littleredhead52

I've been in a relationship with an addict for almost 12 years now. I have been thru hell and back with him. he has almost stopped drinking. now he just does his pain pills (he has a pretty messed up back) The reason I'm writing this is because, I have left him several times always going back. I have two daughters and a son. He has a son that has been in my life since he was four. I Love him and this last time I came back basically for him and the fact I just wanted to go Home. I thought all my children supported me as we have always been close. This last time when I left my A, I went and wrote an email to all my children, telling them everything that was going on with me, that things had gotten really bad with my A, and moved in with my oldest daughter.
Well I went back after about a week, with my oldest saying, "Anytime you need to just get away for a few days, I'm here for you.
My youngest daughter who lives a long ways away from me, wrote me and her brother and sister, about how she can't do this anymore. That I am basically cut off from her. She doesn't want me to call or contact her till I have been away from my A at least a year. I am so hurt by this I don't know what to do. My oldest daughter got mad at her and told me just don't respond to her email, so I haven't. She also said they talked and my youngest admits that she probably shouldn't have been so mean to me in her email.
I do understand how she feels, but now I feel bad that it's all my fault, the choices I have made, has now put a big space between me and my youngest daughter. I don't know what to do?.... I Know I have issues, I'm always trying to be a better person. But I can't do what my daughter is asking me to do, (which is to leave my A and his son)
I know who and what my A is.

This is what the last of her email said...Your actions, your inability to say no to A....well what they are saying is No to me. No your daughter doesn't deserve to have a Mom who is safe and healthy and capable of making decisions. A mom that is actually cognizant of how her lifestyle chooses affect her children. A Mom that has clarity.

Maybe this is the wrong thing to do. I've tried understanding, I've tried support, I've tried money. I guess now I try tough love.

Now I'm feeling like I'm just not a good Mom or person anymore!

interrupted

Your daughter feels that you have chosen your alcoholic, drug-addicted boyfriend over her well being. Whether she is right or not isn't really the point. She owns her feelings, and she can create and enforce any boundaries she decides are healthy for her. You have decided to stay with your addicted boyfriend, as a result you no longer have a relationship with your youngest daughter.

In my family *I* am the daughter that moved away. I did it to protect myself from the chaos of addiction and enmeshment in my family. Ganging up on her with your other daughter isn't going to improve the situation - she already feels undervalued and likely has for a very long time. She has stated her boundaries, she doesn't want a relationship with a mother enmeshed in addiction and codependency. It is her right to decide that. There is nothing you can do, she gets to make choices for herself just like you do. I think you should respect her decisions and boundaries instead of trying to challenge them. Just like you can't fix him, you can't make up her mind for her either, the only person you can change is yourself if you decide to do so.

I'm sorry that you're going through this. The destruction of addiction isn't limited to the addict alone - it affects the whole family. Addiction is a family disease.

Kialua

Yeah this is just too much for your kids, even adult kids, to handle. They need some calm in their lives if you have been with this guy for 12 years. You should email her and tell her you completely understand and will respect her boundaries and that you love her. She still loves you but can't take anymore of the drams. This is only normal for her to do this. And it is normal for the other daughter to be at odds with her about it, unfortunately. But it doesn't have to stay that way. You do need to look at your enabling and become aware of how it shaped your family. I know this sounds hard but it has to be. Please read through the stickies above to see how your children have grown up through this lifestyle. They will continue to take sides and fight but this is not about who is right and who is wrong. This is about the mental health of the family and what the addict has put them through.

Kialua

This is what your daughter is going through and she has intelligently decided she can't live like this anymore. Just take out the word Alcoholic and put in Addict:

http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...olic-home.html
The Three Rules of the Alcoholic Home
Taken from: Adult Children of Alcoholics--UIUC Counseling Center

(The Three Rules of the Alcoholic Home)

If you grew up in an alcoholic family you may have longed for the day when you could go to college and leave the pain and chaos of your family behind. You may be surprised, therefore, to find at college that you experience feelings of dissatisfaction, apathy, or distance from other people, similar to those you felt at home. Such feelings are easy to understand when you consider that families are places where you learn about yourself and about life. Although all families operate with "rules," alcoholic families have rules which severely limit the development and growth of their members.

Claudia Black, a leading author and theorist regarding ACoAs, has identified three such rules in alcoholic homes:

1. Don't trust. In alcoholic familes, promises are often forgotten, celebrations cancelled and parents' moods unpredictable. As a result, ACoAs learn to not count on others and often have a hard time believing that others can care enough to follow through on their commitments.


2. Don't feel. Due to the constant pain of living with an alcoholic, a child in an alcoholic family must "quit feeling" in order to survive. After all, what's the use of hurting all the time? In these families, when emotions are expressed, they are often abusive, and prompted by drunkenness. These outbursts have no positive result and, along with the drinking, are usually denied the following day. Thus, ACoAs have had few if any opportunities to see emotions expressed appropriately and used to foster constructive change. "So," the ACoA thinks, "why feel anything when the feelings will only get out of control and won't change anything anyway? I don't want to hurt more than I already do."


3. Don't talk. ACoAs learn in their families not to talk about a huge part of their reality - drinking. This results from the family's need to deny that a problem exists and that drinking is tied to that problem. That which is so evident must not be spoken aloud. There is often an unspoken hope that if no one mentions the drinking it won't happen again. Also, there is no good time to talk. It is impossible to talk when a parent is drunk. When that parent is sober, everyone wants to forget. From this early training, ACoAs often develop a tendency to not talk about anything unpleasant.

dollydo

Your bad choices have affected your children, sometimes we children just have enough.

My mother an alcoholic always hooked up with abusive alcoholics, her children suffered, we still bear the scars today. Honestly, she never had her priorities straight and always chose men over her children.

I am no contact with her yet again, the third time in my adult life, my brother only speaks to her when he absolutely has to. We are sick of all the drama and childish nonsense.

It is just the opposite, your daughter is doing tough love with you, for her well being. She has set her bounderies, if I were you, I'd respect them.

You both are adults, you each can make your own decisions in life, personally, I respect her decision, I understand.

littleredhead52

Thanks for all the responses, I have ever intention of abiding with my daughters wishes. I am also an ACOA, so I know what it does to the children, like I said I have my own issues. And in my life right now
"It is what it is". Hoping my daughter will get some help with her issues with me. What I have done with my life and the bad choices I have made, are up to me to change, and I have been doing that. slowly but surely, Progress not Perfection!

tromboneliness

These things are hard to do. When my wife was still drinking, I enabled her a lot, and although I never actually left, I certainly thought about it -- I went so far as to surreptitiously collect cardboard boxes and stash them in the basement, so I'd be able to make a quick getaway. Turned out I never had to, but things were getting close.

One of us busted your chops for "enabling" the addict, and when you leave but then come back a week later, the message is clear: He can keep right on drinking and using, and you're still going to stay with him.

Your kid has set a clear boundary with you -- that's a healthy step on her part. The counselors told me that the worst thing you can do is to give an ultimatum (e.g., "Get off drugs or I'm leaving"), then not stick to it. That's why I never quite told my wife that I would leave if she didn't get sober. I came right up to the edge of it, and I think she felt that I would leave, but I never came out and said so in black and white -- because once you say that, you have to make it stick, or you're giving them a green light to keep right on doing what they're doing. He claims to have "almost" quit drinking -- but so has everyone else. Almost doesn't count. The pain meds are a big problem -- although I must admit, having just gone through an episode of back pain myself, it can really do a number on you. But taking narcotics every day isn't going to fix anything; it'll just make the problem permanent.

It's tough to do, though -- although my wife has been sober for 16+ years, that doesn't mean life is fabulous around here. I'm still a mess, we still don't communicate as well as we should, I think we both enable each other's irresponsible behavior to some extent, and so on. It's never perfect, just better than it was. Good luck!

T

VickiACA

littlredhead,

Are you attending al-anon? Working a program?

I wasn't surprised by the responses you received her. A post like this will speak to child within all of us that was forsaken for the alcoholic.

I don't think it's ever to late to be a model to your children. I knew something was up with my Mom - she was much calmer and focused. I asked - even though she no longer lived with the alcoholic she had gone back to Al-anon. And the difference was noticeable.

Take care of yourself - work your program. My guess is that it's likely that relationships with your children will improve.

Vicki