Near beer drinking: trigger for me
 

My AH is now drinking and keeping near beer in the fridge. He got his DUI 7 weeks ago and had sworn off drinking forever. He was a dry drunk for 15 years of our marriage and he drank NA beer off and on during that time. What concerns me is that he said that when he started drinking the real stuff again it was when he would mix it with NA beer while I was traveling.

Anyway, the NA stuff still smells like the real stuff and it's a huge trigger for me. I could really use some words of encouragement so that I don't go ballistic on him and make things worse because I know nothing I say will make a difference anyway.

I'm sorry to say that I don't have much in the way of advice for you. I guess when I am triggered by something I tend to just walk away for a bit, breathe and come back to it later.

My dad used to have a fridge in the garage too- maybe he could store it somewhere else?

Near beer? I always thought that was for middle school kids so they could "pretend" to drink real beer.

Here's how an alcoholic thinks...heck if I'm gonna' drink this stuff...may as well drink the real deal...especially if he hangs out with people drinking real beers. It's just a matter of time. Does he go to meetings? I lived with a dry drunk for a year...a total rage-aholic! It was self abuse to stay any longer. I got out with my baby. But NA beer....slippery slope. But what can you do? Nothing. You can only keep the focus on you. Put some money away and start imagining a life without him. Start being more independent. Just little things...like driving out of town, joining a hobby group, getting your car fixed without him, meeting other people in the same boat. Cut your hair the way you like it. Embrace and enjoy you!

Windblown, well I really hope I don't have to live life without him but I know I couldn't handle another year like the one we just had. No, he's not going to meetings. He quit and is abstaining of his own good faith and I assume he's just being accountable to himself. I don't see him drinking the real stuff any time soon, not with the DUI conviction pending and then afterwards, it's going to be h*ll for him. We live in AZ, one of the toughest states on DUI offenders. He'll most likely get actual jail time, he'll lose his license for a short period of time, and he'll have to get an ignition interlock and probably have to keep that on for a year minimum.

As for my hair, it's funny that you mention it. I had my stylist cut bangs into my hair and about 10 people made comments about how they liked it. He said nothing.

And, we have quite a bit of money put away along with a decent amount of equity in our home and I have about 4-5 months of living expenses in my name only at this point. He stopped hanging out with his drinking buddies but he did most of his drinking alone at home, in his closet, or late at night. He wasn't a very social drinker.

6 near beers=1 beer- so he is drinking It was not allowed in AA or my X's outpatient treatment center-they have alcohol in them

Nothing to do but to smile, bite your tongue and watch this play out. He's got some further adventures to endure before being willing to do much of anything to effectively help himself and calling him on it will make him defensive, upset your home and not change a thing. You don't want to deliver him a gift wrapped excuse to shift the blame onto you when he starts up again.

Low alcohol beer should allow him to coast for up to another 6 months, figure some dope smoking in there at some point if he's so inclined.

At some point this year he'll want to talk about how good he's been for so long and how he is going to be very careful this time around and do so much better that you'll be amazed at how responsibly he'll drink and that he's now made a few test runs and they've turned out incredibly well so you should take the news about this very calmly and be happy for him.

It's coming from a universe you can't understand, and it's really futile to try.

When he says those things all you can really do is nod. The next phase of your mutual adventures has already then begun and there is never a turning back of the clock.

This is what I figured and it's why I've been so disappointed that he didn't try AA. Oh well, we'll see how the next few months go. He has another court date later in the month but I don't know what that is for, though. He had told me that beer lost it's taste to him once he got the DUI. Well, if that's the case then why drink the NA stuff? Doesn't it also taste like beer? DUH.

Oh, and I just found out that he hasn't been taking his anti-depressant either for about 5 days now. He had said that the paxil made his alcohol cravings worse but he hasn't said anything about how he feels about that or about quitting the drug itself. I just noticed that his pill bottle had the same amount since last week(there were only a few left hence the reason I was able to tell).