I am only talk from my experience and that is that 1. NHS alcohol support services are woeful. 2. AA is very powerful.
This may well be because I was still drinking when I accessed them but they certainly didn't make me stop. It was too easy to lie and be believed. I also had lots of very expensive private mental health support. That didn't work either because I never told them I was an alcoholic. It just made me an even more practiced, manipulative liar.
And I was a very good liar. All alcoholics are. It's what we do. Lie to everyone about everything, including of course ourselves. But the real damage is the lies we tell people.
AA works because step one is admitting that we are alcoholics. This is more than just saying, "Hi I'm Shannith and I'm an alcoholic." It means admitting that I am powerless over alcohol.
That I can never control my drinking. I can't cut back, measure it or drink like a normal person. I drink myself to death.
The thing with A.A. is that everyone in the room admits that and once you've done that all that's left is the truth. People share the truth about their experiences and no one bats an eyelid. No matter how terrible the things I have done, how low I have gone, everyone in the room has been there and gets it. No judgement.
All we did is listen, identify and share how it was for us and how using the rest of the steps we find the strength and hope to stay sober just one day at a time.
And how we try to put right our wrongs and help other alcoholics get and stay sober.
It's not a cult and you don't have to believe in God - all of which put me off massively- as well as thinking I could just say I was an alcoholic and, job done. I've admitted it, now hey presto I'm cured.
It's a bit more than that but it's actually very simple. And it's a petty good way to live.
Imagine a place were you could say anything, admit you anything and people will just say, "me too. I'm like that. I think like that, I've been there and this is how I got well and you can too. It's going to be ok."
It's pretty good stuff.
I'd never have believed it was possible to live without drinking. In my case I was physically very addicted. If I stopped drinking I went into seizures- hence the multiple hospital admissions.
I've got cirrhosis, downgraded from advanced liver disease. But I'm healthy. Reasonably sane and sometimes even serene.
It's a miracle I'm still alive and A.A. is full of people just like me.
@loopou66 the best thing you can do is take your DH to a local A.A. meeting. And make him keep going.
Even if you want nothing more to do with him, it could well save his life.
An Al Anon is also wonderful for people how have had to live with or still live with alcoholics. Everyone there understands the disease and will know evey emotion you are going through and will give you a place to be listened to and most of all understood.
I really never thought I'd become an advocate for A.A. but do you know what, I'd not be writing this without the support and love I've had from a bunch of random drunks in various church halls/other odd rooms for hire over the last year.
God (as you understand it/him/her/they/whatever moves in very strange ways indeed 