ etc.; I finally left for me, for my own sanity, my own health, for a chance at a better life for myself. I am extremely lucky that my AH has sought long term sobriety, that he shows me that he gets it, he’s constant, but I am still looking after myself, treating myself well, and have enough self-love and awareness to say that I will never live with an active alcoholic again, as I deserve so much more.

Two years on and with the relationship that I have today with my sober AH, which is still very early days, I can see how far we have both come, how abnormal our lives were for so long, what an abnormal home we were bringing up two girls in, how abnormal our thinking was and I wouldn’t ever wish to go back to that awful, black time.

You have found SR, you are at the start of your recovery, so I sincerely hope that this is the start of your journey to having a life that you yearn for and also learn to think that you and your children are all worthy of being open to it and deserve it. Of course you love your husband but you have to know that you don’t have to go down with a sinking ship, you can choose to rescue yourself and in turn your children from living your current life. Nothing changes, if nothing changes.

Many above have written far more distinct reply’s than mine without going around the towns and houses! I am sorry that I have written war and peace but I just wanted you to know that you are definitely not alone and share my experience, strength and hope with you. I was hopeless and helpless, but once my own recovery started, things improved dramatically for me and it will for you too – but recovery definitely starts with you.

tryintosmile

I could have written what you just did - almost word for word. I'm still with an active A but the good thing about coming here to SR and getting counselling is that I know those 3 C's now and I've accepted them. It's such a relief when you stop believing you could control it all if you could just find the key. There isn't one.

There are many people here who have been through it and come out on the other side and you will find so much support and inspiration