Head v. Heart - Need support for the head
 

Funny how the months of April and May have been bad months for our marriage for years. Some of you may have the same experience.

Last May, AH spent a month at an inpatient facility. After that he was able to get 5 months sober, then back to same old drinking and eventually drinking and driving. Car crash, but no injury to him or anyone else.

May before that, I kicked him out for a couple of months. That's when I started reading here, and got help from all of you.
After he came home, he was sober for awhile, then back to it.

A few weeks ago, my head had had enough, and I pushed for a separation. He has been living with his mother since then.

The burning question is how long to stay separated this time?
My head says wait until he has at least a year of sobriety before considering allowing him to come back to live here.

My heart, on the other hand, aches. My heart says let him back yesterday. I feel guilt and pain and like I am the monster for breaking up the family. When he is sober, he is a wonderful, loving husband and father. The kids miss their father. They rarely, if ever, saw the ugliness. They are 6 and 9.

I wish it could be a "no contact" separation, but that isn't an option.

I appreciate all that SR provides. Thank you in advance for any words of wisdom that you can provide to my head. I know that with time, my heart will get peace.
:gaah

Its easy to put a time limit on things in advance, and a year is often the milestone many folks recommend for sobriety to really have an effect on someone's thinking. But I would recommend you just take it all one day at a time and see what he does. You may be ready in a month, or 6 months, or 3 years down the road...who knows?!

If you take it one day at a time, it takes the pressure off feeling like you have to make a decision at a certain point in time. Just wait and see - more will be revealed.

Hugs to you tonight. I know this is very hard, and my heart goes out to you.
~T

Dear Godismyrock,
I live with an alcoholic and if I had to do it over again, I would have nothing to do with them. He is the sole provider (at the brink of loosing his job) and I blame myself for not protecting myself by not trying to find a job earlier. I spent 5 years hoping that he would quit. What I learned is it is so easy to fall back into alcoholism. I have endured so much emotional/verbal abuse that I wouldn't wish this life on any person.

I remember when I started writing here about 3-4 years ago. People told me to leave. I tried to explain it was hard - I was older - blah blah blah. Well guess what. I am EVEN older, he has gotten worse, and all I have to show are more battle wounds. I think I had to prove to myself that this was a hopeless case. I now know it is. Am looking for a job - something well meaning friends and counselors told me to do months ago.

I know you won't take my advice. I "heard" everyone else, but I made excuses why not - including he was wonderful when he doesn't drink - so I don't want to disrupt my life and go into financial hardship and be wrong. I can tell you that if I had won the lottery or came into a lot of money I would leave in a flash.

I mean, when your AH asks me why I would love someone like him, like I love losers. (My personal problem was not wanting to give up a comfortable home and struggle financially - and at the same time what my husband carry on living well in his house which I spend a lot of time renovating).

Save yourself. Don't take him back. He will drag you down to the gutter, abuse your, make your life miserable. Even if he is a millionaire, it gets to the point where because of the abuse it is not worth it. (where I am now).

Best to you....

I agree with Tuffgirl - play it by ear. There is no need to decide now. Just really, really think it through before you get back together for the sake of your kids.

I humbly disagree with Soltraveler. If she has kids, it is even more reason not to take him back. My husband's father was an alcoholic. My husband's kids are a mess. If you don't need him for financial reasons, you have no reason to subject your children to that. They will only grow up damaged.

After all I have been through -- I would could not see how I could advise someone to go back to an AH especially if they are able to get by financially without him. He clearly hasn't beaten the love out of you yet - but he will soon enough. You don't want to wait until you are old - 20 years later - to realize you shouldn't have stayed. He's a repeat offender. You sound just like me always hoping....all I was doing was putting my eggs in a broken basket. :-((

I believe that it is wrong to play with children's emotions and their sense of attachment. They may want him in the home, but he is their wonderful daddy. YOU have to be the adult for the rest of you.

Because if he slips, when he slips, you don't want to have to evict him again and put the kids through the yo-yo of alcoholic recovery, which appears very iffy to me from all the reading I do here. (My own children's father has never sought recovery, which in a strange way, lets me off the hook emotionally).

Let him experience his highs and lows (because there are some, you just aren't seeing them with him out of the house) AWAY from you and the kids. Your job is their stability and it sounds like they are stable now (even if they miss him). Why rock the boat?

I hear you. This is a tough place to be and you love this man. I completey get that. But, you are not the monster breaking up the family. He is.

The whole one day at a time thing does not seem to give you much space for your own codependent recovery, because it leaves you evaluating and reacting to him. And it doesn't make it clear to him that transformative change is required.

Right now he knows that all he has to do is hold on long enough for you to cave. Which you have shown that you are likely to do. What he needs to know is that you are gone. Really gone. Maybe there is some chance you'd take back some version of him that has built a track record of sobriety and growth in the future. But it takes people time to grow, if they ever do. That's probably why everyone talks about giving it one to two years.

I say follow your head. It was your heart that got you here.

As to your children. (I have two, also, and am in your boat with an alcoholic husband). Maybe they haven't really seen the ugly yet. But, unless this man truly embraces recovery, they will. It is just a matter of time. And, of course, there is the risk that he never does. I say this is not a matter of trying to set up some deadline. This is a matter of refusing to back down - for your health and happiness and that of your children - until and unless this man presents you with hard, cold, long-term proof of reform.

I am typing this for me just as much as for you. I never want to end up back where I have been.

If you read Sol's post again, she suggested thinking twice BEFORE "getting back together for the sake of the kids." IOW, she agrees with you. She was responding to the OP's feeling bad about "breaking up the family".