My mother isn't talking to me
 

I believed all the excuses. It's been two and a half months. Since I spoke with my mother. My dad is ok. I told her at Christmas that if she continued to take my ex husband side that I wanted nothing more do with her. Of course I was drinking at the time. Now she is in bad health at 73. Should I just let it go? She has been a big factor in turning my daughter's against me. I asked to urgently speak with my mother.

Hi sweetichick

if you think it's time to let bygones be bygones, you could always get your dads opinion I guess?

There is a recovery aspect in this tho - if this attempt at reconcilliation is super stressful, or your mother says something non supportive, will it make you want to drink?

what measures do you have to prevent that?

D

How is your sobriety going?
As I recall this situation with your parents is ongoing and has been for a long time.

Your daughters do not speak to you because of your drinking. Best to accept that and not blame other people. Nothing will change unless and until you stop drinking.

Perhaps now is not the time to seek reconciliation but to focus on your sobriety without any more of this constant drama about factors and people you have no control over.

Sweeti,

Focus on getting and staying sober. My humble opinion, you will be in a much better place mentally and physically, to tackle these issues once you have some sober weeks and months under your belt.

You needn't wait forever, but even a couple of months down the line would be much better.

Frankly, you can barely look after yourself, let alone worry about your parents.

I’ve been sober two and a half years and took a break from my 70 year old father after this past Christmas when his manic episode resulted in a ruined Christmas Day and an aftermath that lasted a couple of weeks. It was pretty awful, and I was facing other responsibilities like moving across the country and changing jobs, and the stress was too much for me. I recognized that the stress was too great for me to keep my serenity so I prioritized. Sobriety comes first. I haven’t dealt with him and won’t, until I’m more balanced after all of the changes become more familiar and routine.

We are obviously in different places in sobriety but I think it illustrates that you gotta take care of you to be able to take care of others. You have more on your plate than I do because you need to get sober still. And when you are, you have to work to stay that way. Learning boundaries is crucial to that. I hope you take care of you first and others after that.

+1.
been goin round and round the mountain on this and right back here again.
repairing the damage while your drinking wont repair the damage.

Sweeti,
So much good advice given to your thread, per usual. I hope you take some of the advice and put it to action. While we can not stop you from doing anything, only you have that power. I do hope you choose to not drink, get sober, recover, focus on you and be well. From there you can mend these broken relationships, but that is only going to improve when YOU improve your self.

How long will this go on?
Will this be a sad case we are reading about, or not reading about because you have disappeared and we are all left guessing what happened to you? - I really pray this is not ever the case
Will you be the most amazing success story and be able to share your experience, strength and hope to others?
The thing about the above is you are the one who has the CHOICE in the matter. You have to take ACTION in the matter.
You have to do the WORK.
While we can all give you advice on the daily, help you along, encourage you and sometimes give you a stern kick in the butt, it is up to YOU to be the best version of yourself.
You have so much support here it is AMAZING. All the people that come here to help you, encourage you and support you is so great. I find that you have so much love and true support here. I hope you take the bull by the horns and choose to be sober and start to recover.

Only was I able to recover when I stopped making excuses and realized the BS I was telling myself and believing. That is really all it was, BS. I was lying to myself and to others for far too long.
I was tired of feeling tired
I was tired of the lying
I was tired of not being healthy, mind, soul and body
I was tired of the excuses
I was tired of the hangover
I was tired of the same sad story... Poor me.
I was tired of it all and everything alcohol brought to my life. It was nothing but a disaster.

My prayer is that you have better days. You start to recover and look within your self and those around you see that (over time, it is not instant)
I pray you are no longer in mental anguish

Addiction makes us extremely selfish. We think the world revolves round us and what we think we want should be everyone else’s priority. We fail to see that others have bigger problems of their own to deal with and we tend to want to turn everything into being about us with no consideration for others. She is in ill health and I doubt your problems are her priority right now.

Until you have some space between you and your addiction you either need to let it go or steer well clear until you have at least 30 consecutive sober days under your belt.

Thanks Bexxed. Your story really helped me. Maybe I am too old myself to deal with my mothers problems. She is bipolar. Always at doctors. I don’t know why she has shut me out. All we did was talk about her illnesses. I will just leave it a month. Maybe longer. Thanks for your advice.

I second what everyone else has said. Take care of yourself for a while, and leave the family drama alone. Keep it as simple as possible. Your number one priority right now is getting and staying sober. Everything else can wait until you feel stronger.

I ended up almost completely cutting ties with my father for quite some time. He was my number one trigger for drinking, so I removed him from the picture for a while. He didn't understand, and blamed me endlessly, but I didn't let that bother me. I was protecting my sobriety. That's what you need to do. You cannot control what others do or say or think. All you can control is yourself and your actions, and trying to figure out why people do what they do is a never-ending game and drama you do not need right now.

She shut you out and your daughters are not on your side because you are an unrecovered alcoholic, and there’s nothing worse to be around.

I know because I used to be one, and I inflicted myself on others on the reg. Scores of people turned against me. Of course. Unresolved alcoholism makes you unstable, paranoid, angry, selfish and difficult.

Sobriety will force you to turn inward. It’s possible that’s what you don’t like about it: you’ve got a long, long history of blaming people: the ex, the ex’s current squeeze, the neighbors, your daughters, your mom. You’re not going to take responsibility for any of your problems while you still drink. Alcoholism blocks that.

You can still get free, but no one gets sober by using everyone in life as an excuse.

Quit drinking. Volunteer your time. Work. Take care of others. Look outward. What are the needs of others around you? Who is the real sweetichick? Is she a perpetual victim or is she someone else entirely, someone we can’t see, and you are unable to see for yourself?

Take the time to find out. You might surprise yourself.

I'ts disappointing you ignore any questions about your sobriety from people who try and help you. Maybe focus on your sobriety instead of just continually wanting people to comment on your next drama. I say this not in an unkind way but from a place of concern.

Sweeti, I would not attempt any kind of reconciliation at this point. You are vulnerable and it seems that dealing with your mother would be very difficult for you. Focus on your recovery.

On another note I talked to my exes wife today. She was really nice to me and asked how I was holding up.She is finding it so hard she works 7 days a week to take her mind off his death. I am still finding it hard but getting there.

Time heals all.
Sober time heals much better.

I have the same question.

Sweeti,

I'm sorry things are difficult for you. But, like others keep saying, it's best to keep your focus inward right now. Getting involved in drama, even if it's family, will only make things more difficult.

I think one of the scariest things about sobriety was losing the familiar "comfort" of alcohol. I was talking with a rehab counselor and she told me I would have to prepare for how to deal with my problems without alcohol.

"What do you mean?" I glared. "I don't have any problems. There's nothing wrong with me. The only problem is that I drink too much." Oh, man, was I wrong.

Getting sober is a process and it can be difficult. We lose our familiar way of being in the world. I'm not saying this to scare you, but to encourage you to go through the process. And to keep your recovery friends close.

The good news is that as we get sober, we can learn new ways of living. Of coping. We can be liberated.

It can be scary and it can be difficult, but oh my God, it's the absolute best thing we can do for ourselves.

Please trust in yourself, Sweeti. Come here and talk to us. Go to an AA meeting or post here or do anything else instead of drinking.

There is an amazing woman inside of you just trying to get out. Your addiction wants to drown her voice in alcohol. Don't listen to it.

Don't worry about other people right now. Your only focus should be on staying sober and getting better.

You can do it.
:)

Of course. Unresolved alcoholism makes you unstable, paranoid, angry, selfish and difficult.

Hi, Id just like to add my voice to the experienced folks here.

In my life ive found that unresolved trauma was and is the reason for my behavior.

I know nothing about you or your past, but if your drinking is he way you are coping, you might want to look into healing whatever is hurting you to beging with? Just a suggestion and my best to you

Hi Sweeti,

I agree with what others have said about this not being the time to work on reconciling the relationship with your mom.mit would be a good topic to talk about in therapy, how is that going?

Have you been able to stay sober? I hope you are, there is a great life there for you to seize, you just need to make the choice to do so.

❤️Delilah

I dont want to hijack this post in any way, I just wanted to say it just helped me tremendously.

Just awesome responses.

Thank you everyone

I’m glad it could be helpful. I think it’s important to focus on you, in a healthy way, and shut everything out that distracts from the most important thing which is getting and staying sober.

It’s not selfish to do that. It’s selfish not to do it, actually. We may not intend to cause problems when we put others first but what we are actually doing is using them as excuses to not take care of ourselves. Which is very selfish. For me, once I saw that I couldn’t un-see it if that makes sense.

Having an elderly bipolar parent is difficult. I understand it well. It’s hard to see through the disorder to the person, it gets so blurry. And you love them, you hurt them, they love you, they hurt you. And they are old and you feel terrible. It’s all nothing you can engage with when trying to get sober and even when you are sober you have to put you first when all is said and done. I didn’t get the gene because it turns out he’s not my father after all. He’s an unmedicated dry drunk. I’m grateful to not have the disorder myself.

Are you drinking?

Hugs.

bexxed

I would add that it doesn’t matter why she shut you out. You can’t change her, or anyone’s behavior. Only you. You can only change your behavior and you can do that beginning right now. I begin every day, by not drinking and it gets easier and easier every day. I know you can, too.

xo-b

Thanks for another lovely message Joe. Others only see that I drink too much. My psych iatrist is the same. I know my problems run much deeper than that and I just drown them. Otherwise I would have been able to stop by now. Getting sober is scary. I become so full of fear. I pace the house. Thanks again Joe.

I think the advice to keep up your mental health has been a pretty common theme in all your threads, Sweeti, but I guess we can sometimes see things differently?

I had a lot of underlying issues too - I made the mistake far too long of thinking I had to solve those things before I could quit.

Don't do that.

It turned out I could stop drinking without having to solve everything first - I just had to consistently keep making the not drinking choice, no matter how I felt.

If that was tough - I reached out for support, and I got through.

If you feel your mental health contributes to your decisions to drink, I think you either need to make that clear to your p-doc or get a new p-doc?

For me, not drinking anymore, no matter what, helped me probably more than anything else to deal with all the underlying stuff :)

D

Thanks Dream for your post. I don’t want to be the one that disappears. It is a choice. No one is holding a gun to my head. I do get great support on here. I am tired too of all the things you listed. Thanks for the encouragement and common sense.

Thanks for your help Dee. You are right. If I tried to solve mental health issues first It could be years before I stopped. I am as of this moment committed to not drinking no matter what. It’s the only way out. I have tried controlled drinking etc

Thanks for sharing your story. All I want to focus on now is sobriety and not endless drama with my parents. You are right in cutting people off who are triggers.

It doesn't have to be forever. Just until you feel stronger.

This is it, Sweeti. Many of us have underlying issues to deal with, but I know from my experience, I accomplished nothing as long as I was drinking. Sobriety had to come first.

It's absolutely impossible to solve underlying mental issues whilst an active alcoholic, mainly because any Dr isn't going to be able to determine anything about how you feel, whilst you are under the influence, because Alcohol is a depressant. By definition it makes you mentally ill. How can a Dr determine whether your illness is or isn't just a by product of your alcohol addiction?

Once you have stopped drinking for a period of time, your mental health will improve, things will become clearer. Then a Dr will be able to treat any underlying issues properly.

I thought I had an unmanageable anxiety problem. Once I stopped drinking I realised that my anxiety problem was nowhere near as bad as I thought. I went for CBT treatment and I was walking into the room going, "actually, I'm ok" The therapist was like, there's not much I can do for you, you seem fine.

Key thing is, alcohol made me feel like that, I wasn't that bad without alcohol.

Stop making yourself ill through drinking, and then you can start working on yourself, along with Doctors, on any treatment you will need.