meggem

question - you keep saying you didn't want to drink, it doesn't bother you that its in the house and her removing it doesn't make a difference because you can go to the liquor store so I am just wondering - why did you then?

and what kind of drink are we talking - did you have one drink or a swig? were you out at the bar? was this just a very small slip?

JustADumbGuy

I drank a fair amount given that I have no tolerance after quitting. Probably about a quarter of a 750ml bottle of booze.

I had taken a few vacation days (use them or lose them). I was to go back to work yesterday, but as she was leaving for work, she commented on how the house was such a mess. I called my work, asked for another day, and cleaned the whole place top to bottom, so she would be surprised when she got home.

Proud, I rewarded myself with a sip. Idiocy. It turned into a few large glasses.

Then my work called with an issue. I went in and fixed it for them, still drunk. They could tell I had drank, and I was upfront about it, but since they had called me in, did not raise a fuss about it.

I don't know why I did it. There is no good reason. My brain was screaming, "No! Don't do it!" And yet I did. Maybe just pure hubris: "I can handle this".

The whole thing is so maddening.

NYCDoglvr

If you haven't been going to AA, I suggest starting. Get a sponsor and do 90 meetings in 90 days. I never could have gotten sober 23 years ago without the support of other drunks who told me it's only today I don't drink. I was very surprised to learn I don't have to drink, it's a choice I make each day. Good luck.

BoxinRotz

When you've had enough of the booze, hurting your family, the guilt, lies, time lost to being drunk, feeling like crap the next day, repairing the mess you've created, the broken trust... You'll stop. But not until you are so sick of it.

meggem

Well.. Good luck..

I can't imagine berating yourself the way you are is going to help matters. and actions speak louder than words. With my A all I heard after a while was blah blah blah blah.

Florence

Are you in this forum looking to be absolved?

Go to a meeting. Talk to other alcoholics. We are not stand-ins for your wife.

FireSprite

I think your share here illustrates a really important lesson about powerlessness on all sides of this issue. (But.... I'm not quite sure what you are looking for from F&F members as you don't seem to have any specific question?)

After TWO YEARS, something as insignificant as a day off of work cleaning your home triggered you to drink in ways even YOU don't understand. (although, if you're being honest with yourself you have to acknowledge it has a lot to do with your Ego/Pride, right?)

If you want to grow from this, recommit to sobriety/recovery & take an honest look at whatever preceded this lapse - I will bet anything it didn't just "happen" but was actually the last action in a long line of breakdowns in your mental processes/recovery work.

Kboys

JustADumbGuy, are you my husband? I'm pretty sure not... but wow, amazing number of similarities. Anyway, I hope things work out for you. Good luck.

"And just so you know, idiots come on all sides of this alcoholism problem. I was never an alcoholic, but I am a recovering idiot. A codependent one."
I like this. I am going to use this... except I am not to the recovering part yet, I'm just an idiot. Thanks for that.

Shellcrusher

Relapse is a very scarey thing for the friends and family group and I'm not sure what the motivation is here.

Bill managed to work his sobriety with other alcoholics. Not his wife.

I'll wish you good luck.

legna

I relapsed after seven years without a drink. Best thing that ever happened to me - really. I originally stopped for a number of reasons that were completely unsustainable. After that relapse, I found a sustainable reason to stay sober and a way into genuine recovery instead of simple abstinence.

Good luck.

Hopeworks

THIS ^.... abstinence is not authentic recovery.

wanttobehealthy

Anyone is welcome here. You're not in the wrong section at all. Please stay. You sound like you care a lot about your family and want to make things right for you and for them and this forum seems to me to be a fine place for you.

redatlanta

JDG - Sorry I don't buy that your relapse happened like this. Relapses begin long before the drink goes in the mouth. That day you were not "just struck with the maddening urge to drink"…….I guarantee that urge has been swirling around in your head for awhile. This is how relapses happen - The AV starts doing its talking, the RA loses focus on recovery. Ultimately the AV wins IF the RA doesn't immediately acknowledge something isn't right and handle it.

I applaud you for your honestly with your wife. That takes balls. I hope you recognize that you need to do something about this NOW. You haven't mentioned your recovery process but whatever it was - get back to it NOW.

"I can handle this" is classic alcoholic thinking. Its significant. If you were in recovery that thought process would have not crossed your brain you know you can't "handle it" your slip has already caused you problems. Drunk at work? Great….how did you get to work btw? Did you drive?

I'm not meaning to pound the sh!t out of you I believe you are deeply ashamed and saddened. I just know where this is headed if you don't do something about it and would hate to see you lose it after 2 years sober.

SeriousKarma

My concern, to be honest, is that you're laying the groundwork down for future planned slips.

I'll be totally forthcoming here. Contrition may be good thing, but when in clever hands it can be a powerful and negative tool. It's possible there may be a bit of that here with you. Some parts of your post remind me of my STBXAH in our early days. He was always very apologetic after slips, but could never remember the triggers. Apologizing for him became an art form. He somehow was able to make me feel like I was the center of the world. I would completely forget the quivering bowl of fear-jelly that I had been only minutes earlier. All I wanted to do was bask in the glow of his apology-love. Sick. Sick for me. Sick for him.

What's important here for you to understand, is that my husband never got better, he got worse. He spends all of his time perfecting manipulation techniques, and none on recovery. His disease has progressed to a sad place.

Apologies are nice, forgiveness is fantastic, but the only thing that means anything here is your butt in a chair in a meeting room. Regularly, repeatedly, working a program of recovery.