BAW81

Based on some of my previous posts, some of you may already know that I experience daily struggles with my STBXAH. Everything is a fight, everything is a struggle, everything is my fault, and when I don't do what he wants, I'm bullied....My therapist classifies his treatment to me as abuse.

I've been reflecting on our relationship which lasted 8 years (4 dating, 4 married) and I saw glimmers of behavior but early on was so eager to please, I rarely poked the bear so the emotional abuse was not so clear...

I understand that alcoholism is a progressive disease and sometimes I feel like it has taken over his whole being like a body snatcher but then I wonder maybe he was like this all the time, I just never challenged him so strongly to see this ugly side.

I am struggling to make sense of how someone can be so nasty, so spiteful, so angry, so combative after a year....I think I'm more scared of the fact that he will stay this way indefinitely and I'm going to be forced to co-parent with a monster.

I've read so many other posts from people about how they wish their person would go back to the person they were before....part of me wonders were they every really that good to begin with? Deep down I knew something was wrong with my ex but I thought I could "help" him and that is my mistake to own and I'll be paying for that mistake for a long time to come.

I apologize for my depressing post, just processing some thoughts and always appreciate others feedback.

dejavuwife

How is that for a clear answer? I really think it depends on how longstanding the alcoholism has been perhaps. I look back on my first marriage, and I did feel like the first several years without the alcohol may not have been as good as I remembered it (bc compared to the years with him drinking, the clean years probably looked even better than they really were). At the same time, the alcohol REALLY changed his personality, and the longer he was drinking, the more permanent those changes seemed and the more and more I started to believe his character changed. I remember one anniversary we had thinking, "I would never even consider going on a date with you if I met you now."

My current husband sober is a COMPLETELY different person than he is when he is not. But maybe that is because for 90% of our marriage, he has been sober. If he kept drinking the way my first husband did, I am sure his behavior/personality would start to make more permanent changes as the habits become more engrained and it starts to seem more normal to everyone around. His not-sober behavior NEVER was accepted by anyone around him because it was so out-of-character, but when it becomes more in-character or typical, for someone maybe people begin to tolerate more and more.

Sasha1972

I was with ex for 25 years. Many of those years were good (if they had all been like the last five, I wouldn't have stayed around). He was a heavy drinker, but it did not eradicate his many positive qualities. In hindsight, of course, I can see lots of red and yellow flags, but for most of the time we were together, it was a good relationship.

In the last years, I think the combination of life stressors (having a kid, career not going as expected, typical middle-age stuff) and the acceleration of drinking changed him. I remember googling "brain tumor signs personality" because I couldn't believe how profound the change was, as his rage, self-pity and dishonesty grew and grew, and as I found myself increasingly targeted for displays of rage and accusation. I understand now that as I became more aware of (and more worried about) his alcohol consumption, I became more of an obstacle to him continuing to drink at will, which drove a lot of the anger.

But he was not a bad person all along. One of the hardest things to come to terms with is that the thoughtful, empathic, intelligent and kind person I married is gone, even though his body is still walking around (stumbling over the furniture and passing out some of the time, but you know what I mean).

I believe that there has been organic neurological damage from alcoholism which is most evident in its effects on cognition and memory - maybe the early signs of this damage were present years ago?

But the marriage was not a mistake, and the good years were good years - he wasn't always what he is now.

hearthealth

IME, they are functional until they are not and it's so individualized. Their goodness doesn't disappear. As I recover, my tolerance to the negative aspect of alcohol diminishes.

Nata1980

Looking back, it has always been about XAH and he has always been prone (and still is) to rages, complaining, depressive demeanor and overall “world against me” depressive attitude

There were some good words and nice moments , but I have never felt safe with him. Always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Funny thing is that he presents completely different picture to the outside world ~ very Likeable guy who must socialize with cashiers and waiters

BAW81

I learned the term "House Devil, Street Angel" on this site today...seems applicable to what you describe.

shauna71

I'm right up there with everyone else! It depends. I have known my XABF for over 20 years now. He was a heavy drinker in his teens and twenties and then slipped deeper and deeper into alcoholism during his thirties and forties. He isn't the person that I first met - and like DejavuWife mentioned - I would NEVER go on a first date with him today. The man I loved is gone and has pretty much given up hope when it comes to his own life. I think that having very few coping skills to deal with life's regular challenges makes the anger, the frustration and manipulation that much worse. I most definetely believe (and still hope) in the good, but it is just buried so deep.

tomsteve

"..part of me wonders were they every really that good to begin with?"
as stated, it varies.
for me, i was at one time, but as alcoholism progressed i got worse.
at one time my fiance said to me:,"youre the most loving man i know, but when you drink you can be evil."
which progressed to
"youre the most loving man i know when youre sober, but when youre drunk youre evil."
which progressed to
"when youre drunk youre nothing but evil and its happening a lot when youre not drinking."

LLLisa

That. Is. It.

It was the rage, self-pity and dishonesty, which he blamed totally on me, that made me see what he was.

maia1234

The red flags were there when he refused to go to counseling with his parents when he was 17 years old and we had just started dating. I was to young to understand anything. Fast forward..... I sought out our first marriage counselor 17 years into the relationship. I remember sitting in the office and telling him "some" of what axh would do/say. He looked at axh and said "can't you just be nice to her"??

I put up with another 17 years of abuse, his under the breath comments, the dirty face he made at me, the verbal and mental abuse, the affair, the sleeping in my car.... ugh, what the hell was I thinking?? I was just so sick, that I can't even fathom what I lived through. It is almost surreal when I think about it.

I am grateful everyday that I have overcome my previous life and truly believe that anyone else can too. With very hard work anyone can be the person "they" were, being a codie or as an addict. I am sending strength your way. Hugs!!

BAW81

Thank you to everyone for your comments!

honeypig

This is also how I feel about XAH. When I look back, he DID tell me, in so many words, very early on, that he was an A and that he had been in AA for a number of years but felt that he was past that now. I didn't know what a huge red flag this should have been--but that's not HIS fault.

He was kind, caring, loving, and competent--exactly the White Knight I thought could fix my life. We spent all our time together, seldom w/anyone else (another red flag of an unhealthy relationship, but I just thought "soul mate!"). We did work on my old farmhouse. We got dogs. We planted a huge garden. I thought this was heaven and it would last forever. I would sometimes cry, wondering how I would ever live once he was gone (he was older than me and I assumed he'd die first).

And then he was caught in a lie. And much later, in another. And not so much later, in another. Things so gradually unravelled over the years--I wanted to believe the best, and so I never really acknowledged what various things meant, brushed them under the rug. Nevertheless, for a long, long time I felt things weren't right. He'd go to a friend's to play cards on alternate weeks, and he'd always be extra affectionate when he got back. I knew they drank at cards, thought nothing of it, but had this niggling feeling, "he's nicer when he's been drinking" and felt wrong for feeling that.

It ended up badly, no doubt. But even after the divorce, he helped me with one huge project and any number of smaller ones around here, sometimes at my request and sometimes out of the blue. I came back from a weekend visiting my mom and found he'd come over and mowed the (very large) lawn for me in my absence. I don't think these are controlling or "sucking back in" actions, since he has never once given any indication that he wants to come back. I do think he feels remorse, at least at times. I also think, though, that his perception of what happened over all those years is very, very far removed from mine and he does believe he's a victim to at least some extent.

In the last year or so, I've also come to the realization that he very likely has at least some component of adult ADD in his alcoholism. However, he is equally as unwilling to address this possibility as he is to address the drinking, so the only difference it makes is in how I view him, how I view certain incidents in the past, and how I communicate w/him now.

So to sum things up, yes, in my case, I strongly feel that he really did have good in him, and still does, although it's harder to see now. I also feel strongly that his life is set on its track and I can't even imagine what it would take for him to turn things around. We talk on the phone and we help each other out in small ways (I made a pot of chili the other day and gave him a jar of it, he returned the yoga DVDs that he isn't using so that I can use them). But the marriage part, the husband and wife part, is gone, and again, I cannot imagine what it would take for me to ever feel that towards him again, or likely for him to feel it for me again.

It still makes me pretty sad on some occasions, but acceptance grows day by day. We spent 21 years together, 19 of them married, and that's more than half of my adult life. The work now is in weeding out the bad habits, the fears, the things that held me back, and cultivating the good things that I learned and experienced, and then taking those good parts forward w/me into whatever comes next...

hopeful4

I think I was very much the same. I did not poke the bear, so there were some good times. Had I actually had a backbone and done something about what was going on, I doubt those good times would have been very good.

However, I am glad my kids have some good memories to hold onto. I played a huge part in making that happen, and I don't regret that. I don't even know if this can make sense to anyone but me, but that's ok.

Big hugs to all.

theuncertainty

Sending hugs, BAW, if OK. I think a huge factor in your question about were they ever good depends so much on the last part of your statement that I've quoted. The answer I would give now for AXH (who was emotionally abusive, among other forms of abuse) would, I think, be similar to that you would give, but wouldn't necessarily be the same given by those who's qualifiers weren't also abusive.

If you had asked me right after I left AXH the first couple times if he was ever actually good, I would have said yes. I'd have pointed to so many little things that he did that were good, normal... and ignored a good number of little red flags that marked his treatment of me - or any of his past (or future) significant others - as abusive.

Answering that same question after I've had time to reflect on the relationship and to learn about and heal from the abuse, I'd say no. No, he was never *that* good. Never as good as I built him up to be in my mind and heart. _Our relationship_ was never as good as I built it up to be in my mind, because underlying it all was the foundation he was building to control me.

However, as an alternative to that post: I have an uncle who is an RA. I don't know what it was like for my cousins living in the same house as him, but I can look back now as an adult and I can kind of tell when things started getting bad. I know when he realized he had to to stop. He's not the same now as he was when we were all younger, but I'm not either. There are a lot of years between then and now. He's not the same, but he was as good an uncle then as he is now.

OpheliaKatz

I think my A desperately wanted to be a good person. He made it a project, to try to be good. However, the stronger his addiction took hold of him, the worse his behavior became. It wasn't so much the relapses that bothered me as the lying and manipulation and the refusing to try rehab even once. I think he believed in goodness. He believed in sobriety otherwise he would not have had a relationship with me, but his fatal flaw was hubris. He thought he had control. As he lost control of his addiction, he denial of his own weaknesses meant he tried to control the people around him, like me. I think addiction changes a person.

Think of it this way. Are you the same person you were before you met your A? Can you ever rewind time and go back to who you were? I wish I could, but it's not possible. Your A is not the same person they were before they become addicts. It is something that will always have happened to them. They will never be the same. They will struggle. So I guess it doesn't matter if they ever were good... it's just if they are good now.

I have a lot of sorrow for who my A used to be... once upon a time.

ukiah77

My RAH of 15 years seemed pretty "good" when we first met. He was free and full of life, we had similar personalities, so I thought. We were in our early 20's with no real responsibilities though, once life got real, he started being negative and complaining a lot. He clearly couldn't handle life's everyday issues, even the simple things. That's about when the drinking was slowly but surely becoming his go-to coping mechanism. I wish I would have been wise to signs of alcoholism earlier in our relationship, but sadly, I was not. I thought it was normal for a 24 year old boyfriend to drink beer 7 nights a week. NOT NORMAL!

OpheliaKatz

I reread this again today. This post always makes me cry. I don't think my AH was (should I say STBXAH, when I don't know if that's going to happen?) always bad. I think he had some toxic ways of relating and that he thought he was a good person. However, we had very different ideas of what was good behavior -- his idea of good behavior is very different from society's idea of good behavior. Interestingly, this was something he was really obsessed with (the idea that people should be good, to treat other people with respect... and yet... he had no problems lying to me, over and over, and gas-lighting me and trying to control my perception of him). I think there was a deep divide in his mind, about how he was and who he was trying to be. Unfortunately people are what they do, because at the end of the day it doesn't matter what their intentions are, it just matters what their actions are as actions are the things that have effect. I feel so sad that things are over. I feel so sad that I might never see him again, but do I want to be awake all night wondering when the next "incident" might happen? Do I want the constant stress... etc? No I really don't. I had always hoped that I could let him go "with love", and that in some small way, I could stay in touch and see him recover from a distance.

His idea of what happened and his idea of the reasons I had to take the actions I took are very very different from mine. I know he thinks he is a victim. I know he won't be showing up to mow my lawn at any point in the future. He cuts people out of his life. This is what he does. There are people he has not seen for half a decade because they got in the way of his drug use or because they know about his past bad behavior. It's sad, because people love him and miss him. I don't even know why we bother loving him and missing him.

Ken0331

I read this couple months ago, before I joined, trying to go through this portion of the site to see how you all feel and get some perspective on the pain I caused my now ex-wife. We haven't spoken since the divorce. She doesn't know I have since gone to rehab, regularly attend AA and am now sober.

I'll have to make amends to her and her parents soon, and I'm just trying to gauge the level of pain and where my behavior sent her mind. Honestly not sure how I'll be able to set things right.


I wanted to come back to say I often hear in the AA rooms that we are not bad people trying to become good; we're sick people trying to get well.

I know that's true in my case, anyway. Before my drinking got out of control and I passed that line to become an alcoholic, we had a pretty good decade together. I didn't always drink like an alcoholic. But once I did, I progressively got worse - b/c alcoholism is a progressive disease. In the end, she represented a barrier between me and the way Ken really wants to drink. Even if she didn't criticize me. Just her presence meant I couldn't drink myself into the oblivion I now so desired. That made for the chaos and turmoil so many of you have described here.

Nata, let me just share with you some words from the Big Book of AA:

BAW81

Ken - Thank you for posting. An update from me is that after 16 months, I'm still trying to divorce my STBXAH. The courts are requiring he stay sober, via Soberlink, and that he attend AA 3x/week but not much has changed for my experience with him. He is still very spiteful and attempts to emotional manipulate me, the difference is that it does not pierce me as deeply as it has in months past.....I am stronger and my skin is thicker.

He also admitted to me that he's only going along with the court order right now because he has to but still thinks everyone is overreacting and he can "control" his drinking. So he might be sober and going to AA but he is far from recovery.

I do like your point about not being a "bad" person. Since this post, I do feel that my STBXAH's behavior is because he is not well and suffering from severe mental illness.

I am working on my ability to forgive what has happened and continues to happen so that I can rid myself of the burden of anger that has been a weight on my shoulders for a long time. And through my quest to forgive, I work hard to give him to god when he does something to me or my DS that I don't like.

Best of luck to you and your journey.

Ken0331

And you on yours. I will say a prayer to my Higher Power to grant you strength, courage, and wisdom.