seekinganswrs

Been here before, last year almost around the same time...contemplating and struggling with the truth of my husband's 16 year addiction to one thing or another. Last November he came back from working out of town ---his job usually took him out of town M-F-----and I had boxed up all of his things (that would fit in boxes) and told him....either quit the narcotics, or I am done. He quit...temporarily. He didn't take any pills except for a non-narcotic tramadol from November of 2011 until July 2012, that I know of.

However, around July we started arguing more, and usually I am more passive because I just don't want to argue, but I was being more reactive to him. Anyhow, we took this trip out of town and we had this kayaking incident. I was with our 14 yr old and he was with our 12 yr old and their kayak flipped, and he just couldn't handle the situation. I had to get both kayaks to shore upstream with the boys, and I felt like God was showing me my life with him. I am always the responsible one and he is the one who can't handle life. It's odd that after all the other crap he has done and put me through that this incident became the tipping point for me. A week after we got back, I moved out with the boys. I didn't even know he was back on the Loratab, but I knew he was abusing the tramadol. It wan't until a week after I left that a check came though our checking account that wasn't dated and made out to an odd acronym. It was for another doctor, one that would give him narcotics. The found out he had went back in July and started on them.

I told him I won't just divorce him, but he needs to do all the things he thinks he should to repair our relationship, etc...It's been about 7 weeks and he is still getting medicine and lying about it. I gave him a drug test last weekend and he passed it, but when I went to test him last night he told me he wouldn't pass it because he had found some Loratab in a sock and he had taken them the day before. He doesn't know that I can check the prescription claim history and I know he filled another prescription on 10-4, and I knew he wouldn't pass it, but he lied about why he wouldn't.

He is not a bad person, but abuses prescription medicine and then seems to withdraw each month. He also buys them. If anyone is really interested, I am sure you can go back and read my post from last year when I started seeking help for myself. When I moved out I felt relieved. It has been a huge adjustment for my sons, but they aren't doing too bad. I was homeschooling them, so I enrolled them in school and we moved to a city outside of where we live. We are about 60 miles from him. I guess I am just struggling now with how long to let this go on?? I am a Christian, and a big believer in marriage, hope for the impossible, etc...but I am exhausted. I told him I would give him about 6 months to do what he needs to do, but I feel like he just doesn't get it. I don't think he gets how serious this is. He tells me he wants me and the boys back home, and cries, and then does the thing that has caused us to leave. I feel there is so much at stake, and I don't want to make a mistake. Part of me feels like he isn't as bad as some people, and I should just go back, and part of me is so relieved that I don't have to be there everyday wondering how many pills has he taken, what money is missing from our account, what a certain check is for, did he get cash back to get pills, etc...

Redapples

I wonder how much of this crap we can actually take? When do we finally lose it? It is a dangerous roller coaster ride where we could end up having a stroke or heart attack because of the stress we have to endure on a daily basis. A mental break down where we no longer can take care of the ones we love.

Yes we love them and want to help to the point of trying to control their lives meaning the addicts to make them see how they are making us sick. Just dealing with them on a daily basis is making us sick. Not knowing where they are if they are ok is making us sick.

I love the selfish in addiction and selfish in recovery theory. Basically they are just selfish people, who do not care how ill we become to take care of them. I know I am rambling here but it kills me to see so much pain so much loss the people who have to struggle on a daily basis to keep the family life together while the addict goes off on his/her binge of choice.

I went to an intake worker a couple of weeks ago to get some sort of counselling because I am at the point where anger is taking over and I am ready to bite someones head off. Where I want to break every dish in the house. It is not a good feeling.

Ann

I am the mom of a grown addict and I often think it must be so hard for you young people with children. Not only do you need to protect the children from the life of living with an addict, but then you have to support everyone all by yourself. My mother was widowed young, so I know how hard that can be.

I keep you all in my prayers, that you find the courage to do what is best for you and your children, and the your life ahead is better than the life you leave behind.

Hugs

outtolunch

Boundaries protect the setter and minor children. A boundary requires the boundary setter to change their own behaviors instead of trying to control and change other people. Boundaries begin with "I". For example, "I will not expose my children to someone in active addiction or new to recovery". The boundary setter takes responsibility for their own boundaries and removes themselves and minor children from the situation.

People in active addiction or early recovery make lousy parents.

laurie6781

I want you to remember something that can and will be very important
for your own healing:

Just like a marriage may not be 'forever' a divorce may not be forever. If
our A wants to and does get better there is nothing preventing us to remarry this
person that we still love.

It just will depend on our A's actions not their words.

So my suggestion is for you to work on you, and if that means divorce than so be
it. I look at the vows one takes in a marriage ceremony as a contract,
a contract where both parties agree to give 100%, and when one party is only
giving 49% or less then the contract has been [B][I]BROKEN[B][I] and the other
partner is free to do what is necessary for them to have a sane, serene, calm and
peaceful life.

So, please keep posting and letting us know how you are doing as we do care so
very much. You know you can rant, rave, scream, cry, and yes even laugh here,
and you will have the support you need.

I hope that if you have not yet, that you will try at least 6 different meetings of
Alann and/or get private counseling also. It can be such a HUGE help in our own
recovery.

J M H O

Love and hugs,

peaceandgrace

My heart is with you, seekinganswrs.

I can share a bit from the perspective of the child who has to live in a household with addiction.

The first perspective is the child that I once was. My father was a functioning alcoholic in the sense that he held down a fine responsible job and supported his family. However, the rages, the arguments, and the tension between him and my mother over his alcohol abuse deeply affected me. I used to pray they would divorce. When he went out of town on business, a deep peace settled over our family. I prayed it could be like that all the time. I consider myself an ACOA with all the attendant issues. However, I have worked very hard for years to be compassionate and understanding with myself. It works:-)
To this day, I believe it would have been better to have lived in a home with a single parent than one in which there is such tension and rage.

Another perspective is the one I get from the teen students I teach who live in homes with active addiction. Through the writing assignments and texts we read, they inevitably connect to addiction issues. The harm that is done to them by addicted parents is a national tragedy. Divorce hurts no doubt. But, the redemption offered by a peaceful home or a stepparent who embraces the children is a beautiful thing to see.

The last perspective is from what I see with my AS and his 3 1/2 year old daughter, my granddaughter. My AS is not currently a father to his daughter. His lover is drugs and how to work as little as possible to have them in his life.
While I pray that he will someday be able to be a father, I know he isn't able now. Fortunately, my granddaughter's mother knows this and keeps her daughter away from my AS. This is an incredibly mature act by a young woman not even yet 30! The strength she has to do this is humbling.

I pray for healing for you and your children. Your husband has to walk his own road. Kudos to you for the bravery you are showing in all of this pain.

with compassion,
Peaceandgrace

supportforme

I'm so sorry you and your boys are going through this. Only you can answer the question how long to let this go on. I'm also a mother of 2 boys with a pill addicted STBX
AH. I lived your life for too many years. I thought by staying married I would not destroy my boys lives. I too struggled with the vows I took. I lived through the cycles of living with a zombie and withdrawls and situations where I realized I no longer had a partner and could not depend on him. I took him off of my health insurance in 2010 b/c I suspected that he was doctor shopping and I wasn't going to risk loosing my health insurance if he was convicted of prescription fraud. This disease progresses. I had no idea of the potential consequences for staying. Because I stayed, I endangered the safety of me and my children. All the consequences of his addiction fell down upon me and my boys. I finally found my answers. Please get yourself help and protect your boys. You are in my prayers.

seekinganswrs

Thanks to everyone! This is hard and exhausting to say the least. He called me Sunday evening to say he threw all the pills out the window, but who knows? I never know, but I know I have heard it all before.