Do you know an alcoholic? What has happened to them?

I know of 2 people who agreed they had a problem and turned their lives around - there is hope.

I live with a recovering alcoholic who hasn’t had a drink for five years. He’s the man I married again, thanks to huge willpower and AA.

My ex/children's dad - he got sober a few years ago, and married the woman who he met shortly after we split. They were on and off as he was drinking but eventually got married a few years after he got sober. Both are now very religious. I dont chat to him about it, we just parent amicably, but its a huge feat. He never stopped for me, or his kids, or his now wife, he literally hit rock bottom then started on AA.

OMG that is one of the saddest stories I think I've read on here. I am so sorry, poor poor girl.

First husband. He left when the children were tiny. He married a drinker as his second wife. Embezzled a million pounds. Told a thousand lies. She divorced him. He ended up with a warrant out for his arrest. Committed suicide in a cheap hotel when our children were in their 30s.

Unfortunately, they have all died.

One, my grandfather, who lasted a long time, but died horribly in his early seventies from a combination of no less than four unpleasant alcohol related cancers (of the throat, tongue, stomach and bowel), along with liver cirrhosis and poor lung function.

Another, a young female relative-by-marriage who died aged 35 from alcoholic liver failure which set in after bariatric surgery made her switch overeating for drinking.

A school friend who died last year aged 45 from a massive gastrointestinal bleed caused by oesophageal varices, because of liver failure from persistent alcoholism. She left behind two teenage children.

Another relative (male) who died of a heart attack aged 60 which was caused by organ failure due to alcoholism.

All of them struggled with poor past decisions they had made in their lives, bereavement, trauma and depression.

Sadly, most really serious alcoholics end up dead. 😞 You cannot change them, only get out, protect yourself and your child, and get them access to professional help. Contact your GP for support and focus on yourself.

Some time after losing my mum I went to volunteer in addiction services, initially in a prison rehab unit. I really loved it, learned so much, and am glad I went for it. But obviously, I only had a second hand experience of addiction, and at that time no professional training in supporting people with substance dependency.

We used to do these group sessions with guys who were on methadone while in prison, they'd be released and be back within days often. I remember once expressing surprise to a colleague at how few people achieved recovery, let alone maintained it. They laughed and said if one in a hundred of the guys they worked with made it a week or more without relapsing, that was good going. They did it because often it took fifty relapses on the trot for one stint at recovery to stick. And of course, everyone deserves the support to try enter recovery, no matter how many times they've tried before.

It really hit home for me how the stats are against people who are addicts/alcoholics.

The sad part is that the booze/drugs seem like the solution to a problem at first, then over time you need more and more for the same effect, and within very little time you're now physically dependent and need even more to get even a slight effect, and a short time later you no longer experience any positive effect from the substance, you're merely using/drinking to avoid withdrawals, which can range from being able to kill you to making you want to die to escape it.

It's like quicksand and often people don't realise they're in it until they're stuck in it.

That's not to be hopeless or say people can't recover, many can. But the superhuman amount of effort it takes, and support, and courage, is immense.

Two sadly both passed away

Your husband could beat this but he has to want to do so.

I know one, she lost her marriage, her house, her job and her child. Even the idea of losing her child didn't stop her drinking. She looks dreadful as she has replaced alcohol addiction with not eating, she thinks she looks good as everyone tells her how great she looks.

Her personality has changed completely, she isn't the person I first met before her drinking got out of hand.

My brother. Functioning alcoholic until his mid sixties then massive stroke at 64. Now lives in a nursing home paralysed doen one side.

Maternal grandfather - dropped dead of a stroke at 60
Maternal uncle - died at 47, bowel rupture/sepsis
Maternal uncle - had massive heart attack at 45, barely survived and has lived a shell of a life ever since.

Fractured the entire family.

Get out while you can OP, it's no life to live.

My step-father, a violent, aggressive alcoholic with a mean streak in him a mile wide even when sober. He was also addicted to weed. Smoked and drank every penny we had, while mentally and physically abusing myself and my mother. She was his enabler and refused to believe anything was wrong and hit me herself if I tried to tell anyone. Everyone I knew in their lives ended up going NC, including me. As far as I am aware they are both still alive but they can rot in hell as far as I am concerned. She was drinking along with him by the time I cut them off.

Take your child and run, OP. You can't control your partners behaviour, but you can control yours. Your child is going to have a much better life as a result of you leaving, a healthy relationship with at least one parent and a much better chance of having a good life as an adult. Your life will be immeasurably better. My parent's addiction and abuse destroyed my child hood and crippled me mentally as an adult.

If there’s an alcoholic in your life, what has happened to them?

I did know one.

He died.

I know someone, they are self medicating and slowly loosing everything and everyone - children, partner, home and at some point job. They manage to not drink (we think) when looked after/ kept busy, but as soon as they’re alone they binge.

I knew one.
His alcoholism gave him throat cancer and he died a long and painful death. He was the most glorious man but the drink just had too much of a hold on him.

I loved him and still do but I also have ultimate respect for my auntie (his wife) who endured an awful lot she didn't deserve.

So much sorrow in these posts. I wish alcohol didn't exist.

I know loads of them. They’re sober and generally doing great. I’m an alcoholic, going on 3 years sober now nearly.

I have a fantastic life, happy marriage, happy well adjusted children. Good mental health, good boundaries and coping mechanisms.

People with drinking problems in my experience who get sober are much more together, successful and functional than the non-alcoholics I know. Because they’re sorting their shit out.

A lot of my friends who aren’t alcoholics have horrible mental health and terrible coping mechanisms. They aren’t drinking every night, but they aren’t functioning great either. The thing about getting sober is that it completely turns your life upside down and if you’re doing it right, you’re going to come out the other side a whole different person put back together in a different way. I can deal with hard stuff when it happens. I have good boundaries. I have a good support system. I take care of myself mentally and physically.

I think there is a tendency to think that everyone who is an alcoholic is doomed to die a sad lonely death drinking alone in a bedsit. It’s just not the case at all. But it’s simply because people have absolutely no idea that the happy put together people in their lives are recovering alcoholics. Other than Dh, no one in my life knows really (though they know I don’t drink anymore). No one else I know who’s sober, with the exception of a few who have very public personas as people in recovery, goes around announcing it, so the stereotype remains because people just don’t realise.

2 in my husband’s family. One stopped drinking in his 40s, but sadly died a few years later. His poor body was just trashed from the alcohol. Another stopped drinking in his 30s and is now in early 70s. He’s very unwell with a host of different conditions, some of which his doctors attribute to the drink. His life has been fulfilling in a career and family sense, since he gave up alcohol. But he’s never been properly healthy.

NC.

So sorry for what you're dealing with @BottleDown but well done for taking steps to exit the relationship. I'm sure you know about alcoholism being a family disease - it's something that children really shouldn't be exposed to. The damage is immense. I have some idea of how hard what you're going through is but please, please follow through on making that break, for you and your child's sakes.

I was in a (same-sex) relationship with an alcoholic for two years. I didn't realise she was an addict at the start, having had no exposure to alcoholism in my own lifetime, and being (ironically) tee total myself. We didn't live together which also made it harder to really witness. I worked it out after the first year, spent the second year trying to do all the things I now know from bitter experience to be utterly, utterly pointless - pouring hidden alcohol away when I found it, trying to persuade her to see that she was killing herself, planning days out hoping she'd have something to look froward to which would distract her (only to have them all ruined and cancelled as she'd be drinking again), genuinely thinking that after every big conversation I'd actually got through to her and she'd now finally realised what needed to be done <hollow laughter> Trying to manage and resolve it, basically. I remember when I learnt the 3 C's - you didn't cause it, you can't control it, and you can't cure it. That was a revelation. Never a truer set of words spoken.

In the end I left (well, actually she threw me out and I just didn't go back.) It took a lot of strength as I had loved her and it was hard to see her destroying herself. In one of our conversations she had admitted: "I know I'm fighting for my life here" so she knew it, which made it harder to leave. But I knew it was the only thing to do. I couldn't help her, she was beyond help, she didn't want help. She wanted to sit in her flat drinking and blaming everyone else. I could choose to get (further) dragged down by her or make a break. My presence wasn't going to change the outcome either way.

She died 6 months later. It was a surprisingly peaceful death, she was very lucky given that by that time she was in a cat and mouse situation of being hospitalised, released and getting herself re-admitted through drinking almost constantly. They were in the process of widening her oesophagus as it was effectively sealing up due to the amount of alcohol she was consuming and the resultant vomiting. She'd had minor tears and effectively died from one leaking slowly but I gather if it had been a major one that had ruptured violently it wouldn't have been a nice way to go. A woman posted on here not so long ago about her brother dying in this way and I recognised what she was discussing. My ex was 51 when she died.

She came from a very disadvantaged background and had risen to be an Oxford don and to work all round the world. Which made it even more tragic somehow.

I'm still supporting her now 85 year old mother who has never got over it.

Some people do recover. One of them is my gardener - after a 25 year addiction he did AA and has been dry and functional for years now. Part of the reason I employ him is because he's kept going winning that battle despite everything life has flung at him and I want to support him. But the truth is that recovery is extraordinarily rare. I'm now in another relationship and my partner used to work in alcohol cessation services (though we met quite randomly.) She's told me the stats on recovery and it's vanishingly low - something like 2% success to 98% failure. Sadly very few alcoholics permanently recover. Please don't waste your life and that of your child waiting/hoping that your partner will be in that minuscule minority. One thing I know - if an alcoholic is determined to recover, they will - without or without support. If an alcoholic hasn't got that determination they'll fail even if every bit of support in the world is made available to them.

There is tons of support for people in your shoes on the Alcohol Support threads. Pointy Things runs a great thread for those in your situation, I'd strongly suggest you look that up.

Sorry for the long post.

All the very best to you and your little one 💐

Yes. Her were children were recently removed by social services and to be honest they should have been removed a good year before it finally happened. She considers this the greatest of injustices, because she loves her children. I'm sure she does love them. No-one doubts that. Not enough to stop drinking though. I doubt she'll recover, I think she will die from it. Incredibly, her liver is apparently still holding up, but it can't forever. Or she'll walk into traffic or something. Maybe this sounds very defeatist and who knows, maybe she'll surprise us all, but you have to understand how long this has been going on.

Yeah, my Dad. He'll outlive us all. Drank from teens to early 60s, hardcore drinking too. Late 80s now, normal age related health stuff.

Two uncles died from liver failure.

My sister died in her mid 30s leaving a young child. She actually killed herself but it was because she had been told that her body was fucked and her ex has got social services involved.

My step dad died early 70s of liver problems.

My mum is early 70s and began drinking heavily in her 50s. She now has Korsikoffs and looks like she’s in her 90s. She’s bitter and blames everyone else for her situation. She has broken her hip twice after falling.

Both dead young. One left a 5 year old with one parent and the other drunk himself to death deliberately. People always ask why I’m boring and avoid alcohol and pubs. Don’t allow it in my home nore so I allow my kids anywhere near a person drinking it.

I personally know 2 who both died. One from stomach cancer at 59 (was more low-grade alcoholic- but this type of cancer is known as the drinker’s cancer) and the other fell down stairs and choked to death on vomit. They both made everyone around them miserable.

my stepchild’s mother is an alcoholic and it’s only a matter of time before something untoward happens to her because of it. 3 out of 4 kids are no contact with her. The other is too young to make that decision. It’s hell for everyone involved. Social services are involved as are the police.

You need to get away. This is going nowhere positive.