Police have just dropped home drunk DH

[MrsJaneyLloydFoxe]

… covered in vomit.

DH went out to work even straight from work, it was meant to finish at 8pm. Woken by DH at 1245 saying ‘come downstairs the police want to talk to you’ . We have three children including a 12 week old baby that was now awake and crying. Police officers said they had found DH vomiting on the pavement in town and had to bring him home. I was so horrified I couldn’t speak.

DH is covered in sick and incoherent. Has vomited again and I’ve left him on the sofa with a bucket.

What do I do? I am so angry. I want him to never do this again. He has a problematic relationship with alcohol - all or nothing - and he has done this in the past and has always said he will stop. This is the first time in about 18 months.

I am heartbroken. I hate him for this and I’m upstairs crying not knowing what to say to him. He showed no sign of remorse. I am sobbing. Please help me know what to say to him and how to handle this.

Hi OP I’m so sorry you’re going through that. I’d be utterly humiliated and even more so for my husband. It sounds like he’s got a bit of a binge drinking issue which I have been through with my husband, maybe once a year where he would drink to oblivion and something would always happen on these occasions - breaking his ankle, being verbally aggressive and ruining our engagement party. We took a separation after the last incident which I initiated which I think scared him and he quit drinking and we’ve been very good since.

I think to some people, alcohol just really doesn’t suit them and your husband might be one of those people. If it completely changes their personality and makes them act out in a way that is so different to who they are… the only real option is for them to not drink.

BUT the decision has to come from them. It’s got to be a lightbulb moment. Ultimatums don’t work.

Ultimatums haven't worked in the past because OP hasn't seen them through. That's not an Ultimatum, just an empty threat.

As with so many threads 1st 2 posts nail it.

If he got that sick at a work event, will work colleagues have seen this? Will he be fit to work today? Does this put his job at risk?

I’d be in the camp where he leaves today, gets sober and earns the right to come back - or you end it permanenetly. Binge drinking/alcoholism are the same thing when it comes to the fall out for families.

Ultimatums don't work period, because you can't manufacture an artificial desire in another individual with an addiction/behavioural issue.

All that "following through" would achieve is OP and her children leaving a still binge-drinking DH. It's in no way a solution when the "problem" in question is the drinking.

Ultimatums won’t work if you don’t follow through OP.

channel your inner molly mae, today he is to leave. Don’t care where he goes or what he does, you’ve been here before and you won’t do it again.

tell him if he’s serious about your marriage he will leave, join AA, do alllll the things and then you can talk once you’ve seen that commitment from him.

and he only gets to come back provided those things continue and if he drinks again he’s back out the door.

Alcohol or drug use usually invalidates life insurance.

Presumably Op couldn't refuse to have him home?

There’s sadly nothing you can get him to do. All you can do is control your response to it. I’m sorry OP it’s entirely unacceptable x

You've had amazing advice op. I just want to wish you luck and strength. The fact that you are reaching out for support now is the very best thing to do for you and your children. You're clearly a fantastic mum.

I am the child of an alcoholic , my mum stayed with him. And whilst I am not resentful towards her , I do wish that she had left him. I saw him behave like your husband and remember the shame of knowing that my neighbours saw him passed out drunk outside our front door many times.

I hope today is a better day and that you find the right way forward for you.

I'd tell him next time the door will be locked and you'll have to spend the night in the cells for being drunk and disorderly. Id not be standing in as his mother to talk to the police when they bring him home.

No point giving him an ultimatum, as others have said it doesn't work and its a type of control

If he wants to drink to this extent then he has to sort himself out and if he gets a criminal record in the process - so be it.

Make sure you have an emergency fund, sort your own life out int he event of having to exit from this partnership. get yourself back to work or training for work etc

They might not know now but they will eventually and it's horrible living with an alcoholic and you never know when the next time will be (experience with step dad). Definitely give him an ultimatum (but usually they don't work like other posters have said) and he needs to attend AA and ask his GP for help as well. Make sure you have access to all the paper work and finances. You don't need this shit, you have a young baby! I hope you got some sleep and you are doing ok x

This is the end. Boot him out. There’s no coming back. I’d have told the police I didn’t want him home and that I was fearful of him. Who does that when they have a tiny baby? Disgusting behavior and you all deserve so much more.

@Justalittlenaughty respectfully , you are wrong.

A person that drinks so much that they end being escorted home covered in sick shouldn't be drinking at all. In this case It is a pattern of behaviour and it is that bad.

Alcohol is an really nasty drug.
A professor I knew who works in addiction and brain says alcohol is one of the very worst drugs ( along with nicotine) in terms of absolute wreckage it does to the body and society-
But Government makes a fortune in taxes selling these toxins.

Possibly the new baby is a trigger with the drinking ( ironically) the extra pressure- but him getting wrecked is not a good way to deal with the pressure.

Hopefully he will want to change- Alcohol is everywhere , and socially acceptable , so not easy for someone with alcohol problems .

Sorry you are having to endure this.

AA is probably the only way.

When he is sober and over the worst of his hangover I'd sit him down and calmly tell him you will not be spending your life and raising your children with someone who you can't trust around alcohol. Tell him that there are some people who aren't able to drink moderately once they start, they're not wired that way, and they almost always end up in a mess. Causing trouble and misery for themselves and other people. The only solution is for people like this not to drink at all. Tell him it's entirely up to him if he drinks again, but if this keeps happening you will leave. Then you will really just need to wait and see what he does. The most likely is you'll have another dry spell before it happens again, and you'll continue to have those punctuated by binges until either he decides to stop or you decide to leave. In all honesty, there is nothing else you can do. You won't fix it...etc.
I would advise if you stay, you keep an eye on frequency escalating or changes in patterns, like starting to drink between binges, because it can be a bit boiling frog. Id also advise that you dont wait too long to leave if it continues as a pattern. Decades of dreading work do's, christmas, weddings, bbqs, constantly on edge watching what he drinks, well, it ruins everything that should be fun.

🙄

Am I misunderstanding? OP says it's 18 months since the DH got drunk?

Probably 18 months since his last binge.

Re ultimatums, these are things you set for yourself, not the drinker in your life. Tell him you will leave if he doesn't stop, because that's what you'll do and you're giving him fair warning. Don't bother telling him as a stick to drive change as it won't work. He will agree, of course he will. Then he will keep to it for a while. He's gone 18 months without help or threat so he can do that again. However, this will have no impact on his future behaviour when be will choose whether to drink or not regardless of what you've said before. He knows well that if he drinks he is ill, the police are involved and you are devastated. If that doesn't give him pause next time then no ultimatum is going to work, because the pull to drink is stronger than his sense, dignity and thought for his family. Give yourself the ultimatum but don't see it as a cure for him.

It's not the timescale that is problematic with binge-drinking, it's the total inability to self-regulate, the excess, and the consequences of getting so completely out of it every single time you do indulge that you have no control, no recollection, injure yourself, inadvertently destroy property, spend money you don't have, embarrass yourself, provoke others, etc etc

It's a totally different form of alcohol abuse to just drinking one glass too many four times a week

Edit - sorry, just realised you asked "since got drunk", not since DH last had a drink.

So the government are no worse that drug dealers. So so many destroyed lives and broken families. Is it really worth it?

That money should go directly to the families affected. It is theirs.

Tell me about it ! My parents were alcohol and I felt like they loved beers, cider and vodka more than us. We were neglected big time and went without a lot of things. Basic things like no socks and always in trouble at school for never having the correct uniform. They couldn't have one drink, they had to drink until they were hammered and fight and bring dangerous people from the pub and have threesomes in the lounge, it was hideous. That's why now I give my kids stability and love.

My parents were alcoholics*

Raging is just a complete waste of breath.
Just say calmly and factually that this is the last time you will tolerate him drinking so dangerously and if it happens again he will have to leave.

He sounds like someone who cannot afford to drink alcohol at all.

But you have to actually mean it.