Beachn

Seren

Hello Beachn,

I'm sorry to read all that you have been through with your wife. I certainly understand your anger and your indecision. I hope you realize that not all decisions have to be made right now--this instant.

To all, I am concerned about the tone this thread is taking and want to post a couple of reminders about the SoberRecovery Rules. In particular, Rules 4 and 9.

Rule 4 is our Anti-flaming rule. We don't allow recovery methods to get bashed here. If something worked well for you in your own recovery, please do share. Whatever method an alcoholic or addict that we love uses for their own recovery is a very personal choice, and they are allowed to do what works best for them--even if we do not like it. Just as we are allowed to do what works best for us--even if they do not like it.

Rule 9 is our Family Friendly rule. If it shouldn't be viewed by minors, then it shouldn’t be posted to the forums or chat rooms. This is a public, family-friendly forum. In addition, if something would not be considered “work safe” (to a boss or co-worker), then it shouldn’t be posted.

https://www.soberrecovery.com/forums...ting-tips.html

Beachn, I've learned over the years that early recovery is frequently an even more selfish time for the alcoholic/addict than when they were active in their addiction. Whether or not this is something you can tolerate sounds like a decision you will have to make. Praying for peace and clarity for you and your family.

Seren

Beachn

AAPJ

As someone who spends most of my time on the "other side" of the forums I found Beachn's posts #111 and #114 and #118 taken together to be some powerful thoughts. So powerful that I will probably share them in one of my AA meeting groups. I think they would have lost most of the power if they were sanitized. We alcoholics and addicts need to hear of the destruction we caused. His misery and anger needs to shine through loud and clear and believe me it did. He may not be able to get through to his wife but his share is helping to remind me to stay sober and the consequences if I don't.

Addiction is not family friendly and to criticize what he posted after his experience is disappointing at least to me. I have expressed this view elsewhere over the years and I expect no support from the moderators. But really perhaps you all should re-consider the rules.

Count me as a supporter of Beachn and IMO no apology is needed from him. YMMV.

ChloeRose63

Beachn,
Please post an update. We will always be here for you.

Seren

Hello Beachn,

You don't owe me or anyone here any apologies. My post was merely a reminder as the language on the thread was getting a bit, er, salty.

You have every right to be angry and to voice that anger. And you are welcome to do so here.

This is a publicly searchable forum, and we do have "minors on board". That is why we have the family friendly rule so that young people can read here and participate here.

Again, you owe me no apologies.

AAPJ, No, addiction is not friendly to families, but it is a disorder that affects the entire family--many, many of whom are minors. We work very hard to protect them and make no apologies about that. You are welcome to disagree, but that rule is unlikely to change.

Beachn, I hope very much that you have had some respite from all the drama that has been occurring. It is exhausting, I know.

Beachn

Deleted. Will try again

trailmix

Please don't be worried too much about the content of your posts Beachn - if we post outside of the "rules" someone will come along and let us know, but don't take it to heart.

This is a very supportive group and I hope you aren't spooked. Post away, someone will say something if it's outside the lines (which is so rare it's almost unheard of).

Hope you are doing ok and hope you will update.

schnappi99

Hi Beach, sorry did not see this thread a while ago. Early in alanon, as I was working on my 4th step w/ sponsor etc I worked out my boundary; I cannot live with active addiction, nor will I subject our daughter to it. Alanon has clarified my position on wedding vows any my job as husband and father, I take that stuff seriously but there is no win with active addiction in play. If the old behavior resumes then either she leaves or I leave with the daughter- period. Maybe we lose the house and everything burns down, a bummer, but if I have the ability to chose then all that is better than living alongside addiction.

She's not showing signs of drinking, nor is she in a recognizable recovery program or obviously doing any spiritual work. The personality change in her compared to 10yrs ago isn't to become a street rat instead its emotional, physical, spirtual detachment and general disregard for self-care.. pretty much small talk only for the last few years and no signs of her old self or a new one emerging from that. OTOH the house is calm & civilized and I am daily grateful for that. My business is my side of the street- twice weekly alanon w/ service work, serious pursuit of spiritual practice, growing in understanding and usefulness like they say in the Big Book.

The marriage (now 25yrs) doesn't seem to be going anywhere, but fixating on such things as methods to feel good doesn't work anyhow so, whatever. We have a daughter to raise and we are always teaching via conduct, so now I'd like to show cordial, civilized & respectful. I did plenty of angry, resentful and manipulative before.

But thats with her not drinking. I've heard adult children of alcoholics share a number of times that the grew to resent the sober parent for keeping them in a situation living with active addiction. My marriage vows are not worth that, nor can I allow myself to succumb to anger & resentment again.

Givenup2018

So sorry Beach but as many will tell you here the Active A will make many promises and break them all too. She is no longer the woman you knew. Your first priority is your little kids and yourself. Stop helping he and throwing money at her detox programmes. Let her hit rock bottom and say no more. Tell her to join AA. You must join Al an in to get the support you need. Proceed with separation or divorce, you cannot help her till she decides to help herself. We have all been there. Don’t destroy yourself by the chaos, you need to stay strong and resolute for your children and your financial security.

Mango212

"the Active A will make many promises and break them all too. She is no longer the woman you knew."

Good reminders.


In Al-Anon and this amazing interconnected journey of recovery I'm finding there are no actual "need to" in anything. One of my best therapy appointments was a Groupon haircut appointment in a city across the state that I like to visit. The hairdresser has great recovery on the friends and family side of this disease, and had great ES&H that really helped. "God, help!" is a powerful prayer. In allowing myself weakness, letting go of everything and having things break open inside me, I found numerous really good things happening.

Aliceiw

hmmm. Someone suggested I read in here because I have a family member who is currently struggling with alcohol so I started with this thread. I, too, am an alcoholic. My ex was a heavy drinker who brought alcohol into the home and drank every night. However, I was demonized because I couldn't "hold my liquor" the way he did. I was demonized by him and he was the poor longsuffering martyr. Those were our co-dependent roles. He got some kind of self-esteem thing or something from seeing himself as the terribly put-upon husband and seeing me as evil. And I suppose I was evil, in a way -- not in the way you kind of, I thought, cruelly painted with a very broad brush, all people with addictions in one of your posts, but I was -- at least for a few years -- ignoring many of the many expectations my husband had about what a "perfect" wife should be. Despite my alcoholic haze, I managed to get a master's degree, hold down a challenging full-time job, be a care-giver for my two ailing parents, successfully and attentively raise two children and be responsible for basically all of the cooking and household chores. If such a thing is possible: I was kind of a drunken wonder woman. I did it all, then drank my face off and blacked out or passed out every night. I finally spiralled into a depression that was so deep and so severe that I gave up trying, climbed into bed one day and stayed there for the better part of a year. Ugh. There's a lot more to this story -- there were the bruises, the broken bones and the mental and physical abuse that aren't part of your story, of course. I don't mean to minimize your pain, but the thing is, I see myself in your story, but I kind of more from the perspective of your wife. I wonder what happened. Did she suddenly go from being the perfect wife and mother to being the evil philanderer you describe? What did she do before all this happened that made you see her as so perfect? I'm sure her transformation didn't happen in a day....or in a vacuum. Was she getting any help for her co-existing mental problems before things got so wildly out of control? Did they come first, or did the drinking start first? Had she always been a drinker, or did she pick it up during your marriage? I wish you well, and I wish her good luck with her recovery and with getting some appropriate mental health care. I applaud you for giving her your help and support -- emotional and financial -- despite the crazy behavior she's displaying right now and how much it must be hurting you.

The bottom line for me was that I had to leave. And I think you should do it too. You don't sound like an enabler, but it may be that knowing how much she has disappointed you is eating away at her and the only way to "face" that is to not have to face it by self-medicating with alcohol. Leaving each other (after 30 years) was the best thing to ever happen to my ex and me. With the exception of one bad slip, I haven't had a drink in 8 months, and I have no desire to drink again. Thanks to abandoning everything (my children were grown by then and on their own) from my marriage, packing a suitcase and getting on a plane, I did what I think you want to do: save yourself.

So my advice is do it: Leave. ASAP. Save yourself. You may save both of you in the process, and it certainly sounds like you'll save your children.

Aliceiw

I do think you may be right that some rehabs are pretty lackadaisical in keeping their patients on the straight and narrow. I don't have any experience going to rehab, but I did meet a rehab worker once (in a liquor store...ugh.) I was in over my head then and knew it, and I asked him about how I might go about checking myself in. He told me not to do it. He said at his rehab there are more drugs and alcohol than you'd find on the street. That's no good at all. For the cost of rehab? Are you kidding me?

I did go to a very good detox facility once. I went because I was starting to have seizures from withdrawing from a pharmaceutical drug I'd been prescribed for years. I decided my best bet was to go to a detox rather than an emergency room because I hoped that the staff in a detox would know best how to deal with withdrawals. It was a very good place and they did help me. I learned quite a lot about everything, and it was a good foundation for getting off of the drug (a benzo for anxiety) and getting off of alcohol.

You are being loving and generous enough to pay your wife's bills for her treatment, so I think it's completely fair that you should be able to choose where she goes. Maybe do the research and find a place where the staff takes their responsibilities seriously. Perhaps there are places where only women are treated? If you want the name of the detox I went to, please pm me and I'll be happy to share. Many of the people I was with went on into rehab with them and I heard good things about the work they do. I'm not sure where you live, but sending her someplace far away might be best for the both of you for a while.

Good luck to you and I'm very sorry for all you're going through.

Mango212

Beachn, sending good thoughts and wishes your way.

Beachn

Hi everyone, Wasn’t able to delete my last post, and leaving a delete marker was the best I could do. After rereading what had written, it was just... wrong from a bad place.

Beachn

OpheliaKatz

1. You can't help someone if you have anger and resentment against them -- this ceases to be "help" and becomes control.
2. I wouldn't want to help a stranger who has done the things your wife has done to you... and like it or not, AT THE MOMENT, your wife is a stranger and there is not telling if she will ever change back into the person you knew before... . You don't know if she will stay sober forever or relapse soon or 10 years down the road. Active addicts lie.
3. If it is true that addiction causes damage to everyone in contact with it, it will continue to damage you and your children unless you are able to detach from it.
4. Please seek to accept the things you can not change: you can NOT change the addict. Only the addict can change the addict. You can not control the addict, only the addict can control the addict. Nothing you do or say can change the addict. The addict needs to want to change BY themselves and NOT because of you or their family or their pet dog or whatever. Lasting change happens because the addict WANTS to change for themselves.
5. A relationship where one person is trying to control another person is not a relationship... EVEN if the thing they are trying to control is raging alcoholism in an addict who can die from it. Even if they are trying to control the raging alcoholic because they are trying to protect their children -- this is not a relationship, this is dysfunction.
6. What exactly are your boundaries? She is sober now but if she relapses... then what...? She is sober now but if the sobriety period is full of quacking and mood-swings and abusive behavior... then what...? Whatever you decide is your boundary, it is something that you should change about your behavior, not actions you take in order to change HER behavior. For example, if she relapses then you move out...? That's you doing something for your sanity, nothing to do with her. You should not expect anything from her after you move out -- not remorse, nothing. You may not get remorse. You moved out for you, not her.
7. The children are already affected by this and I hope that they are getting the help they need to cope. Not only are the children affected by the addict, they are also affected by their codependent parent who might be too busy trying to manage the addict that that parent is unable to give enough time or attention to the children. In many, many cases where there is abuse, addiction, or affairs, the children start to resent the parent in control: in this case it is you and not the addict (because you are the only parent who is able to make sane -- they think -- choices).
8. Alanon tries to tell its members to accept things as they are. Not things as they were in the past... not things as you think they will be in the future. Things as they are. Because with addiction, you simply can not know what is going to happen. You have expressed anger at the idea of having to accept things as they are. You don't have to force yourself to accept things as they are. No one should feel that they have to. So you can choose to leave.
9. Personally, I chose to leave. I only get to live one life. I want to be safe emotionally, financially, and physically. And I didn't accept life with an addict. That's me though. Maybe you are okay with living with it. Different strokes for different folk. But I think you sound very angry and very resentful. And I totally understand why you would feel that way... but those feelings are toxic to the relationship going forward. Do you want to go forward? Or are you still here because of things that happened years ago?
10. What are you really holding on to? Hope? You can't eat hope.

OpheliaKatz

Which wheels are these? Are you talking about the wheels in her brain? Because if she's been boozing and cheating, that wheelhouse is broken. You also can't possibly make anyone think anything -- you can't nag them to change.

Some people tolerate/enable their addicts for so long at the addict's rock bottom becomes lower and lower until letting them finally hit rock bottom is dangerous.

If you don't want to play, step off the playing field. As an addict, this is where she will be stuck: managing her addition forever, she will be on the field forever even if she's been benched and isn't actively kicking the ball.

tomsteve

Jesus helped those that couldnt help themselves. the others?
He gave them the message of what to do,then let them decide to do the footwork.He allowed them to make their choices even when He didnt like their choices.
no one has said forget the past. reads like she was quite awesome. however, shes not that woman anymore and you may never see that woman again. she may be even better but may not-no amount of carrying an alcoholic will make an alcoholic into what we want them to be. it didnt matter what anyone WANTED me to be or how much they carried me, i wasnt going to change until I WANTED to.

we arent made with anything but a body. everything after is all learned.
on this:
my actions are you can do this, you’re not alone so stop acting like a ****** and get It together. For God’s sake remember who you are are start taking responsibility and fix your crap.
those arent actions,beach-those are words and those words are NOT supportive.

want to see her push you further away? talk like this to her.

AnvilheadII

In rehab are very effed up folks. Victims and villains alike and often able to switch between roles as needed to obtain whatever they want at the moment: attention, pity, sympathy, sex, cookies, whatever. The chameleon qualities of an addict make them versatile, otherwise **** would have hit the fan years ago, but also dangerous to the emotional well being of anyone caught in their web of lies. So these poor folks in rehab telling their sob stories, romanticizing use, laughing at the damage they’ve caused and calling them mistakes instead of taking responsibility for the things they have done is in my opinion a major cause of relapse.

wowzers. and you know this HOW? have YOU been to rehab? or is this all based on the experience of one addict, your wife? according to the above we should just shoot them all.

i'm a recovering addict and i find every word above hugely offensive. that you harbor all this and still claim to "love" your wife is a joke. you're out now to punish her. to take out all that hate on her and make her pay.

really would be best to let her be.