Should I be worrying about him?
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2017
Posts: 20
Should I be worrying about him?
Thinking a lot today about if I should be concerned or care about my XABF's recovery or not? I see so many threads on here I just wish I could send him, that maybe they would make him think. But, I doubt he would appreciate or even read them. (Still no contact attempts from either of us.) He admitted once he was an alcoholic, and one other time that he's been "drinking too much for too long." But, took both comments back blaming me that he said it just because that's what I wanted to hear to stop the argument... So, maybe he still believes he doesn't have a problem, maybe he thought I was the problem and that's why he asked me to leave and hasn't looked back. I want him to get better.. realize what he's doing to himself, his career, his mind and body, and the people around him. But more than realization, I want him to get help... From what I've read it has to be his decision, and his rock bottom that takes him there... Idk why I still feel a responsibility in helping him. Maybe selfish, because I know it would help me feel better too?
Guest
Join Date: Dec 2004
Posts: 2,281
It's possible to change actions in order to change whirling self-destructive thoughts. That's what these are to me.
Actions that can help:
Go to an Alanon meeting... where/when are meetings in your area? (Make that an extended area, if you can!)
Go somewhere, anywhere that has healthy people and isn't a trigger.
Get something to eat or drink.
Listen to KLOVE or some other upbeat, positive radio station.
http://www.klove.com/listen/player.aspx
Look for what speaks to you and leave the rest.
One moment at a time. The only way to move forward is to look for solutions in changing your own life. You are stronger than you realize.
Actions that can help:
Go to an Alanon meeting... where/when are meetings in your area? (Make that an extended area, if you can!)
Go somewhere, anywhere that has healthy people and isn't a trigger.
Get something to eat or drink.
Listen to KLOVE or some other upbeat, positive radio station.
http://www.klove.com/listen/player.aspx
Look for what speaks to you and leave the rest.
One moment at a time. The only way to move forward is to look for solutions in changing your own life. You are stronger than you realize.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2017
Posts: 151
Hi Della,
You are in a tough spot no doubt. One where I was only a year ago.
What I can tell you from how my experience went down is this.
No amount logic, pleading, crying, arguing, or begging can make someone "see the light"
I was the king of "if only" statements.
All you are doing is falling deeper and deeper down.
It is the most difficult thing in the world to watch someone you love kill them selves with addiction.
The ugly truth is- they are going to say whatever they need to say to drink for as long as they want to drink. Even up to their deathbed.
I really think it boils down to the answer to these two questions... how far down do you want to be dragged and how much of yourself do you want to lose to fight a no-win battle?
Each of us has to answer that question for ourselves. Our own rock bottom if you will.
I wish you strength, peace, and hope.
Please keep coming back. You are among friends and people who understand how you feel.
You are in a tough spot no doubt. One where I was only a year ago.
What I can tell you from how my experience went down is this.
No amount logic, pleading, crying, arguing, or begging can make someone "see the light"
I was the king of "if only" statements.
All you are doing is falling deeper and deeper down.
It is the most difficult thing in the world to watch someone you love kill them selves with addiction.
The ugly truth is- they are going to say whatever they need to say to drink for as long as they want to drink. Even up to their deathbed.
I really think it boils down to the answer to these two questions... how far down do you want to be dragged and how much of yourself do you want to lose to fight a no-win battle?
Each of us has to answer that question for ourselves. Our own rock bottom if you will.
I wish you strength, peace, and hope.
Please keep coming back. You are among friends and people who understand how you feel.
Community Greeter
Join Date: Aug 2011
Posts: 16,246
dellaND.....no, I don't think it is selfish to wish that someone would get better.
It just means that you have compassion.....and, you probably still are harboring the desire for him to get better so that you can fulfill the fantasy that you had for the relationship.
For him to "get better" will take a total life change and years of him working hard and continuously on that.
You don't have the power to help him with that...just like he doesn't have the power to help you......
Ruminating these kinds of questions is common in the grieving process.....(I remember doing the ruminating thing, myself).....
Soldier on and keep reading and learning and building your own happy life....
You are responsible for your own happiness....
You have brains in your head
and, feet in your shoes
and, You can direct them'
any way that you choose.....
by Dr. Seuss
It just means that you have compassion.....and, you probably still are harboring the desire for him to get better so that you can fulfill the fantasy that you had for the relationship.
For him to "get better" will take a total life change and years of him working hard and continuously on that.
You don't have the power to help him with that...just like he doesn't have the power to help you......
Ruminating these kinds of questions is common in the grieving process.....(I remember doing the ruminating thing, myself).....
Soldier on and keep reading and learning and building your own happy life....
You are responsible for your own happiness....
You have brains in your head
and, feet in your shoes
and, You can direct them'
any way that you choose.....
by Dr. Seuss
Member
Join Date: Feb 2013
Location: W Washington
Posts: 11,589
i think that for a long time you said something like this in your head:
IF ONLY he would quit drinking, our lives would be great.
IF ONLY he would HEAR me and do something about HIS problems, our lives would be great.
altho i am certain you do care for his well being, for a long time his "getting better" was the key to YOU GUYS getting better. in your mind, his sobriety would FIX everything.
so today the urge to "help" with the subtle undertone of "maybe then we could...." is still there.
here's the hard part. accepting that just because WE think/believe that someone ELSE needs help/to get better/to change, that has zero bearing on how they GET to live their own lives. trust me, i get it....my husband and i go 'round and 'round on an issue, and i am convinced that I AM RIGHT, while HE is confident that I AM WRONG, and it is HIS life anyways. against absolutely everything i have learned here and put into practice, i argue my point, i defend my point, i yell my point, i hold fiercely ON to my point with a death grip and i am seemingly incapable of just letting it go, shutting the hell up, letting him be him.
either it's my NEED to be right........or i am right. lol but regardless, it causes me nothing but grief and a sore throat.
with that said, the farther you stay OUT of HIS stuff, the better it will be for you. the sooner you can just let him be him and no longer be on the campaign trail of helping him see the light, the better it will be for you.
IF ONLY he would quit drinking, our lives would be great.
IF ONLY he would HEAR me and do something about HIS problems, our lives would be great.
altho i am certain you do care for his well being, for a long time his "getting better" was the key to YOU GUYS getting better. in your mind, his sobriety would FIX everything.
so today the urge to "help" with the subtle undertone of "maybe then we could...." is still there.
here's the hard part. accepting that just because WE think/believe that someone ELSE needs help/to get better/to change, that has zero bearing on how they GET to live their own lives. trust me, i get it....my husband and i go 'round and 'round on an issue, and i am convinced that I AM RIGHT, while HE is confident that I AM WRONG, and it is HIS life anyways. against absolutely everything i have learned here and put into practice, i argue my point, i defend my point, i yell my point, i hold fiercely ON to my point with a death grip and i am seemingly incapable of just letting it go, shutting the hell up, letting him be him.
either it's my NEED to be right........or i am right. lol but regardless, it causes me nothing but grief and a sore throat.
with that said, the farther you stay OUT of HIS stuff, the better it will be for you. the sooner you can just let him be him and no longer be on the campaign trail of helping him see the light, the better it will be for you.
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2017
Posts: 20
Thank you all for the kind words, the real words.. I guess I'm just still in the nit picking stage of trying to come up with everything little or big that happened his fault or my fault or our faults and how it could've should've or would've been differ IF ... which is pretty much torturing myself. There are a few things though that I've felt extremely guilty about and need to get off my chest, and I figured, since not to him, who better than to tell you guys...
There was a recent incident that has eaten away at me. So... I worked during the day. XABF always would text me a million times towards the end of my shift asking where I was, what time I'm off, will I get off on time, how far I was from the house, literally every different way to phrase what exact time I'll be home so he can hide his bottles or drink as much as possible before I do. I had told him I would be home around four and we had plans to go out for dinner and go to a movie afterwards in celebration of me getting my MCAT scores back. On my way home I call, he answers and I can hear the slurring... I ask him if we are still on for date night and he tells me... well I'm going to the movie now, I ask him to wait for me I'll be home in 5 minutes and I'll come and we can do dinner after, he tells me he only bought one ticket and already left the house. I tell him, how that upsets me, is disappointing and hurtful and disrespectful... Anyway, he comes home a couple hours later, drunk, and laying on my lap on the couch and wants me to rub his head so I did. He fell asleep (passed out) and his apple watch started lighting up saying -- Nicky "(kissing emoji) I seriously cannot wait to see you when I get home!" -- this is a girl he's been trying to tell me is his best friend from work everything is innocent but would never invite me out with them or let me meet her or anything and are constantly texting snapping calling and then deleting messages. (Not fishy at all right.... I'm just crazy like he says right... F**k...) Anyway, I tried to remain as calm as I could and not say anything because I knew he was drunk and when he's tired everything is made a million times worse. But I couldn't, it was just a burning stabbing pain in my heart... So I woke him up and showed him his watch on his wrist and said what is this about? He ignored me, so I took it off and said please wake up what is this message about why did u delete everything else? He came back saying ohhh she just had a tough week and Idk why she would send me that and I didn't say anything to make her say that and I only deleted the messages cuz I wanted to clear out old messages... blah blah just excuses thinking I'm an idiot. Anyway, I was crying and just wanted to know what was going on and when u see something like that u start thinking, oh did he go to the movie with her ? did he even go to the movie ? etc. I was holding his watch and said well maybe I should just call Nicky and find out whats going on? And he laughed, so I pushed call. He literally chased me in the room and "gently" tackled me to the ground and was on top of me trying to get this watch. I should've just dropped it... but I didn't I held onto it and said I was going to figure this out and he kept pulling on my arms and wrestling me basically on the ground with his arms over my face.... so I bit his arm. Hard. And immediately stopped and dropped the watch and felt terrible. But he went on to throwing beers, throwing chairs, swiping everything off the table, calling names, and went straight to the room, pulled out a bottle of more than half empty tequila and starting chugging from it. Of course, I was the one to clean everything up, and apologize for biting him and told him I panicked when he was on top of me. He didn't apologize for anything. Told me I was to never touch his personal property again. (in between chugs on his bottle) This turned into another talk about his drinking... and he actually cried that night and said he needed to stop drinking so much. But that was it. So, I've felt terrible about that night for awhile...
I also feel bad about enabling him... there were times where I knew if he didn't have a beer in his hand when he got home, he would be angry. So if I did the shopping that night for dinner I would always get him a bottle of wine or a 6 pack of beer. No liquor, not a ridiculous amount... but I did get it for him because I felt more in control of maybe predicting the night, rather than him buying a 1.75L or a 30 pack to binge on...
And one other thing I'm on the fence about... I feel bad for all the times I tried to get him to talk to me or pressure him into opening up or listening to me or just communicating in general. I don't feel bad in that I know all I was trying to do was have a relationship! Communicate. Love. Talk. Share... but he always made me feel like he was annoyed and upset and couldn't stand that I would want to talk and would always say "you always want to fight/argue" when I would say something as simple as.... how was your day? anything interesting happen?. So Idk if I really feel bad about that, or I'm just feeling bad because he told me too.
Sorry to ramble and create a huge message as a reply to my own thread ha, but I had to get that off my chest...
There was a recent incident that has eaten away at me. So... I worked during the day. XABF always would text me a million times towards the end of my shift asking where I was, what time I'm off, will I get off on time, how far I was from the house, literally every different way to phrase what exact time I'll be home so he can hide his bottles or drink as much as possible before I do. I had told him I would be home around four and we had plans to go out for dinner and go to a movie afterwards in celebration of me getting my MCAT scores back. On my way home I call, he answers and I can hear the slurring... I ask him if we are still on for date night and he tells me... well I'm going to the movie now, I ask him to wait for me I'll be home in 5 minutes and I'll come and we can do dinner after, he tells me he only bought one ticket and already left the house. I tell him, how that upsets me, is disappointing and hurtful and disrespectful... Anyway, he comes home a couple hours later, drunk, and laying on my lap on the couch and wants me to rub his head so I did. He fell asleep (passed out) and his apple watch started lighting up saying -- Nicky "(kissing emoji) I seriously cannot wait to see you when I get home!" -- this is a girl he's been trying to tell me is his best friend from work everything is innocent but would never invite me out with them or let me meet her or anything and are constantly texting snapping calling and then deleting messages. (Not fishy at all right.... I'm just crazy like he says right... F**k...) Anyway, I tried to remain as calm as I could and not say anything because I knew he was drunk and when he's tired everything is made a million times worse. But I couldn't, it was just a burning stabbing pain in my heart... So I woke him up and showed him his watch on his wrist and said what is this about? He ignored me, so I took it off and said please wake up what is this message about why did u delete everything else? He came back saying ohhh she just had a tough week and Idk why she would send me that and I didn't say anything to make her say that and I only deleted the messages cuz I wanted to clear out old messages... blah blah just excuses thinking I'm an idiot. Anyway, I was crying and just wanted to know what was going on and when u see something like that u start thinking, oh did he go to the movie with her ? did he even go to the movie ? etc. I was holding his watch and said well maybe I should just call Nicky and find out whats going on? And he laughed, so I pushed call. He literally chased me in the room and "gently" tackled me to the ground and was on top of me trying to get this watch. I should've just dropped it... but I didn't I held onto it and said I was going to figure this out and he kept pulling on my arms and wrestling me basically on the ground with his arms over my face.... so I bit his arm. Hard. And immediately stopped and dropped the watch and felt terrible. But he went on to throwing beers, throwing chairs, swiping everything off the table, calling names, and went straight to the room, pulled out a bottle of more than half empty tequila and starting chugging from it. Of course, I was the one to clean everything up, and apologize for biting him and told him I panicked when he was on top of me. He didn't apologize for anything. Told me I was to never touch his personal property again. (in between chugs on his bottle) This turned into another talk about his drinking... and he actually cried that night and said he needed to stop drinking so much. But that was it. So, I've felt terrible about that night for awhile...
I also feel bad about enabling him... there were times where I knew if he didn't have a beer in his hand when he got home, he would be angry. So if I did the shopping that night for dinner I would always get him a bottle of wine or a 6 pack of beer. No liquor, not a ridiculous amount... but I did get it for him because I felt more in control of maybe predicting the night, rather than him buying a 1.75L or a 30 pack to binge on...
And one other thing I'm on the fence about... I feel bad for all the times I tried to get him to talk to me or pressure him into opening up or listening to me or just communicating in general. I don't feel bad in that I know all I was trying to do was have a relationship! Communicate. Love. Talk. Share... but he always made me feel like he was annoyed and upset and couldn't stand that I would want to talk and would always say "you always want to fight/argue" when I would say something as simple as.... how was your day? anything interesting happen?. So Idk if I really feel bad about that, or I'm just feeling bad because he told me too.
Sorry to ramble and create a huge message as a reply to my own thread ha, but I had to get that off my chest...
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Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: Northwest
Posts: 4,215
Nothing you did or didn’t do would have made any difference, hon.
This is bigger than you. It’s bigger than him. The other woman is a symptom. The alcohol addiction is the root cause.
Try not to beat yourself up, yes?
Sending you a hug.
This is bigger than you. It’s bigger than him. The other woman is a symptom. The alcohol addiction is the root cause.
Try not to beat yourself up, yes?
Sending you a hug.
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2017
Posts: 20
Ya, if things wouldn't have gotten better there was no way I would've been able to do it with him. He sabotaged so many study days for my MCAT... I'm sad thinking that if I wouldn't have had those distractions, or been in a better emotional place with support from a significant other or just no other at all to cause issues... I could've done better. But it is what it is. Just hoping I get in.
Member
Join Date: Jun 2006
Posts: 5,103
Thank you all for the kind words, the real words.. I guess I'm just still in the nit picking stage of trying to come up with everything little or big that happened his fault or my fault or our faults and how it could've should've or would've been differ IF ... which is pretty much torturing myself.
I would hope that you are looking at your own reactions in these situations and saying aloud. Yeah I will not ever
Reward someone with a head rub after they ditched me to go spend time with someone else.
I will never ever again get involved with an alcoholic.
I will always trust my gut instinct especially when it comes to knowing I am being lied to and cheated on.
I will never clean up a mess after an alcoholic has had a meltdown.
I will never try to get someone to share feelings and talk with open communication who does not want to talk.
You have many lessons from this experience moving forward to make your life so different. Today you certainly do know what you do not want in a partner and that’s step forward.
Anger can be a good motivator for change!
I would hope that you are looking at your own reactions in these situations and saying aloud. Yeah I will not ever
Reward someone with a head rub after they ditched me to go spend time with someone else.
I will never ever again get involved with an alcoholic.
I will always trust my gut instinct especially when it comes to knowing I am being lied to and cheated on.
I will never clean up a mess after an alcoholic has had a meltdown.
I will never try to get someone to share feelings and talk with open communication who does not want to talk.
You have many lessons from this experience moving forward to make your life so different. Today you certainly do know what you do not want in a partner and that’s step forward.
Anger can be a good motivator for change!
Member
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: New York, NY
Posts: 6,262
You may want him to get the message but you can't make him get it. There's nothing anyone can do or say to an active alcoholic to get them to change. To stop drinking they have to want sobriety desperately and he's far from that. I suggest Alanon meetings to help you detach. And, as someone mentioned above, hanging out with healthy people. Big hug!
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