Talking to the A? Your experience
 

My A is my husbands mom. Last night he told me he was ready to talk to her about her drinking. I just listened to what he had to say and tried not to 'anticipate' future problems. Right now the relatioship is distant at best. He would like more connection and involvement. However...sober. I'll support him. I have a daughter and he deceided the next visit he will meet with her alone while my daughter and I are not there, and I agree.

It's been my experience and understanding that talking with an A rarely changes things, they just hide it better. Or keep on keeping on. She has never sought recovery, she works, keeps up appearances so it seems like she 'doesn't have a problem' (functional alcoholic). What has been other experience when talking to an A about their drinking? I am in Alanon.

I always got a lot of anger and blame shifting. My ex would also go on the attack and say something like, "Oh, are we talking about everyone's flaws now? Well you're fat, ugly, a b-, etc." if I brought up his drinking.

Yes, I expect blame shifting or just agreement to avoid anything. I expect I'll be blamed. I'm the easy target.

My A dad and AH were exactly the same. Either lash out with verbal insults or just say yes to shut me up.

When an A is that deep in denial, it is pointless.

Sorry you have this in your life. Nice job on attending Al-anon. It helped me enormously.

My RAH while relapsing would not get angry at all when I brought the subject up. He would very quickly state that 10 years sober was proof that he was not an alcoholic. He would sometimes mention hosts of documentation that he had found on the internet supporting his theory without being able to produce it (I'll get it for you tomorrow which eventually turned into "If I have to produce it for you then you don't trust me")

Of course he also denied he was drinking multiple times even once while holding a vodka in his hand.

Good luck.

Yes, this... "well what about the things that YOU have done?!" he would say.
And then launch into a tirade about all the things I have done to drive him to drink... or if I happened to be on his good side that day then he would go into all the ways his parents wronged him, my parents, his past employers, pretty much anyone and anything but him.

It's just a hopeless endeavour.

Well, all he can do is try but he must prepare himself because if she is not ready for recovery (and it sounds like she is not) then the conversation might turn sour.

I wish him all the luck in the world!

I think if no one has ever spoken to her about it that it is a good idea!

She should know he is concerned, and he has a right, and I believe it is healthy for him to express his concern to her - once, and only once...and while she is sober. I hope the best for his talk.

It’s been my experience that there is never a good time to speak with an alcoholic about their drinking. One misconception we often have is, waiting until they have not consumed alcohol thinking we are talking to a sober human being when in fact we are still very much dealing with an alcohol soaked brain.

I think understanding the objective of “the talk” should be the first part of any plan. What is your husband trying to accomplish with “the talk”? What boundaries is your husband ready to set?

I think without us having a real plan along with real expectations and boundaries ready to be put into place we are setting ourselves up for disappointment.

Maybe it was the wrong thing to do, but when I left my XAH, I never told him it was because of his drinking. I never talked to him about it, I never complained or asked him to stop.

He begged me for a reason why I was leaving and I just said that I didn't want to live my life this way anymore, I didn't love him anymore, and I wanted to move on with my life. He KNEW why I was leaving. I wanted him to admit it, at least to himself.

Your husband could make the effort, but it probably won't come to anything. Unless he wants to explain the consequences of her continued drinking - boundaries that may include no contact with the family unless/until she's sober and working a program - then that's on the table and she can do what she wants with the info.

I'm trusting my husband to decide what to say. I'd like to talk before hand about what boundaries we have to set etc. I've set my own. He wants to have time with her and him and my daughter.

I've said no. That's my boundary

You've said no to what? To your daughter spending time with her? I don't see where you can legitimately say HE can't spend time with her. And I don't know that you necessarily are entitled to complete veto power over his allowing your daughter to have contact with her. It sounds as if he is acutely aware of the problems, and as long as she isn't drunk or left alone with your daughter unsupervised, it doesn't seem to me that she would be endangered.

We can't tell the difference between drunk grandma vs. sober grandma. If he could tell and historically hadn't allowed things to happen (holding her drunk, etc) I say a big no. I have no problem with him being alone with her. I'm not okay with him taking our daughter into situations that historically we can't tell what's going on. She boundary steps if we say no, and her husband enables.

Play time at a public playground or something as long as one of us is there is ok, but I think it's only fair to tell her why we aren't ok with one on one or overnight time.

I'm very sad to hear that :( I hope the talk goes well, I can say from experience that most of the time talking to an alcoholic achieves nothing. They are either in denial, complete agreement and follow nothing through, they lie some more or it's just like talking to a brick wall and very frustrating. Stop with the words and implement the action, 6 years of my nagging/GP and Psychologist talking to my husband didn't work but he got a shock when I gave him his ultimatum and told him he has to go to rehab or he has to move out.

I just so wish words would work with them as it's my way of communication but really, I've tried so many different techniques; the only thing that did work was strict boundaries with a time-scale of being followed through consistently.

Good luck :)

Ali this has to be the healthiest way to get away from an A I've ever seen posted!