boomerlady

I suggested marriage counseling since my AH and I are not getting along, and me being the codependent thought I owed him that. We went to our first session this evening and I feel a little let down. He came and acted interested but some of his statements to the counselor were just pure quack, quack. He obviously doesn't get it, and just as I thought thinks everything is great. I'm encouraged but also not hopeful after this initial visit. IMHO, he seems to be playing a manipulation game to please me by going.

What experiences have some of you had with marriage counseling with an active AH who is in total denial?

LaTeeDa

I like to stay away from always, never, ever kind of statements, because there are inevitably exceptions to every rule.

Having said that, I just don't see how therapy can be productive for anyone who is not genuinely interested in bettering themselves. That goes for couples therapy and individual therapy both.

A therapist, to me, is like a guide. They help you go where you need to go, and see what you need to see. They don't fix things for you, they guide you to finding ways to fix things for yourself.

L

DMC

I had 3 different therapists over about 8 years. (in 3 different cities. I didn't change because I didn't click - I moved a lot.)

The first was very supportive, identified that his behaviors were the biggest problem, yet I hadn't really realized that the alcohol was the biggest problem. I knew it was A problem, and it became more and more apparent, but...

The second I started seeing because he'd had his first big alcoholic-related crisis. By now, I knew he was an alcoholic, but I wasn't in a position (nor was I ready emotionally) to leave. I think it still helped me, and I did learn some coping tools. And again, it was nice to know (we did both individual and couple sessions) that I wasn't the crazy one.

The third I started seeing because I knew that it was the beginning of the END. She specialized in addictions and wanted to see him individually as she picked up on my intention for "marriage" counseling right away. I saw her individually through his rehabs, through deciding to leave, and through my "gosh, am I ever going to find someone in this small town, or do I even need someone?" phase.

I thought they were all helpful for me to learn and grow, but it was the individual visits that helped the most. Your mileage may vary. And my therapists all saw through his quacking, except perhaps the first, but again, I had as many individual visits as couple visits.

Good luck. Try going by yourself and see if that changes anything.
Take what you like, and leave the rest.
D

jamaicamecrazy

I have such mixed feelings about counseling. My husband suggested it. I was thrilled. But I always felt terrible after going. We were brutally honest with each other. And it was difficult for me to accept the truth. I think I wanted the counselor to fix us and give us "tips" on how we could get along better and improve our relationship. Instead I think he eased us into accepting the inevitable. We talked about his drinking but the counselor was very non confrontational and thought that only my husband could claim himself to be an alcoholic. I was encouraged to speak more in terms of how his drinking interfered in our relationship and how he had more of a relationship with alcohol than with me. I had a difficult time letting go. My husband was obviously not willing to put his time and energy into the relationship or stop drinking and I think it gave him permission to move further away from me. My husband and I have been separated for a year now. I still see my therapist about once every 2 months just to "check in" and make sure that I am making progress and to get feedback on certain things I have difficulty with. My husband feels he does not need to see anyone at this point in his life...other than his bar tender. He is still drinking and living a life I cannot understand. But I am learning to let him choose his own life and focus on me. I pray that he will choose sobriety someday and then eventually return to the people who love him but I am also mindful of the fact that he may never get to that point.
This is just my experience. Yours may be totally different.

sandrawg

I tried counseling with my exabf. It didn't help at all. Reason being, my exabf is all about deflection, deflection, deflection. I don't see how an alcoholic can ever be productive in counseling, because a) they have an inability to look honestly at themselves and their own issues, and b) the disease keeps them in denial about SO many things.

Babyblue

Lots of marriage and family therapists find working with someone who is actively using/drinking to be futile. Many do but are aware of the limits of any impact therapy can make on someone under the influence.

Not saying you should give up, do whatever feels right for you. You can discuss this with your therapist as well.

NewChapter

I dragged my XAH to marriage counseling after he said, "there is no one else, but the dream of someone else." (For you movie buffs, Meg Ryan says that in You've Got Mail). Ugh. It was 5 months of hell, paying $95/hour to hear his ever-expanding list of grievances against me. Denied that alcohol was a barrier in our marriage. Said I could never understand him because it's his heritage (he's Irish and I'm German). Said he drinks because I'm nothing to come home to...and on and on.

Turned out he was having an affair with a secretary in our office the entire time. My suspicion that he was going so he could say he went was true. Bad news for him was that the affair was discovered, he and she were fired and I'm still working there.

Long way to go to say that there was no way for us to get anywhere in marriage counseling while he was denying that alcohol was a problem. It seems it would be difficult enough, without the crazy-making also going on. And the counselor and I treated him with kid gloves to avoid giving him a reason to stop, which he clearly wanted to do. So no tough talk from her on the alcohol issue, although that was coming and I think he knew it.

End of the story is that we've been divorced 8 months and I"ve never been more relaxed, happy, peaceful. And it gets better every day. Wishing you the best.

sandrawg

In one of our few therapy sessions, my exabf actually said, "If Sandra doesn't like my drinking, she can walk."

Why didn't I just get up, and calmly walk out at that moment????

Linkmeister

I went through couples therapy and throughout the entire series of sessions, EXABF always managed to put the focus solely on me and my "issues".

Whenever the therapist or me brought up his drinking, he got so defensive - he would never look either of us in the eye or give a straight answer. During our second to last session, the therapist called him on this behaviour and when once again, he blameshifted all of it back on me, I walked out of the session.

I had several sessions alone with her after that joint one and that's when a lot of things came out, things that I had buried from my past, things that I am learning to deal with and grow.

As for EXABF-those sessions, plus others since then have all proved to be fruitless as he would only go to one, complain thay weren't helping and went right back to drinking.

ValJester

I can't imagine any there are many marriage councillors who are a match for the awsome baffling deception of an active alcoholic.

Heck, I've seen my wife can pull the wool over the eyes of even the best addiction councillers at her last treatment centre.

I expect the value comes for marriage councilling once both of you are in recovery.

IMHO.

concernednurse

Hi Boomer, I ended couples therapy with my ABF last week and I told ABF he could drink again if he chose to. I initially thought that couples therapy would help us to protect our relationship when we eliminated the alcohol because I knew he would be forced to look at his own issues once his crutch was removed. But it took me 2 months of therapy to realize that he was merely abstaining, not going out with friends, not having to become face to face with his issues because he was avoiding all his potential "triggers" or learning situations, and not progressing in "recovery" in any way.

The honest and open communication in a safe environment was a benefit for us, I think... and we still really have never, and don't "fight" or have a lot of animosity as a rule. And we are both very honest people.. my ABF wasn't "deceptive" in any way in therapy. But I learned that there's a difference between just being honest, and being honest with yourself. Being honest with myself about the reality of the situation is why my recovery is speeding on. HIS lack of honesty with himself about his alcohol problem is what is preventing his acceptance and keeping him in denial. Additionally, I seeked out a MALE couples therapist, WITH a subspecialty in substance abuse/addiction. I'm not a male, nor someone with an alcohol addiction. (Seems a bit about HIM in hindsight, doesn't it?) Just this moment realized a bit more about me, thanks Boomer!

So, did it help? Well, it helped me to much faster realize and accept that my ABF is in denial. Did it help my ABF to look inside himself enough to realize that has a drinking problem? Nope. One last thing, I do think my ABF is very introspective and very smart as well. I think that he probably did gain SOME insight into himself as a result of being in therapy- if only that I am not the only person who sees the alcoholism the way I do... the therapist was honest enough with him, in other words, to call him out when he wasn't "looking inside." He felt ganged up on at times... but thats because that is the reality of the situation that he didn't want to face. It seems to me that the alcoholic believes that EVERYONE ELSE is the one with the problem! Blame-shifting, I think they call it. But if someone doesn't want to face things about themselves, they won't- and they shouldn't be forced... it can really be very damaging to the psyche in the long run.

Anyways, just my ES&H! I'm sure you will make the right decision for you! Good luck!

Thumper

An active alcoholic can not put the marriage first. They will always follow the voice of their addiction and they will not see issues in the marriage the same way because they will protect a world view that protects the addiction. There is no other way in active addiction.

The counselor we saw, that specialized in addiction/family/marriage therapy, refused to do marriage counseling if my xah was not actively pursuing some kind of recovery. To be fair, I had already filed for divorce at that point so to try and bring that marriage back to life while he was still active was pointless. She also said that she felt our marriage was very savable. His addiction and our co dependency brought tons of stuff to the table but the major issue was communication, which is apparently very fixable. The 'other' things required putting our marriage first, honesty, following through on what we said, and being responsible to each other, ourselves, and our family - which is not possible for an alcoholic so there you have it. He didn't pursue a plan for recovery, we didn't do the counseling, and I followed through on the divorce.

GettingBy

My STBXAH and I tried marriage counseling early on. We went once. It did nothing for us because the counselor, as many have pointed out, can't and won't label or dissect the drinking issue. The only thing he said to AH was, "You're drinking and driving has got to stop. That's illegal and dangerous." Duh. I just paid $150 for that?!?! And then the rest of the time was spent tearing me a new a$$hole - AH taking my inventory and the therapist then telling me to stop acting like his mother.

Ironically, last week AH recommended MC as a last ditch effort to thwart off the divorce proceedings. I told him that I had no interest in marriage counseling if he wasn't going to get honest about the drinking and him grabbing me by my throat. He's adamant that those things have nothing to do with our marriage problems - he firmly believes we have issues because of ME. I know I'm not perfect, but I will NOT going into a counseling session with AH and air my dirty laundry and then get beat up over it... all while he sits in his chair not accepting responsibility for his crap.

We're at a stalemate and I fail to see what a counselor can do to fix that. Like Thumper, we've had so many people tell us the marriage is savable... but I think it's ONLY savable if you have two willing and present participants. When there is a side affair going on (be it another man, woman, drug, alcohol), you have more than two in the mix and it's, IMHO, impossible to balance that and get it to a healthy place.

My AH has chosen to keep his hand firmly wrapped around the bottle, and so I continue moving forward with the divorce.

Take what you like and leave the rest.
Shannon

nodaybut2day

I also did marriage couple with XAH, twice, to no avail. The first time, it was for him to discuss my supposed infidelity (acting gigs), and he basically walked out because he decided I was lying to the counsellor.

The second time took place when we were very close to separating. DD was 12 months old and XAH took issue with the fact that I wanted to continue nursing her till she weaned naturally. He felt that my lack of sexual interest in him was due to DD nursing. He found all sorts of research to back his claim up that nursing past 12 months was detrimental to a child's development. Of course, he wanted nothing to do with helping me wean DD; he was of the opinion that *I* had decided to nurse her and it was MY problem to wean her. I went into the therapy sessions hoping that the therapist would be my ally in making XAH realize that his drinking was a huge problem. We had 1 session together and then each had an individual session. During my individual session, the counsellor really took pity on me and told me straight up that XAH had a drinking problem...yet when we came back for another session together, he never brought it up. Instead, he focused on how *I* needed to make sacrifices (i.e. wean my baby) in order to preserve the integrity of my marriage. Furthermore, XAH was able to snow the therapist about his delusions/fabrications, saying that he "didn't quite know why he made all that stuff up".

It was horribly disappointing experience. I felt left out to dry by the therapist who clearly had NO IDEA how to deal with an abusive alcoholic. He ended our sessions (paid for by my work's EAP) by saying that we should choose a culture which we both admired and emulate their child rearing practices. Before I knew it, I was researching how Norwegian breastfeeding practices, because that's the culture XAH chose...It was ridiculous. I ended up deciding that no friggin therapist would tell ME when to wean my baby girl and that if I wanted something to change with XAH, I'd need to do it myself.

Soon after, I found SR....

wanttobehealthy

Marriage counseling was futile when AH and I tried it. And we tried it many times during our marriage. I of course was unaware he was an alcoholic for a long time and went along with the belief that if I just changed x, y, and z about myself things would improve. And AH convinced the MC's of that too. And no matter what I changed nothing improved. Each hoop I jumped through led me to 3 more that would suddenly appear.

Finally the last one we saw said that it was not a good idea for us to do MC until each of us was getting individual T. I already was at that time. AH was not. AH's drinking was increasing and I was finding lots of empty bottles at this point in time and beginning to connect the dots. I didn't grow up with or know anything about alcoholism so I had no idea what "signs" to look for.

Once I realized, and AH acknowledged he was an alcoholic (his words were "drink too much") I talked to my T about this and MC and he said that it is never a good idea to attempt MC when there is active addiction- no ifs ands or buts.

AH has tried valiantly to convince me otherwise for the past year. Obviously MC was good for him bc it was a validating environment for him to blame me for all that was wrong. He doesn't have that anymore and wants it back. Not going to happen.

I would STRONGLY recommend against MC -- I can't see that it is going to do any good. For as long as addiction is there, THAT is his focus- not communication, problem solving and the other things that are a part of healthy relationships.

coffeedrinker

hey, boomer, sorry you are having a hard time.

i think that the therapy can be effective, but you will have to leave your expectations at the door.

if your ah is getting ready to confront The Problem, perhaps this will help point to what he needs to do. my feeling is that it's a long-shot, and that should not be the sole reason, although it may have been the impetus, of a continuing relationship with a therapist.

my xah and i went, twice, for short periods. i believe that he wanted a better marriage, and he went through some of the motions, but nothing really stuck, things just got talked about but not resolved....

i don't throw stones at him, nor blame where he was at for the marriage counseling to not be more effective. he wasn't game-playing, he just wasn't where i needed him to be.

Thumper

In reading this thread I wanted to add two more things from my story/experience.

1) Like coffeedrinker - I think my xah was for real in the counselors office. He was legitimately trying to save the marriage but active addiction had become a deal breaker for me and while he had reached the point of admitting out loud that he was an alcoholic he was definitely not ready to quit drinking or see/admit how drinking was impacting his life, his choices, and our marriage. He was very much still protecting his addiction. He could talk about fixing the things 'I had a problem with' but he could not follow through. I guess I'm sharing that to emphasize that not alcoholics are abusive, intentionally deceptive, narcissistic a$$holes but in the end they all follow the addiction first and foremost.

2) I believe 110% that any marriage where alcohol is a factor (whether the label alcoholism is used or not) absolutely requires a therapist that specializes in addiction. This counselor got it. She got him and she got me. It made all the difference. I believe that for both marriage counseling and individual counseling.

lillamy

I think I would like to ditto LTD.
Maybe there are As who see the light in marital counseling.
I just know that mine, who is a master manipulator, had everyone in his rehab facility treat him like he **** gold, they were so impressed with his recovery efforts. I think I was the only one who could tell it was just an act. He figured out what behavior was expected of him and then he showed that, so that people around him would realize what an insane person this wife was who wouldn't take him back.

When he spoke about going to counseling together, the underlying message was: "You were such an awful wife I had to drink to get through the day. So you need to come back to me so you can be a better wife this time around." I heard that loud and clear. And my counselor was saying that this is pretty common in active alcoholics (mine was supposedly in recovery), that they try to use counseling to enroll the counselor/therapist on their side (and manipulative As are very good at this) and get the counselor's help to steamroll the other party (me) into believing that the A's version of reality is true.

As always, take what you can use.

Shellcrusher

I agree with this.
My therapist is an addiction specialist and she wouldn't do couples therapy for the reason LaTeeDa suggested. I just go for my own reasons which helps break the codie cycle.

GettingBy

I second this... I think my husband suggested MC because he genuinely wanted to save the marriage. I know he doesn't want this to end, but at the same time, he's not ready to let go of the alcohol either. He's not really ready to do the hard work of looking inside him to see why he's so angry and understand why he does the things he does.

My AH is a good person. A loving, kind, and hard working person. I love him, alot. But together, we are a toxic combination. We each have issues that need to be worked on and "fixed".


Two broken parts will never make a healthy whole. That I know for certain now.