PohsFriend

So here is a question I am struggling with right now...

Obviously, this forum has a lot more folks on it who are suffering from the past or continuing struggle to live with an alcoholic. If a newbie comes along and says they are dating someone who is doing the things we all fear and recognize we all want to scream RUN!

But... what we know and what we do are different. For those kind souls who have been alternately guiding/smacking/hugging/encouraging and warning me ...you have eased my pain and given me more hope and that has translated into a big benefit to my AW... she's living with a calmer and saner and less reactive spouse.

So a frustration I have now is... I realize that I have to prepare myself for problems and build up my own health so that my happiness and serenity is no longer tied to the outcome of my spouse's battle with sobriety.

At the same time. I am in this, I am not going anywhere and I am not wired to simply prepare myself for defeat. Hope is essential, without hope nobody would be motivated to strive. Without effort, no significant challenge can be overcome. The doom and gloom frustrates me a little bit. I am not asking for hugs and lollipops... to the contrary I do mid dumps here so that if someone much like me but with more experience sees a codependent or otherwise misguided thought/action you can thwack me upside the head... so far I have only gotten my wittle feelings hurt and lashed out once but have taken it to heart and learned to take what helps and leave the rest pretty well. So whack me when I need it, God knows I am brilliant at solving complex problems way out in the distance and terrible at seeing the cliff twenty feet in front of me :-)

So knowing that I only control my side of the street and knowing that the odds are less than wonderful I have to balance pragmatism with optimism. I have to recognize the dangers lest they sneak up and bite my ass because I forgot about them or thought they were defeated. I have to accept that I can do everything right and still fail. I have some changes to make in myself and those will take time, self-awareness, humility and a good dose of honesty.

and....

I want to build a solid foundation for our marriage and the family that we will be when our son is born. I have come a long way in a short time. I know it is time to leave her battle to her and let go of it. I am struggling with that but I am DOING that despite the unnatural feeling I have when I see a problem and need to leave it for others to solve.

So our community is not populated with the people who fought this battle and won it for the most part for two reasons:
1. OK, I get it, there are fewer of them then there of us - those who are fighting it or fought and lost.
2. Twenty years from now if my wife recovers and we are doing well it is unlikely I will be devoting too much time to focusing on alcoholism recovery. I suspect many who have overcome it have learned not to dwell on it or wallow in the past.

So for those who are, or know, couples who are dealing with this and can still say they are happy, happily married and living in a sane, healthy home... How do you/they achieve that balance?

We learned last weekend that it is never wise to believe for a moment that alcoholism is not a threat TODAY. It is a threat today and every day yet we need to live today and build our marriage today or else her recovery and mine don't much matter. Marriages fail every day sans alcohol, it takes hard work and commitment.

Yup, rambling again... you are smart and you get my point... How do you find that balance every day? Oddly, I have found that panic and hysteria don't suit me and are not effective. Al-anon, this forum and getting out of my own way have helped me see that now ;-)

But each day brings a new question and new contradictions so I am trying to deal with them one at a time. Today's is the above :-)


Thanks all. So nice to just dump it all out on you and then go on to other tasks for a few hours without stewing, lol... Maybe I'll be able to pay that back when you encounter a new situation that I have battle scars from down the road...

ichabod

You let them prove to you that they are serious. A day or week doesn't cut it. Years. While they are in active alcoholism they lie about everything. You recognize that and learn to accept it for what it is. In the meantime, you make sure that your happiness isn't dependent on someone else.

After a long while of work and sobriety, the paranoia leaves and the alcoholism isn't a focus.

It seems to me that you are doing the bulk of the work when it really should be the other way around.

PohsFriend

Uhmmmmm... Ok but that is kinda contrary to everythign I have been learning.
1. I am not going to spend my time and energy figuring out whether she is serious, I am going to be serious about making myself healthy. For the sake of my own sanity I have to let her recovery be her business. I know she is working it and I am proud of her but I am trying to avoid judging it... it ain't my recovery.
2. It hasn't been a day or a week or a year. She has been sober since 12/26/11 and had one drink a week ago which she puked up. It scared us both half to death.
3. I can't just accept that she is lying about everything for years unless/until she lies. She's my wife, we live in the same house and if I treated her like that then alcoholism would not matter, we'd be miserable regardless.

OK, here I agree with you and that spurred my question: Balancing the paranoia ...which I would phrase as being aware of and realistic about the situation, with living happily and having a good marriage. I don't think that can be done if I assume that would COULD go wrong MUST go wrong. That would be like my wife assuming that I will have an affair some day and treating me like a cheater for several years until she is sure that I won't. IF she were drinking I would believe nothing, when she isn't she deserves the respect and consideration I would expect and demand.[/QUOTE]
Again I am confused... I am working on al-anon, reading about codependency, figuring out what my boundaries are, figuring out my other issues and in this post, asking how others have balanced being a happy person and good spouse with the concerns you mentioned. I am doing my work ( I think).

What am I missing here?

dandylion

Dear Poh, I can see that you use intellectualizaton as one of your major psychological defense mechanisms. LOL. I am not intending to be critical and using the ole noodle is not a bad thing. It's like--if we can get all the puzzle pieces to fit inside our brain---then we have some kind of control over that which pains us.

The problem is that life doesn't present itself to us like that. It comes in 24hr. increments. Sometimes we need our heart, our instincts, out intuition and our spirit to inform us and guide us.

I have tried to "overintellectualize" myself, at times, and it just ends up exhausting me and making me feel crazy. Some of my AA acquaintences call it "paralizin by analyzin".

I fear that you put too much pressure on yourself to get everything "fixed". That is a natural enough desire (in my opinion)---but it just doesn't work that way.

Poh, you are not superhuman. You need to practice gentleness with yourself. You are as valuable as every other living creature of God.

dandylion

Tuffgirl

Wow - I totally second dandylion above. Pohsfriend, you are way overthinking all of this. And I also mean that in the kindest of terms.

How about just taking it all one day at a time? How is it going today? If its going good, let it be good. Today. Tomorrow is not here yet, but when it does arrive, you'll deal with it then.

Florence

I third Dandylion. You don't have to *do* anything but mind yourself and let the future unfold. You can't rationalize, hope, or love your way out -- if that was possible, none of us would be here.

PohsFriend

Sigh.... don't you damned people know that figuring out and solving the most complex and unsolvable issues is what I have done for my whole life and what I am paid to do and lead others to do for a living? WTF! Yeesh, go tell a fish to stop swimming or something!

Uhm... Sigh... OK, I am going to shut it down and focus on something a tad more profitable and urgent for a while. Meanwhile if you folks could stop absolutely nailing my quirks dead center so effectively, I usually mask my dorkdom very effectively.

You mean there are problems I can't solve by sheer force of will, research, sweat and turning over the rock everyone else overlooked? Damnit!

Bahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.... sheepishly saying thanks. Will go tackle something a little more urgent and achievable for the rest of the evening.

Pretty good day. DAW spent it sober and spent most of the afternoon at a meeting and chatting with her sponsor while I've been getting caught up on the work I got behind on while obsessing over **** I can't control all week.

...I does dat.

Thanks guys.

Florence

Ha! Sounds familiar. The first few months I really dove in and tried to fix everything. Problem? Let's fix this! Clearly this is an emergency! I'm coming at it with sirens blaring! And why wasn't he and everyone else amenable to my fixing! Maybe I just have the wrong tools! What about this tool?! What about that tool?! ALL THE TOOLS.

BUT, it just doesn't work like that. Turns out I was just spinning my wheels and making myself nuts. That's where the surrender comes in. I can not control this, I can not cure this, and nothing I do causes or undoes it. I do my best to keep my resentments in check and just mind my own business, career, make sure my kids are happy and loved, and connect with my RAH in healthy ways. I've said it before recently, but he's been sober for about a year and is only now to a point where he's grounded, not stressed out, and getting out and doing things as a sober, healthy adult. I've had to figure out how to live my life around that and give him the space to succeed or fail on his own and not get in his way or lord over him while he figured it out. It hasn't always been pretty, but we're in a good spot today.

But I had to let go first and be open to the fact that this will succeed or it will fail, and I had to find a way to be fine either way AND fine in the meantime.

Titanic

I have to run Poh, and I have written only part of my response which I began at 6ish. I'll get back here but, in the meantime, am curious as to how you simply define "Hope."

womaninprogress

I can relate to wanting all the answers now. My ABF has not had a drink in 5 months. The first couple months I was the perfect codie, checking bank records, phone records, going thru his truck. But after that first couple months I knew I would be the end of us if I couldn't just let go. I knew I had become just as sick if not more sick then him. I couldn't stand me.

For me when I feel myself having a codie spell it helps me to tell him where my head is at. I was getting resentful, I FELT I couldn't say anything because he was "fragile". And I just continued to internalized everything just like when he drank. I am also more comfortable now expressing my feelings to him, because NOW their heard and met with patience.

I don't know if we'll be okay, and if I dwell on that it scares the **** out of me. But I do know that today is a blessing, today I have a wonderful, beautiful, loving hardworking man. He's made so much progress in his life these last few months. TODAY was a beautiful day, that's really all we got.

WishingWell

Love your honesty!

What I just posted on my own thread was - trying to understand addiction is trying to understand what is not understandable. It makes no sense. Nothing logical about it. That's where we all get so baffled and crazy. There simply is no 1+1=2. That's why it is a brain/mental illness. IMO.

So in the end - that's what we accept. All that we don't and no one understands. The mystery remains and the quest is how to live a healthy life.

Tuffgirl

Well said!

PohsFriend - I am a recovering control freak myself. I know how it feels to be powerless. I was a frenzied mess for a long time. Now two years of Al-Anon and SR, and anti-depressants, and working the 12 steps, I am at a place where it really is far more peaceful to accept that I am powerless and be ok with that. It allows room for good days to happen. For spontaneity. For trust.

Have faith. Hence the focus on a higher power in the programs of AA and Al-Anon. Have faith that everything will be ok. And let it go.

Takes work and practice, but I get better at it every day! ; )

CeciliaV

Poh, we sound so alike in our approach! Embrace the dorkdom! I am overly-analytical person and a problem-solver by nature, with a dash (okay, a HEAP) of OCD. It's what I do, and I do it well, dammit! And in even pairs, no less! (Yes, I really do things in even numbers...and eat my skittles in color pairs...and have to have even number of left/right steps on cracks/patterned floors/etc. And yes, I know I'm bonkers.)

Ahem, anywho. Now for the "le sigh" part. Unfortunately, that problem solving skill doesn't cross over into "fixing" life with an A. It's so hard to take off that fixer hat and realize that there's nothing you can do to fix it. I'm juuuuuust starting to realize that the only person I can fix is me. I can control my environment (by either not allowing the A in it, or taking myself out of the environment with the A).

When it comes to how to balance hope & caution? Best way I can try to describe how to best balance those is to liken it to looking both ways before crossing the street or passing through an intersection - you don't just walk into traffic & hope you don't get hit...keep those eyes open for danger, but don't freak out too much and scream at the cars as you cross. For those of us who have been in a car accident...if you ever approach that same location/intersection again afterwards, the flutters start...you get sweaty & your heart races. You look a bit more cautiously around you as you pass through. With time, those feelings tend to fade. To keep with the car accident theme going and to bring it back around to life with an A: my hope is that my OHMYGOD feelings and over-caution in approaching the car wreck of my marriage to an AH will also fade with time; if there are no more major wreckages, then perhaps that will happen...otherwise, I may have to declare it a total loss & change my route!

And I do agree with others that one-day-at-a-time approach works best. I try not to look back at yesterday or last week and try to see what happened today. I'll deal with tomorrow when it comes. Today, AH was sober. Today, I was a cranky beyotch because I'm trying to let go of my anger & frustration & resentment and not doing a fantastic job of it. Harumph. I'm prescribing myself a lazy evening with coffee & cookies.

WishingWell

So much peace when we try to stop fixing what we can't fix and will never fix. And only try to fix what we can - ourselves.

And if someone told me that 7 years ago I would've argued with them.

It's a spiritual journey -

seek

I have a couple of practical suggestions for you . . . being a head type myself (I am an INTJ and a Six on the Enneagram) . . . get some body work (massage, or whatever) . . .in my city, they have "Chinese Massage" - and it is $20 to $25 for an hour - add a ten buck tip . . .that WILL get you out of your head . . .get out in nature . . .do something physical (work out, go for a walk, whatever . . . go outside and stop thinking, if you can help it) . . .

Staying stuck in your head is not good for you (except during work hours and for some specific tasks at home) and is bound to drive your wife insane. I read that email she sent you and it sounds like she is not a head type . . .

Please take good care of yourself . . .eat well, take vitamins, adopt a spiritual practice, get some exercise, get massage . . .do whatever you can to stop the analysis and worry (have you tried EFT - check it out on YouTube. I like Brad Yates) . . .take each day as it comes . . . pray for strength and guidance . . .and try to find your own happiness. You have another child . . .spend time with her before it is too late (she's a teen, right?). . .

Hypatia

I've decided that living with mental illness and alcoholism in my family is like living with weapons of mass destruction. I have absolutely no control over them. But I'm not going to spend all my time out on the street waving banners and protesting and trying to change governments. Nor am I going to build a nuclear shelter somewhere and live the rest of my life deep underground in fear that one might go off.

We live in a world of nuclear weapons, conventional weapons, criminals and terrorists. Yet somehow we mostly manage to set aside or even ignore these various possibilities and get on with our daily lives.

The same way that I can live with the threat of being attacked, I think for the time being I can live with the threat of my husband drinking again. If I get attacked then I have a few defensive moves available to me. And if my husband starts drinking again then I have a few other defensive moves I can take.

Meanwhile, I'm going to enjoy life and remain optimistic. My husband has never yet been aggressive and he's gone into rehab voluntarily. He can walk away from rehab any time he chooses and yet he's staying. It is an "open" style rehab and he could easily walk to the next village and straight into a pub any evening and yet he is remaining sober and choosing not to drink. So far, so good.

How about focusing on "peace on earth"? That should keep you busy for a while, and a solution would be really awesome!

Meanwhile, I've narrowed my own focus down a bit. I'm making up my shopping list and having trouble figuring out what I'll have for dinner tomorrow. But I'm pretty certain I can solve this problem.

FireSprite

Recovering control freak here, checking in! lol

A few thoughts come to mind when reading your post.

I DO consider myself happy in my marriage now that RAH is a year into his sobriety & I've been able to relax a little. I've also gained immense amounts of knowledge which ALWAYS helps me because it generally brings some understanding as well. We have never been fully sane but we have a happy home and an 8-yr old daughter that is thriving on all fronts: socially, academically, emotionally. I'll take credit there - I've done the lion's share of keeping up a stable home when AH wasn't capable of doing so. I'll never get these years back again & it's impossible to make zero mistakes, but I can do my very best to make her my #1 priority so that she's not dealing with this damage later in life. Honestly, it's made me confront a lot of my own childhood issues with AF & I've found that as much healing as I've ever done, I still have a long way to go. Now I'm dealing more with fixing issues that are mine alone - not caused by my AH or our relationship, but triggered by it nonetheless.

My #1 piece of advice is communication. We each go through a rollercoaster of emotions in dealing with the fallout of living with & loving an alcoholic. As a daughter of an AF I knew this, as a wife to an AH I see it with much better clarity. We can't always know what or how or why we're feeling the things that we are, but if we express it in an honest & respectful way it allows everyone else in the household to 1.) not have to make assumptions about what the issue is.... 2.) not take it personally.... & 3.)gain a greater understanding of each other & support one another more effectively.

All 3 of us need to be able to feel safe enough with each other to share our thoughts & emotions. Sometimes it's as simple as being able to say "I'm not ready to share, but I realize my attitude is pi$$y & I just wanted you to know I realize it." For RAH, this is a big part of his personal therapy because suppressing it is part of the reason he developed a problem with alcohol to begin with. Watching us work through it teaches DD that nothing is perfect all the time, but there can still be balance during bad times. We're showing her that we can have heated discussions without it being a fight and that we can respect each other even when we don't necessarily agree.

That said, we also try to set aside time for straight-up FUN. During those times no one is ALLOWED to talk about anything heavy or serious unless there is a real crisis happening. We also are not allowed to carry our "first-world problems" into this block of time (awwww, your toast burned this morning? traffic was bad? couldn't find your favorite shirt?... aww, poor baby... get over it, find your gratitude for having food in your belly, a roof over your head & move on.) We try to find active things to do - biking, playing at the park, the beach, etc. We try to get away from the TV & anything electronic. (We can't always, but we try)

But the whole time I have to keep working on ME. That's my only defense against potential relapse, it's my only sanity when I feel out of control. I read too much, journal when I feel like it, practice yoga, exercise, & am starting to seek out new hobbies & REALLY getting in touch with my spiritual side. For ME, I am striving to feel balance emotionally, physically & spiritually. I had to learn to accept that he is solely responsible for his decisions. If he decides to relapse it literally has nothing to do with me, I can't stop it from happening. If he chooses to lie or sneak around that's his decision. I cannot control his actions, but I CAN control my reactions.

I also think it differs for each of us depending on our experiences with addiction & the addict in our life. My father was an addict, but was able to find sobriety & turn his life around. My husband & I had something like 13 insanely happy addiction-free years before the problems started. If we'd only been together a short time it might be easier to walk away; if he'd been an active alcoholic for years before seeking help or abusive, I'd have tons more damage to sift through & might decide it wasn't worth it. I might be unable to make that determination having lived it for so long. If I hadn't seen my father recover I might not think it was possible at all. IMO, this is what makes us all the same & yet so different when we go through this process of loving an addict.

m1k3

Just a simple reminder.

Hope clouds observation.

I found when I was hoping her recovery was working I tended to see it as working, whether of not it was.

Your friend,

Hypatia

Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. - Václav Havel

Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. - Albert Einstein

Cyranoak

...no matter how fast it happens.

But, I'll share with you this-- I started up with my wife in 1998. There are a lot of stories along the way, most of them related to me trying to control her and her drinking, her trying to control me and my controlling, and our daughter being the innocent victim of all of it.

The reason we are together today is that I've been active in Alanon since November of 2003, and that she's been active in AA, for the most part, since 2009. By active I mean two or more meetings a week and working the steps.

Please understand there's more to it, both in terms of what else we are doing for our recovery (counseling, etc.), and simply who we are. For some reason, while we are quick to let go of the rope these days, and while quick to throw down for a Battle Royal, we have not been quick to let go of each other (and we both have plenty of historical reasons to dump one another).

In fact, our daughter moved out two weeks agon and my wife and I realized yesterday that we had gone eight straight days without a fight of any kind, nor an alcoholic/codependant incident of any kind. This is uncharted territory!!!

I can say that I'm certain if I had ever hit her, or if either of us had ever cheated, it would have ended quickly and permanently. But, of all our sins, those are the two we didn't commit (if she cheated she got away with it).

I don't know if any of this will help at all.

Take care,

Cyranoak