WantsOut

So I am a recovering A. I left my ex because he was an A and unwilling to really deal with it. Now I'm with someone new - and he's an alcoholic too. So I've been dealing with this a bit in my life (haha)

I was on my usual routine yesterday, just like I'd been with my ex AH. I was angry at ABF for drinking and passing out two days in a row. I was ignoring him, stalking around the house, so POed I couldn't even look at him. I was thinking of threats - "I'm going to leave you, you effing so-and-so!" Anger. Self-righteous indignation.

I locked the bathroom door and took a long hot shower. And then it hit me. I didn't have to be angry. I didn't have to threaten him. I had to talk to him and tell him clearly how I felt. So I came out, sat down, and told him. I told him he drinks too much, he's hurting himself, I talked about the symptoms of something bad happening inside him - he's messing up his stomach.

He surprised me and said I wasn't telling him anything he didn't think about every single day and he had been wondering why I'd been tolerating his behavior.

This was very meaningful to me because I asked my exAH at the end of our relationship if his exwife had left him over drinking and he said, "No, I didn't drink like this with her. She would have never put up with it."

I don't know about your A, but two of mine wondered what the hell was wrong with me that I put up with them!

Good question.

And I am not anywhere as superior as I've painted myself in my own mind all these years. I'm as sick as they are. I sure don't help them by tolerating it. In fact, I hurt them deeply by enabling. And even they think I'm crazy for doing it.

What a world!

Freedom1990

So just what are you getting out of leaving one alcoholic relationship and now being in another?

I too am a recovering alcoholic. I thought I could handle being involved with an alcoholic partner who had relapsed.

That cost me four years of being clean/sober. *Poof*

It was not worth it.

He couldn't have cared less.

He hooked up with another active alcoholic/addict, married her, and they are still together and drinking/drugging 19 years later.

Today I protect my sobriety like the precious seed that it is.

TakingCharge999

I wish you all the best. The partner I have now is not an addict but I still got codie issues to deal with. Yesterday at night I was feeling great, listening to a therapy CD and it dawned on me I can grow as much as I want to, it is inner work and my ability to enjoy the big and the smallest things is in my own hands, no one else's. I too look back now with *a little* more sanity and think "WTF was I thinking?" and wondered if I was not the drunk one for ignoring red flags, and for going out with the same person just in different bodies.

Now I am back to therapy and it has been great help. Here I learn to see the actions of others not the words and that applies to me as well. I say I want to grow but what do my actions say? Am I repeating my patterns or am I choosing my own destiny consciously?

CAPTAINZING2000

It's a lot different sitting in the Al Anon room for me.
I'm looking at it from the outside now.

Any chance of getting your hubby to a meeting?

Freedom1990

It's not her job to get him to a meeting, and it's her boyfriend, not her hubby.

WantsOut

Good question. I relapsed in dec 2008 after a long sobriety. He had nothing to do with it - I was a year away from meeting him. So when I met him I was drinking too and it was all ok. We even had a lot of fun for a while being drunken together. But it fades, as we all know. Alcohol is sweet to you just long enough to suck you in.

Interesting - I was "fine" (in a limited sense) drinking when I was single but as we started spending time together my drinking became an issue, so I stopped again. I had someone to help me see that my behavior was not ok - it was hurting me and others just as it had done years before. Now it's been 50 days - just about long enough for /his/ drinking to become an issue for me.

I know enough now that I can't /get/ him to do anything including attending meetings. I have zero interest in even trying. I share my knowledge with him, like sharing that this is a progressive disease that we have. I am able to recognize health symptoms that others might not recognize and share that with him. I tell him he has my support in /his/ efforts to change.

He IMed this morning from work and said he was ready to make a change - he's tired of being sick all the time. Yep, sick and tired of being sick and tired. I'm going to give him some time - a month or so - to see if he's really ready to work on himself. I am not willing to be strung along for months with "I'm trying" as an excuse. Heard it before. There will be action or I'll move on.

WantsOut

Yeah he's at the bar tonight. *sigh* I'm looking at apartments.

Jadmack25

Sorry my dear, but we both know what the odds were that his words of the morning, wouldn't last till this evening, so disappointed, sad...yes. Surprised?...no.

Good luck in your search for a perfect apartment, and for later on, when he comes home.

God bless

Freedom1990

I repeated the same pattern over and over for 13 long miserable years after I first got clean/sober.

You could line 10 guys up against the wall, and I'd pick the sickest one every time.

It wasn't until my ex-fiance (after the fact I realized he was a dry drunk) walked out on me and my youngest daughter that I finally hit my codependent bottom. My bank account was cleaned out, my heart was broken, and for the first time, I saw the pain my daughter was going through because of my actions. It was no longer all about me.

I made a commitment to myself to start addressing my codependency issues, and to stay out of relationships, no matter how lonely or uncomfortable I got.

It was one of the best decisions I've ever made.

Today my life is full. I'm finally completing not one, but two college degrees. I have a wonderful support group where I live, and a sponsor who's worth his weight in gold.

I will no longer sell myself short for the sake of a warm body beside me at night, or someone to help pay the bills.

I'm worthy of someone who is healthy emotionally and spiritually.

I sincerely hope you get to that place in your life too.

barb dwyer

Epiphany-s are kind of like adventures.

They're never fun when they're happening.
that's how you know you're having one.

It's in the re-telling that the signifigance becomes so clear.

Congratulations!

You have learned - and you are making your choices form a place of knowledge.
Rather than from a place of fear or need or anger.

Something has to be done...
and you'e diong it.

For that part - I'm proud of you.
But it just has to be sad
until it isn't any more.

*hug*

you're not alone.

Spiritual Seeker

You don't have to go around being "pissed" at your partner...for what? You signed up for this.
Get yourself well...It takes a lot of work to be introspective and create change in our lives.
Only when you are well will you be attracted to a healthy partner.

Take the time to fly solo.
It is not so much about picking the perfect partner as it is about being the right partner.
That's my 2 cents.