Unfair!?
 

Tonight I'm angry with my AH. No fight or anything like that to report.

I just hate that we're not supposed to get angry with them about their drinking. I want to yell and scream, "Hello???!!!! How can you possibly drink that much and think it's okay?!!!"

I imagine if you asked him, he'd say our problems are over since I am no longer nagging him. He just gets to have a party every night and I'm supposed to hang in just enough to keep it together for our family but not too much that I go insane.

Truth be told - outside of the drinking, he's a great guy. I just don't think he's ever going to hit bottom.

I guess I haven't reached my limit either. He does have a decent job and we get along well during the work week up until evening time. Once he starts drinking, I retreat.

So, even though I wanted to get angry with the amount he has drank, I didn't. I guess that's progress but it certainly doesn't feel like it.

Ever feel this way?

I felt like this a lot till STBXAH moved out. Going back to another current post here, feeling your emotion and acting on it are two different things. I realised that actually voicing my anger to him just led to a fight, recriminations, more drinking and ammunition for him to emotionally abuse me and attack me later. I got off that rollercoaster of a ride! Venting to him just made my life more unpleasant. There are so many other ways to let my anger out - some more constructive than others! My anger helped me move on, gave me the energy to do things. Venting here, journalling and sometimes just screaming in a parked, locked car helped. It totally confused STBXAH though!

It sounds unfair. I wouldn't like that situation and I am sorry that you are in it.

What can you do to help you feel better?

Where are you getting the idea that you're not supposed to get angry - or for that matter express your anger (you are obviously ALREADY angry) - over excessive drinking?

I've learned to recognize anger as a signal that I need to change something in my life.

L

Absolutely. Anger means (to me) that something is not right with my world. We can't control others or circumstances, but we can take care of ourselves.

Now if I could just figure out a way to deal with my anger over traffic. :c004:

The problem with anger, for me, is that its an unproductive emotion. If I can't do anything about what's making me angry, I just get angrier. When I get angry, I tend to stay angry for a long time, and it saps all my energy. I can't sleep, can't concentrate, and I can't get anything done. And I'm a real b*tch to be around.

I do think I have the right to be angry, and will say those exact words to my AH - but I try not to let the anger consume me. I try to avoid things that make me angrier, like continuing to try to interact on a logical level with my AH if he's been drinking. It only makes me angrier, so instead I avoid/ignore him. He hates that and if he asks why I'm ignoring him, I tell him because seeing you and talking with you just makes me angry, and since I don't like myself when I'm angry, I don't want to be around you. Then I walk away, put my earphones back in, or whatever. He usually gets the message, and goes off somewhere to sleep it off. Once, when he wouldn't leave me alone I went up to the bookstore, bought a cup of coffee and sat with a book for a couple of hours.

I'm not always successful, but I'm getting better.

That is taking care of yourself puckett, and learning to allow your feelings and move on to the next step! This is recovery :)

I have felt that way. It magnified until it nearly destroyed me. As unfair as it seems, I hit my bottom first and started paying attention to reality. I have lots of other less then pleasant feelings and emotions now and I sometimes get angry, but not much and I can let it go.

I don't know who is telling you that you shouldn't be angry, but whomever it is, you might want to reconsider listening to that person.

Anger is a feeling -- not a choice. Our feelings are natural responses to things that happen in our lives, and they give us valuable information about those things and/or about ourselves. For me, anger is almost always directing my atention toward something going on in my life, my presence or my vicinity that is not right/safe/comfortable/acceptable to me. My feeling angry means that I need to give some attention to whatever that "sometihng" is and do what I need to do to take care of myself around it.

Now, how I act when I'm angry is definitely a choice. Just because there is something going on that I need to address in order to take care of myself, that doesn't mean that I need to do so in an angry, mean, nasy, or confrontationl manner -- and, in fact, doing so very often, at best, ends up with my feeling bad about my own behavior and having to make an amend, or, at worst, only makes a difficult, problematic situation more difficult and problematic.

So, your anger seems to be telling you that it is not OK with you to be with someone who drinks too much and behaves poorly when doing so.......the tihng you need to work on is not not feeling your anger, but figuring out what you need to do to take care of yourself in light of the reality that your H is an A and chooses to drink and behave poorly.

freya

So, here it is - the weekend. College football on Saturday. Pro football on Sunday. Let the drinking begin.

I didn't cause it, can't cure it, can't control it.

Any advice on how to make it through?

What are your plans for you this weekend?

I dealt with it by simply not being present. The kids and I would take off and go camping, to the lake, go out of town, go shopping, visit friends, go to my parents...yes, it was unfair that we had to leave. But for sanity's sake it was all worth it.

We had to keep on living our life, and if he chose to drink rather than participate, that was his deal...not mine.

I believe this but it still feels like he gets to party on, and we're the ones having to make a change. It's odd.

I think you can and SHOULD be angry with him - definitely. I think however that expressing the anger to him is probably a no-win situation. It's not that we shouldn't express our anger - we just shouldn't expect anything good to come from it because we're not dealing with someone who is capable of reacting and responding as he should. I used to get my hopes up that I could "reason" with ABF somehow. He didn't listen and expressing my anger and having it ignored just made me MORE angry. lol

You will. I never thought things would get bad enough so that he would hit bottom or I'd hit my limit but it did. Unfortunately a lot of pain comes with hitting bottom - for him and you but sometimes you need the jolt of a particularly bad slash of pain to make you get up and walk out.

All the time. Give yourself some time. Little by little he's wearing out the good will you have for him. You need time to get to the point where it's really necessary for you to get out.

In the meantime set boundaries that are good for you. If you don't want to be around him or talk to him while he's drinking, retreat. Let him be lonely if he wants to drink. Little by little you'll gain independence from him.

Thanks, Redux.

I definitely feel like we've acknowledged the drinking issue before he has hit bottom and slightly before I'm at the end of my rope - but obviously, something was stirred in me enough to make us go to a counseler - and I have never been to counseling in all my life!

You would think catching it in the earlier stages would be a good thing - kind of like if you can catch cancer in the early stages your prospects are so much better - but I think the analogy may fail when it comes to alcoholism.

I don't want to talk about it anymore with him. It is the same age old argument/discussion that has been going on for years. Very, very tiring.

Ask him to watch his games and drink elsewhere. Or, you go do something YOU like to do. Does he have any money you can go shopping with?

For me, all my anger does is make other people think I'm crazy. I realize though that my anger stems from my frustrations. It is an immediate response to not getting what I want or need, or not getting what I think I deserve. Change your thinking, change your life.

I have been working on eliminating the concept of "fairness" in my adult relationships, just the same as I have eliminated the concept of "deserving" in my adult life. "Fairness" for me is for children's relationships; the taking of a toy, the not being invited to a birthday party. I now reserve fairness for financial and business relationships only.

Not sure if any of this is helpful.

I think this type of thinking/resentment kept me in an unsafe, torturous, unhappy, abusive relationship for a long time.

When I make my life exciting and wonderful, when I start looking within and facing my demons and flushing out what kind of person I want to be outside of my relationship with my AH, things change dramatically.

Yes, it's scary to be faced with myself.
Yes, it's easier and initially more comfortable to focus on my AH, his drinking, etc.

But as of today, when I look inside at my potential I get excited about change, about being the one that "has to make the change." I"m thrilled!

This week like you I have been in the angry phase. I got drawn into my ABF drama and confronted him about his drinking whilst he was drunk. Not the best idea that I have had! Nothing positive has come from me arguing with him over his drinking especially when he is drunk. I always end up on the couch while he is sleeping deeply in my bed! I always blame him but to be honest if I did not confront him I wouldn't get into these troubles and I would have serenity. However, sometimes it is just too tempting to say it as it is. It is a constant battle of wills.

I was hoping you'd reply...
 

I will be referring back to these words. Thanks so much for taking the time to write. You have a gift.