CAE

Ok, so I posted a few times here some time back about my ADW. About a week after I posted she got pregnant and stopped drinking for the sake of the baby. She eventually lost the baby after about a week.

She was on and off as far as drinking, various drunk friends that she'd meet and hang out with didn't really care that they were adding to her problem when all they wanted to do when they called her was go out drinking.

After going through several drunken friends who were worse than her she started doing well without them. She'd usually go a week or two between binges.

Then she got a job. The job would stress her out with the psycho women at the office and she'd "have" to stop off at the bar after work to deal with it. Not wanting to turn every time she went out into a fight, I would meet her for a few and we'd go home.

She eventually quit the job after one of her co-workers screamed at her for several minutes straight. She's very sensitive, so anyone being mean to her will send her spiraling into anxiety.

So now she doesn't have a job and she's back to drinking. Last week she drank all week. I had to leave work early Thursday as she pulled the whole "I want a divorce" card. When she finally sobered up she told me that she was having an episode of crazy and would never want a divorce.

She was sober Sunday and yesterday but I called home a little bit ago and she was barely audible (I'm thinking she must've taken a Xanax with her beer).

I'm not looking forward to going home. I get to worry all night about when the shoe is going to drop.

ANEWAUGUST

Hi there..

I am an alcoholic wife.

What I hear in your post is all the BS reasons we use to justify our drunken lives. Work, stress, my feelings, what others had done to me...all, quite frankly BS. Everyone has things to deal with in life. Not everyone has to get drunk to deal with the issues.

We drink because we have a problem with alcohol, and she is most likely an alcoholic.

Until she either hits her bottom, or decides that she needs help, sadly, there isn't much you can do.

I would suggest not going out to drink with her, as that only enables and fuels her addiction. I would also suggest not leaving your job, as 1) you need your job, since she isn't working and 2) that only fuels the alcohol drama.You can read about Co-Dependency, and how that affects you, by living with an alcohol abuser/alcoholic. Al-Anon is also there for those that have loved ones in their lives with an alcohol problem.

Sadly..until she is willing to admit to a problem, or begins suffering the consequences of her actions., nothing will change.

You can change though, how you react to her and how you live with her.

I hope some of this helps..

Daisy30

I agree with ANEWAUGUST.

Nothing Changes If Nothing Changes.

Have you educated yourself about the disease? 2 books that were helpful for me in the beginning are Marriage on the Rocks and Getting Them Sober

Alanon has been a great place for me to recieve support and learn from others experience.

Something I heard at a meeting once:

God help me to accept the people I cannot change
The courage to change the person I can
and the Wisdom to know it's me

(it's a little spin on the serenity prayer)

Take some time to take care of you today. ((((((hugs)))))

naive

hi cae-

i agree with anewaugust...don't drink with her.

i used to drink with mine. my rational was if i didn't meet him in a pub, i wouldn't see much of him.

what happened was that whenever i brought up his drinking, he would point to mine! of course, there is a big difference between my couple of drinks and his many, many drinks.

the other thing that happened was that things are often volatile with a drinker. because i had had a couple of drinks, i wasn't as on the ball as i should have been. this permitted my situation to drag on far longer than it should have and also put me in danger a few times.

i quit drinking at all with mine. that's when my sight got clear.

now that i'm away from him, i don't drink at all. i've witnessed it ruining too many lives and i don't want to play with fire.

naive

honoryourself

I've struggled with the drinking with the alcoholic issue. I never knew mine was alcoholic, I guess I didn't realize. I picked up bad habits! I drank every night at HOME with the A. He would clearly drink twice what I would, but I guess drinking for me helped me to ignore the problems in the relationship. We might laugh or giggle over something and go to bed. Most of the time we would argue and go to bed angry, but at least I wouldn't care, because I was angry too. If I wasn't drinking, I'd internalize and be really hurt and upset. Drinking made me angry and that was better than sad...

I always tried to get 'us' to cut back, maybe go a few nights a week without. Never worked... I was beginning to feel like I needed the alcohol too, as it was becoming a really regular thing for me. I realized I had the problem when I called in to be accepted as a 'healthy adult' for a research study at a hospital, and they turned me down. They asked how many days in the past month I've consumed alcohol. It was probably 30. I said 25. They asked how much, I said 1-2 drinks. It was probably more like 2-4. Even with my minimizing, I was not 'healthy'.

Then my AH decided he had a problem, wanted to cut back to 2 drinks a night. In doing so he also took 2 or 3 days without any alcohol. I did this with him, and then continued to take days without it. It was hard! I liked the taste of the drinks and was thinking about them.. but after a week it wasn't hard, but he went back to drinking more, having excuses to be away with his friends, going out partying all night, well it's friday i get to drink more, etc etc.

I kept with my plan. I don't drink every night. I drink maybe one instead of 3 on other nights. Some nights I do have a drink, but now it's more social for me. And sometimes I realize it's because I have a HELLISH existence at the moment.

Part of the problem is I was always waiting for HIM to change or make a decision to cut back. If he didn't, I didn't. Why should I? If he was going to enjoy drinking so would I.. Bad choice.

However on the flip side.. should I never get to enjoy a beer or a glass of wine in my own home just because he has a drinking problem? He's still drinking, he's not in recovery. He's not asking me for my support in keeping alcohol out of the house. He's not telling me not to drink. If I decide to not ever have any drinks, because I'm afraid then that he'll drink more or that he'll point the finger at me, then I'm working my life around him again, and not around me. It's tricky, and I agree with naive that in any dangerous or volatile situation it's good to have your wits about you and if that means abstaining, then that's important. But one beer or a glass of wine or two if that's my perogative.. I kind of think that's me focusing on myself.

CAE

Ya, I went for about 6 months of not drinking with her. I'm fine with out it, I went to Iraq for a year and it got me out of the habit to the point where I didn't feel like I had to have a drink while watching the game or just hanging out with friends.

I'd be fine with going my whole life without drinking, I've seen the bad things it can do to people and I don't like it.

I got home last night and her brain had sunk to the size of a pea. I could hardly understand her, she was lying down and half awake/half asleep. When she finally came out of it (and continued drinking) she was on and off for the rest of the night, finally getting so stupid that she picked up the computer mouse, holding it up to her ear seriously thinking it was the phone...and the phone hadn't even rung. I spent yet another night sleeping alone as she passed out on the couch.

I found out this morning that she'd bought a bottle of Jager...which screws her up bad. That combined with Xanax and beer just turned her into a mental case. She told me I could just throw it all in the canal...so I happily complied (taking it in the truck to throw it away).

ANEWAUGUST

For us alkies, the combination of booze and pills is a double whammy.

If she is drinking, the Xanax isn't working, they counter each other.

This is a progressive disease...it, sadly does not get better, or go into remission on its own.

What are you doing for yourself right now?

Freedom1990

Actually, that's a potentially deadly combination. They are both depressants (Xanax is a benzodiazapine). I know of someone where I live who died while drinking and taking benzos. He basically passed out and his respiratory sytem became so depressed from the combination of the two that he quit breathing. He was at home alone.

Daisy30

My world used to revolve around my A too. What he was/wasn't doing. I worried about how he would be when he got home, sober/drunk. How much would he drink. How would he behave. Could I trust him to help with the kids.

Then I started thinking differently. I started to see my role in it all. I stopped taking on his problems as my own. I stopped having the same fight over and over. I accepted that I was powerless over his drinking. I started to see what I could do for myself. How I could help myself. I realized this disease had changed me too and I did not like who I had become. I turned it over to God. I set boundaries. I read about alcoholism. I go to meetings. I post here.
All of these things have helped me greatly!
And I can honestly say I like who I am today, It has been a lot of hard work but all worth it. I will never be perfect. I slip. But then I get back up. Progress, not perfection