trailmix

You haven't lost it yet! So hold on. This is a thing that can cause cognitive dissonance with a drinking partner. Especially as alcoholism is progressive and it can progress very quickly. It has a strong hold on him now. His mind is not ok. You can not fix this.

So the cognitive dissonance - your mind is holding on to one idea, but what you are feeling and experiencing is something else. You speak lovingly of him but he's not loving, he is mean and deceitful, he lies, he cheats, he drinks. BUT at the same time, he is sitting there, with the same voice, he looks pretty much the same he's even nice sometimes.

The mind struggles with that. It's like he's "there" but he isn't "there". How do you resolve that?

First of all, if there is any way you can encourage him to leave sooner, I would. You can't start to heal until you can start to resolve this in your own mind. The anger will come, right now you are venting it on the other woman, again, she may be a shrew, but she is not married to you, she made you no promises. Is her behaviour bad, no doubt, but she is not your problem.

He said:

Well, at least that's the truth. You mentioned you could deal with a bit of drinking but not this. This is his drinking, that's what he wants to do. Understanding/accepting is not in the cards for you. He will go off and drink.

I'm going to bump up a thread in the forum for you to have a look at - being rejected by the reject (harsh name, but the message is important).

trailmix

One other thing, please don't let yourself reach the end of your rope.

If you are feeling suicidal at all, please call the hotline and talk to them, they will be happy to listen and advise. I think you mentioned you have a therapist? Sorry I can't remember but if you do, please call for an appointment today, tell them it's urgent. If nothing else, go to your doctor today or the hospital if you like, you never have to be alone in this, people will help if you reach out.

https://www.soberrecovery.com/forums...-suicidal.html (If You Are Feeling Suicidal)

trailmix

Hi zoi. Sorry if my message over-stepped yesterday, it's hard to judge sometimes where people are at in text, you know? Just wanted to make sure you had someone to talk to if needed to vent.

How are you doing today?

hollyhobbie

You will come to hate him, and you’ll forget about her. Then you’ll stop caring about him so much. Then you’ll be mad at yourself for tolerating it, but you’ll need to accept that hindsight is 20/20, and we never stop learning. Even if he got sober, came back, was himself, time will work on correcting your perception of him, because trust has been broken. You can’t unknow what has been revealed to you. The universe will continue to send you red flags, as many as it takes. He can relapse anytime and it all starts over again once (big if) he gets sober and works on recovery with his everything. I went through something very similar with my ex. My pain couldn’t be healed fast enough. But that pain is you already healing, I see that now. And one day I seriously woke up and I didn’t care about him anymore. It was like a miracle, god answered my prayers. But I know better, the pain got me there. And I’ll never let this happen to me again. He’s going to fall flat on his face. Step back and watch Mother Nature do her job, stop interfering with it. You don’t need to be his mother anymore. Be your own mother.

choublak

Because nobody gets into a relationship just to detach later on. I too sneered at Al-Anon at first. I felt like if I wanted to detach from someone I was in a relationship with, I wouldn’t have bothered cultivating the relationship and just ghosted my qualifier.

I don’t think that way anymore. But I can definitely see why someone would come on here and sneer at everything at first.

needuall

Thank you for this post. Lots of great insite here! I can identify with so much, I was married to an alcoholic for years. I keep hearing but I love him.
We understand that but how much craziness are you going to put yourself through? Right now at least, seems like you are being offered a roller-coaster. I think if you are right with yourself, this will not be appealing at all. You will be reasonably cautious with anyone and pull away as needed when/if the other person is hurtful.

velma929

If I might offer an opinion;

It's possible to love someone and have an affair. I know people in my social circle known for infidelity and married for decades. It happens. It's possible that the alcohol eventually has such a hold that an addict no longer can choose to not drink. At that point, someone who will accept a drunk partner becomes a viable alternative to someone with different expectations.

I suspect my husband was cheating. Don't know if he could physically cheat because at some point the booze does a number on a man's ability to function. He was refilling Viagra - and it wasn't being used with me.

I have come to believe that he was doing the best he could. It wasn't an exemplary performance, but it was his personal best. I stayed until he died. I was ready to leave the very day he told me he was terminally ill, but we were looking at a two year prognosis, at most, so I didn't.

I don't blame the woman/women he was with, they never promised to be faithful to me. I don't blame anyone else for my cowardice about leaving. That's all on me.