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DestinyM 03-07-2011 08:46 PM

Other Women
 
I've been with AH for 8 years. Only in the last year has other women been an issue. As far as I know he's only had one sexual affair, the others were just woman he got to cook, clean, drive him around and buy him stuff. He always tells me EVERYTHING about them, even what got on his nerves about them. A part of me wishes he didn't tell me such things.

We went thru a really ugly incident last August, which resulted in me getting a restraining order, charges being filed and I gave up my house to my eldest daughter & moved clear across town with my youngest 2 kids (18 & 14yo). (He'd been living with his uncles for the last 2 years since I put him out of the house I'd bought prior to marriage. Even though we agreed to keep trying at our marriage, I knew he was still drinking and I didn't want him around the kids with his outbursts; he's a violent drunk. His uncles had enough of his mess, with the police looking for him and all, so he was homeless for about 2 months.) Well he hit bottom in Nov and had all his friends and family calling me asking to help him. I eventually broke down and got him into a detox program. After 30 days he came out and in my ignorance I thought that since he wasn't drinking, everything would be better now so I let him move in with me and the kids in my new apt. Well it only took about 2 months before that bubble bust. When I first became suspicious he was drinking again, everything I thought i'd forgiven and gotten attacked my mind like a flood and I found myself angry, bitter and resentful.

About 3 weeks ago we got into an argument over him calling my stepson for his birthday. He felt it was none of my business, I thought otherwise. It got out of control and the police had to be called to remove him from the apt after he bleached half my clothes, turned over all the TVs and pretty much wrecked my new place. My 14yo son had to take him down in one of his mixed martial arts holds. The good thing that came out of this was I found Al-Anon, my son Alateen and I've started reading about the disease of alcoholism and how I'd been contributing to his addiction and how the disease had made me kinda insane too.

I finally spoke to my husband for the first time yesterday. I knew he was drunk and have learned enough to know I can't have a decent conversation with him like that, so I hung up and told him I'd talk in the AM when he was sober. Well, I spoke to him today and he's been staying with some woman. He claims he hasn't touched her but he needed somewhere to stay this week. He'd been staying with his brothers (who have addictions too -- one steals, so he's not comfortable there) and some other friends. His parents passed away years ago from medical issues from their addictions Coming back home is not an option as I'm in recovery, trying to deal with my new found anger issues and he needs to go into recovery, which today (One Day At a Time) he's more than willing to do. I know it's technically not my responsibility where he's living, he created this situation so he has to deal with the consequences, as I've had to deal with the consequences of marrying an alcoholic, but I have feelings about my husband staying with some woman

Thanks for letting me vent but I just would like some advice on handling this. I don't have a sponsor yet and I don't have any friends or family to take to about this.

Lithloren 03-08-2011 12:46 AM

(((DestinyM)))

I am sorry you are going through this. The Rollar Coaster Ride is horrible and very lonely.

In my own situation I wish I would have kept up my no contact. It is so easy to get caught up in their despair. Like when he told you he wasn't comfortable being around someone who steals. Those were the kind of things my ex-ABF would say to me. Those lines would hook me back in.

After I broke up with him in October, he continued to call me for two months even though I never picked up the phone. During my last no contact, I became lonely and picked up the phone when he called at midnight on New Years Eve. There were talks of how well he was doing and how much he loved me. I thought maybe things had changed. Then he just stopped calling me because he had met someone else.

Now that he is not constantly calling me and I have had some time to process our time together, I can see now that he was always looking for someone else. I think she was just the first girl to be interested in him too. He only used me as a back up plan.

I am not saying that your husband is doing that, I am only saying that you might want to have a time out for yourself to think.

You are doing the right thing by going to meetings. I should have stepped up my meetings, because then I would not have gotten lonely and picked up the phone that night. If I had not picked up that phone, I would be in a much better place than I am today.

Lithloren

Buffalo66 03-08-2011 07:35 AM

sorry, i double posted, somehow. My real post is below

Buffalo66 03-08-2011 07:38 AM

DestinyM,

I have been on your roller Coaster ride.
First off, my story, quickly:
My AH and I were together for 10 years off and on. His addiction took a turn for the worse after our son was born 6 years ago.
He was essentially homeless, so I thought. It took years for me to realize he had had several long term relationships with their own complications, scorned women, etc...

All the while he said he was always trying to get his life together to get back to us. HE said he wanted me all the while, and I foolishly believed him.
This went on for years. There are several places and people around town that I have to avoid, for my own sanity.

He had, in EVERY case, demonized me to these women, in order to conjure from them the sympathy needed to keep them enabling and supporting him.
None of what he said was true, but I came to never underestimate the naivete and depravity of some people. They wanted to believe him, they chose to put him up, to feed his addiction for their own sicknesses.

In October he went into treatment and he came home. I had rules about the women, I had rules about his treatment, his meetings. He was grateful for a minute ( month or so)...Then the behavior just crept back, no alcohol, just the same stuff without the booze or beer.
He works, now, and I still had to put him out. This time, he has an apartment, and swears he is not going to go the route of finding women to enable him. He still is intermittently claiming that he is going to work his program, and work his way back to where I can respect him and we can be together.

I cannot hang my hat on that.
The drama and difficulty doesnt just end with sobriety.

Just my Opinion, but, I regret letting him come home so soon. He had not had to earn anything back, and he was highly ungrateful for what he had. He also has a very teenage frame of mind, with impulsive actions,and instant gratification at the fore front. He cant seem to get his priorities straight. It will take time, if he ever gets it at all.

I just wanted to share my story.
It is none of your business if he is using some woman again, but keep your eyes wide open. It is good to know that he is staying with "some woman", who he "never touches"...

Mine had a thing with a young college girl right before treatment. She was dropping off and picking him up from the bar, she would drive him wherever, buy his food, his booze. He claimed they never "did" anything, that she was just a nice girl who wanted to help. I called bull. I could see she was in love with him, wanted more. Ultimately I contacted her,and she confirmed she had feelings for him, that she thought he and I were long over. Her world was shattered. She thought that helping him was going to lead to a grand love affair. Naive. But she was honest.

I think they had been sexual, but it doesnt matter, anyway. Its the sickness of using someone who is willing to be exploited that I dont want in my vicinity.
She still texted him after rehab, asking him to meet her at their bar to play pool. Guess what? He went.

Just one of the reasons he now lives away from me and from his child.

Lithloren 03-08-2011 09:09 AM


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
All the while he said he was always trying to get his life together to get back to us. HE said he wanted me all the while, and I foolishly believed him. This went on for years.

DestinyM, I am sorry I dont mean to hijack your thread, but wow Buffalo66, that is exactly what I heard for 4 1/2 years. This is exactly the messages he left on my voicemail when I wasn't picking up the phone. Word for Word.


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
He had, in EVERY case, demonized me to these women, in order to conjure from them the sympathy needed to keep them enabling and supporting him.

That is exactly what he told his family about me! When I spoke to his Mom, prior to him finding his new girlfriend, she thanked me for what I had done. She was so grateful because she had her son back, the one she remembered when he was 16. He demonized me so badly to everyone for being such a bitch because I was always throwing him out. Everyone believed him. He used them too.


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
He was grateful for a minute ( month or so)...Then the behavior just crept back, no alcohol, just the same stuff without the booze or beer.
He works, now, and I still had to put him out.

Yep, That is why I broke up with him in October. I had always thought without the drugs and alcohol, we would finally be happy, but he was still a jerk. I was still his last priority. I was so naive.


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
He still is intermittently claiming that he is going to work his program, and work his way back to where I can respect him and we can be together.

Of course my ex-ABF is not saying that today because he has someone new, but this is what he said to me too right after I broke up with in October. He even said it was like the Princess Bride movie. He was going to find his destiny and then we would be happy.


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
He had not had to earn anything back, and he was highly ungrateful for what he had.

Yep, I made the same mistake


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
He also has a very teenage frame of mind, with impulsive actions,and instant gratification at the fore front.

Yep, same guy, just with a different face and name.


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
She thought that helping him was going to lead to a grand love affair. Naive. But she was honest.

Yes, I made the same mistake as the young girl. A very wise somen from another forum posted this:

Things like that are so easy to get caught up in... I've found myself wanting to do too much for the men I know too, because that's what we'd do for a friend. Plus most girls think their relationships are going to be forever, so we start in with that married thinking about "for better or for worse."

What's hard to accept is, that type of help will either drive a man away... or make him think he's the prize. So all that giving never gets us a return on our investment in the way we thought it would.

Even now I often have the urge to do too much for a guy. Luckily I've learned to ignore the urge to give and instead give him my trust that he can solve his own problems."



Thank you so much for posting your story Buffalo66. I was stuck in thinking my relationship was so special, when in reality, it was quite common. Thank you again.

Lithloren

DestinyM 03-09-2011 09:40 PM


Originally Posted by Buffalo66 (Post 2890638)
DestinyM,



He had, in EVERY case, demonized me to these women, in order to conjure from them the sympathy needed to keep them enabling and supporting him.

You know what's crazy -- He doesn't do that. He's brutally honest to these women about his addiction, his abusive ways, and parts of his past, to the point they want to meet me and tells him how much he seems to love his wife. I've met a couple and their crazy selves who told me. His drinking buddies, family and friends all tell me how miserable he is when we're apart and that all he does is talk about me. I read somewhere in my CAL literature that some AHs do that, they put their wives on a pedestal and then get upset when they don't live up to the heights they've placed that at. When he's talking to me I'm everything but a child of God, can't get it together for nothing, but to everyone else I walk on water. It's really crazy! :a108:

passionfruit 03-10-2011 05:38 AM

It is not me that is the problem. IT IS HE.
 
My AH actually said that to me over and over.

How I was on a pedestal and was "different" from other women. He loved me. What more did I want? How come I didn't get that? He knows its true. I just need to accept what I really am to him and we will get along fine. If I could just get that through my head OTHER WOMEN WON'T MATTER.

He treated me like crap. Period.

I cried and felt less than and thought I wasn't good enough or just enough period for a long time.

One good thing my AH has taught me: I could be model perfect with big boobs and he would still stray.

It is not me that is the problem. IT IS HE.

Lately, when I think of how much I miss him, I make myself remember him standing next to some thing he has the hots for and his reactions to her. I instantly feel the pain again and am usually able to walk away without reaching out to him

Recently, he was messing with a girl at a restaurant. He denied it of course, but I could see by her actions and reactions when I made it a point to kiss him in front of her that there was more.

He tried to get me back and I refused citing the incident. His response was "Oh, I did ask about her. They said she works this area when she works. But that is all. They also told me she flirts with men alot, FOR MONEY."

All I could think was: He's lying. He's flat out lying. He is talking trash about her to me thinking this will make me feel better?

I actually felt sorry for her at that point.

I see many posts on here where women bemoan the alcohol, but few mention womanizing in association with it. Everyone knows alcohol loosens inhibitions. Yet we rarely mention it, unless it is flat out thrown in our faces.

My AH drank at home always, so I never feared him cheating for a long time. He even said to me that he will never drink away from me. He was true to his word until the last few months. Then he started drinking on the way home-driving. So he clearly has had trouble with being faithful while drinking in the past because he made it a point to make this clear to me.

He and his best friend weren't speaking when I met because his friend caught him in bed with his teenage niece...drunk of course. (I didn't know it at the time).



In the end, he began to do his womanizing in front of me. I imagined all this happening. He was just being friendly and I was excessively jealous. EVERYTIME.

I think if women embraced the truth about their AH and other women, it would be easier to walk away.

However, alot of us simply don't allow those thoughts to enter our minds. Denial.

I, at one point, became numb to his womanizing ways.

Never did I think I would see a day when I watched my husband hit on a woman and simply turned and walked away, not caring.

That is when I knew I was changed.

How did I ever get here I thought?

A day at a time I guess. Now I need to get out. A day at a time.

Summerpeach 03-10-2011 05:46 AM


Originally Posted by passionfruit (Post 2893077)
My AH actually said that to me over and over.

How I was on a pedestal and was "different" from other women. He loved me. What more did I want? How come I didn't get that? He knows its true. I just need to accept what I really am to him and we will get along fine. If I could just get that through my head OTHER WOMEN WON'T MATTER.

He treated me like crap. Period.

I cried and felt less than and thought I wasn't good enough or just enough period for a long time.

One good thing my AH has taught me: I could be model perfect with big boobs and he would still stray.

It is not me that is the problem. IT IS HE.

Lately, when I think of how much I miss him, I make myself remember him standing next to some thing he has the hots for and his reactions to her. I instantly feel the pain again and am usually able to walk away without reaching out to him

Recently, he was messing with a girl at a restaurant. He denied it of course, but I could see by her actions and reactions when I made it a point to kiss him in front of her that there was more.

He tried to get me back and I refused citing the incident. His response was "Oh, I did ask about her. They said she works this area when she works. But that is all. They also told me she flirts with men alot, FOR MONEY."

All I could think was: He's lying. He's flat out lying. He is talking trash about her to me thinking this will make me feel better?

I actually felt sorry for her at that point.

I see many posts on here where women bemoan the alcohol, but few mention womanizing in association with it. Everyone knows alcohol loosens inhibitions. Yet we rarely mention it, unless it is flat out thrown in our faces.

My AH drank at home always, so I never feared him cheating for a long time. He even said to me that he will never drink away from me. He was true to his word until the last few months. Then he started drinking on the way home-driving. So he clearly has had trouble with being faithful while drinking in the past because he made it a point to make this clear to me.

He and his best friend weren't speaking when I met because his friend caught him in bed with his teenage niece...drunk of course. (I didn't know it at the time).



In the end, he began to do his womanizing in front of me. I imagined all this happening. He was just being friendly and I was excessively jealous. EVERYTIME.

I think if women embraced the truth about their AH and other women, it would be easier to walk away.

However, alot of us simply don't allow those thoughts to enter our minds. Denial.

I, at one point, became numb to his womanizing ways.

Never did I think I would see a day when I watched my husband hit on a woman and simply turned and walked away, not caring.

That is when I knew I was changed.

How did I ever get here I thought?

A day at a time I guess. Now I need to get out. A day at a time.


This is called gaslighting, a serious form of abuse!

passionfruit 03-10-2011 09:17 AM

gaslighting?
 
I did not know that.

I just did some research on it. Without a doubt he did.

Ran across sociopath in the article. Rings remarkably familiar where he is concerned.

blwninthewind 03-10-2011 06:18 PM


Originally Posted by Lithloren (Post 2890321)
(((DestinyM)))

I am sorry you are going through this. The Rollar Coaster Ride is horrible and very lonely.

In my own situation I wish I would have kept up my no contact. It is so easy to get caught up in their despair. Like when he told you he wasn't comfortable being around someone who steals. Those were the kind of things my ex-ABF would say to me. Those lines would hook me back in.

After I broke up with him in October, he continued to call me for two months even though I never picked up the phone. During my last no contact, I became lonely and picked up the phone when he called at midnight on New Years Eve. There were talks of how well he was doing and how much he loved me. I thought maybe things had changed. Then he just stopped calling me because he had met someone else.

Now that he is not constantly calling me and I have had some time to process our time together, I can see now that he was always looking for someone else. I think she was just the first girl to be interested in him too. He only used me as a back up plan.

I am not saying that your husband is doing that, I am only saying that you might want to have a time out for yourself to think.

You are doing the right thing by going to meetings. I should have stepped up my meetings, because then I would not have gotten lonely and picked up the phone that night. If I had not picked up that phone, I would be in a much better place than I am today.

Lithloren

My dad was an A (surprise surprise huh?). He was married once before he married my mom, they divorced after 22 yrs (and many many affairs), and is currently on wife #5?

He was a retail store manager. He met my mom when she worked at the same store he worked at. EVERY OTHER wife has also worked for him, and he has never divorced/separated from one before beginning a second relationship.
The running joke is that he was forced to retire early because he used his store personnel as his own private dating pool.

My point is this. My dad will never find what he's looking for. He's going from woman to woman trying to find his missing piece...which in Alnon speak is really PEACE..not piece..
Sad. Yours is the same guy, different package.

DestinyM 03-10-2011 06:57 PM

Gaslighting... Wow, I learn more everyday. I just googled it and read about it and I'm fighting back tears. I realized since I found Al Anon 4 weeks ago and started reading about the disease of A that A had effected me my entire life. My maternal GF was an alcoholic and my mother who raised me (father abandoned me at 9 -- another dreadful long story) told me stories since I was a kid of how she got an ulcer young and of sleeping with her clothes on out of fear her father was going to come home and kill everybody. He also beat on my GM. My mother is really controlling and I've only in the last 2 years been able to break free of it. I'm 42 with 3 bio kids, 5 stepkids and the AH. I literally had to move out of the house I bought because I put her name on it, even though my credit was good enough to have the deed in my name alone. (I'd been diagnosed bipolar 4 yrs before and I was concerned if I got manic and did something crazy, that my kids would need a permanent home.) She lives in Florida but was influencing my eldest daughter (22yo) that I was still mentally ill and that my decision making was wrong. That my house rules were unrealistic considering my past & current relationships. It felt like everything I said was criticized and undermined so I gave up and left with my youngest two kids.

But I remember having conversations with her about my life and her telling me I wasn't remembering things right. It left me feeling really confused. When I met my AH 8 years ago I see how easy it was for him to get his hooks into me now. I was so open, I was dealing with the diagnoses of an anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, PTSD and agoraphobia, on heavy meds trying to regain my life after a nervous breakdown in 1997. That's when my mother came in with her codependency to take care of me and my kids. (She'd divorced her mentally ill husband the year before.)

I got myself together and med-free, got back in college and working in 2005. I married in 2004. My mother continued to rationalize to me why I should let her keep handling my finances because I was so "unstable" and "irresponsible". Even dealing with my kids, every time there's a problem its because of my breakdown and inability to function and poor judgment.

Then there's the AH who feels he's been my savior. It was him who singlehandedly helped me get off meds and back to work & school. Personally, I thought it was my tireless effort to stay in therapy, be it 3 or even 4 times a week to deal with the crap of my childhood and trauma of adolescence and young adulthood - which was riddled with DV and stalking; and my working with the Drs to find the right "medication cocktail" to manage my physical symptoms that got me back to a functional level, but don't let him hear me say that. He even takes credit for my kicking a marijuana habit because he said he didn't like it so I quit. As if...

But I've had countless discussions with him about incidents where he's telling me I'm remembering it wrong. That I started the fight. That I did things that didn't even sound like me. That the only reason I got hurt was because I was out of control and he was "trying to restrain me." Like when he put me dragged me into a cab after I ran from him in the street after being assaulted, trying to hide. He says I walked and got in the cab and then willingly walked into his house to be held captive until I ran out barefoot with no phone or money. Did I mention that was my birthday? Anyway...

It's like everyone I've chosen or in my mother's case, been around that was supposed to provide an encouraging and supportive love relationship has had issues. Its like everyones been manipulating me to their own sick minds pleasure. What a brain f***!!!

I read today that I should take care of myself like I've taken care of those I love and expected to take care of me. A model idea considering I have worked 50-60 hr weeks and still came home to cook and clean for an AH and kids regardless of my health but I won't even take the time to fix myself a sandwich for lunch.

Obviously, I have a lot of work to do.

blwninthewind 03-10-2011 07:08 PM

DestinyM - I think you just had an aha moment.

Very very few of us don't come from family who has been distorted by alcoholism/addiction. We go to what we know...that's part of being the child of an A.

I can't even blame my idiot RAH for where I am, I got here all on my own, well that and my A upbringing. It's sad. Makes me want to send my kids off to therapy now to keep them from ending up the same way.
I reccomend Alnon. I'm not a joiner. I don't make friends easily, probably because I don't trust very easily...but I finally went on Valentine's day and saw how life can be for me. It can be so much better than what it is now!!! Please give it a try. You will come out stronger for it!!


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