I've just added up a typical week's worth

[MorelikeCalzone]

of empty bottles my DP has got through in this past week. I'd say this was a typical week:

6 bottles of wine
5 x 330ml bottles of larger

add to this a large g&t every night

I'm so unhappy about DPs drinking but he refuses or can't change it

That's around 70 units a week. Does he ever have a night when he doesn't drink?

Oh sorry, it's more than that - I only calculated for standard measures of gin.

Rarely has an AF day

Same as my DP.

I cant do anything about it though.... its such a waste of a life, parenthood and marriage

Is that how you want to live? You can’t change him but you can change your life. It’s far too much, and I speak as someone who’d happily swig a G+T every night if I could (and didn’t worry about my health, wallet and waistline).

There's plenty you can do about it.

@Mrskeats what would you suggest then ?

My DP shifted to fairly low alcohol beer a while ago, I think its 2%. And he's gradually cutting down on that e.g. mixing with diet lemodade, alternating with diet tonic.

But the strategy has to come from him. He has to want to do it.

I was with someone for a while who had a drinking problem which in the past had led him to become unemployed and homeless despite being very bright etc. His father was also an alcoholic and that also ended in divorce. I walked away from it. He fell off the wagon again and that was it for me. It's terrifying and destroys families as plenty will confirm on here.
If he won't/can't cut down then the op has a decision to make.
My ex bil is also an alcoholic and he has also ruined his family life.

Unfortunately it’s one of those things that no one can “make” someone do. They have to be ready. I was drinking nightly for about 5 years then one day I just decided I didn’t want to drink every night any more. Once I decided it was easy. Now I can happily enjoy a drink 2 or 3 nights a week and be fine on the other nights. I think it was so easy because it was my decision. I wasn’t doing it for anyone else.

You, unfortunately, cannot change him. He has to want it and do it for himself. The only thing that’s in your control in this situation is whether you want to carry on living with him or not.

Can you appeal to his vanity at all? That much alcohol packs an awful lot of calories, & men in particular tend to put it round their gut - there's a reason why "beer belly" is a phrase. Also, drinker's nose, while not actually caused by drinking, is made worse by it.

It's rotten being around an alcoholic, even someone who doesn't necessarily get drunk that often. So draining. If he's rarely sober in the evening, he has a problem. Does he drink during the day? What time does he start on non-work days?

Has he said anything about his drinking, or is he in denial or not realise he has a problem?

What would he say if you put all the empties in front of him and added up the units?

As well as the damaging effects of alcohol, there's also the calories and the cost aspect. Even cheap wine etc is going to be well north of £100 pm just on his alcohol, which will eat significantly into many budgets.

Does he realise that you don't have to be downing bottles of spirits at breakfast to be an alcoholic or problem drinker? Plenty of people are functioning alcoholics who don't see much health problems until the liver damage shows itself.

Does he acknowledge he has a problem? H drinks more than me but decided to cut to 2 bottles of wine max plus a couple of beers as he was drinking habitually too much

@barberaofseville

i refuse to put the empties in the recycling bin anymore... at the moment there is a weeks worth sitting on the kitchen windowsill

this is a new angle for me.. at some point he will move them away into the recycling bin.

He usually has a g&t before dinner and then a bottle of wine during the course of the evening... the empty beer bottles are from when the weather was sunny the weekend vefire last and he had a few wilst sitting in the garden during lunchtime.