Support group for those affected by someone else's drinking

[fedup078]

Hi
I haven't seen a dedicated thread for the families or partners of alcoholics / problem drinkers so I thought I'd start one for people to check in for support.

My mother was a problem drinker from when I was 12 until she died when I was 36 2 years ago . I was nc at the time

Currently divorcing a drinker and feeling quite low about it all suddenly. I know there was nothing else I could do but it doesn't make it easier .

Have given al-anon a thought a few times but I'm not sure in person / zoom meetings are for me.

Well done it takes an enormous amount of willpower and it hurts. But it doesn't hurt a fraction of what it would if you had them back. I'm waiting to go down for a heart procedure. It would have been easy to let him play the kind saviour of the day but a huge mistake too. I'm surrounding myself with good people, who I can be good to but they are good back. Such a simple thing so hard to find in a relationship.

Good luck @Mememene

Although the drinking and gaslighting etc was a nightmare i never hated him . I knew he had an issue and even though he refused to address it I could never bring myself to shut him out

But now. Since our wedding anniversary and his one night stand stunt. I hate him . It's feels so much more personal and painful . I don't want to hear from him again

I do understand that, I don't hate my now ex, I feel sorry for him. He's not malicious but he is stupid. It made it harder to walk away. I have now and there's no going back. I almost walked back when I was told of my heart problems, I was so scared, I wanted that old him back to look after me, the nice one

The old him has gone, his priority is getting shitfaced, and I do mean shitfaced, and his son who is an abusive female bashing charmer who I won't be in the same room as.

I refuse to allow him to treat me badly, then blame me reacting. Lesson learned though grey rocking now..

In the run up to my heart implant, I had a run of texts offering me lifts to hospital but telling what a truly awful person I was, really nasty stuff, in the same text. I didn't block then as I thought if he was venting by text he wouldn't turn up at the hospital, thankfully he didn't.

What kind of a person does that? He used to be so kind. That person has left the building.

I am hoping that the hate you rightly and naturally have for him now, turns to not giving him a thought and not wasting even that emotion on someone who isn't worthy of your head space.

Xx

@fedup078 I do actually understand how you feel, because my feelings towards my ex changed radically after he died and I found out just how badly he had been abusing our DDs. I may never forgive him - DD2 has just been diagnosed with BPD and PTSD and that is on him. It hasn't affected my relationships with his side of the family, however - they are not him.

Hi, I was just about to ask whether I could join, but reading this last page of posts (I haven't read the rest of the thread yet), I'm not sure I'd fit in - I'm newly separated from my ex, he admits he's an alcoholic (although I think he only says that to shut me up) and I kicked him out the other day....I now regret my decision/miss him and am struggling with things but he seems to have turned it round on me, saying I nagged him too much basically and he won't ever stop drinking etc etc.

I also wonder whether he has some mental health issues but that's another story, but yes anyway, I'm not quite where some of you are yet and could do with getting my head straight somehow.

Hi @Borderlyne why do you think you won't fit in?
Your story sounds v similar to mine
I didn't want to end it but felt I had no choice
Mine also said he would not stop. Told me I was unreasonable to ask him to and also tried for turn it on me

@Borderlyne
Stay! I was in a v similar situation a few months back and found everyone here so supportive and understanding.
Are you going to AlAnon?

@Borderlyne we have all been where you are now. It's a journey and you have to make it at your own pace. Nobody here is going to tell you that you must do this, that or the other, only that in our experience there are better and worse possibilities. We won't whitewash how tough it can be either. Everything you are feeling is normal for someone who is sharing or has shared life with an addict.

If you want to just lurk for a bit longer you're welcome to do that too. We're all here for you if you need us.

Hello. Thank you.

I haven't got it in me to explain everything just now - might try in the morning - but I just can't seem to rid myself of the thought that after 7 years (which isn't that long in the grand scheme of things but is my longest relationship and his too), he's still so willing to just choose drinking over being with us.

He's sleeping in the back of his work van - has found a cushty little campsite that only charges £6 a night to park on, right by the canal and is actually fairly idyllic looking - and has been buying so much camping gear to make his life comfortable and he's eating good food and drinking wine every night like he's on some holiday! And posting about it all on some 'vanlife' Facebook group.

I didn't expect him to regret things bit I did hold out a bit of hope he might and the trouble is, I feel completely abandoned and lost so whenever I see him (which is every day currently as his work stuff is stored in my garage), I feel compelled to say the same stuff over and over again - I want you back but I want you to change...why don't you miss me/us....you're loving life and thats not how it was meant to be...can't believe you're choosing drinking over getting help and getting your family back....to which he replies the reason he left (I had asked him many times to leave and this time he took me up on it), was "because of this - it stresses me out and I feel like I'm having an anxiety attack".

I'm trying to move on as realistically I know he won't change, but I'm also trying to hold onto him because if I move on, it's definitely over (he's made it quite clear that once someone decides they're done, he never goes back even if he wants to).

Silly really.

Turns out I was in more of a mood to talk than I realised, sorry about that!

Don't be sorry! Getting it out is a good thing.

You're grieving for the relationship you thought you had. Living with an addict feels like living with someone who is cheating on you, because that person is prioritising something else completely. And you're powerless to do anything about it.

As a first step, you need to seek help for yourself. You can't change what he does, but you can change how you respond to it. An important part of that is self care, and counterintuitive as it feels, that means putting yourself first.

You can try Al-Anon, which is the sister organisation of AA but for families and loved ones, or you can try Smart Family & Friends, which is a CBT-based support programme that runs alongside SMART recovery. Both focus on giving you better coping strategies for dealing with your situation and taking care of yourself, and will also teach you the difference between supporting and enabling.

He currently has no insight, he genuinely believes there is no problem and that he is living his best life. In your place I would progress the separation into something more permanent - this is may be more or less difficult depending on whether you are married or not. You don't need him at your house every day, you need him gone so that 1) you can get on with your own recovery and 2) he can learn that he isn't living his best life and that his behaviour has consequences. This is the hardest bit. Keep working at it in your own time and things will get better. Life without an addict is wonderful.

Thank you for the advice.

He does say he misses us and that he does get bored - which is the reason he gave for getting wine the other night; he had told me a few hours prior that he "might only have a beer or two" (I know, I shouldnt ask but couldnt help myself that day) but that he got bored around 7.30 and went and got a couple of bottles of wine from the local shop.

He always phrases the wanting to drink as "really fancying a beer" and although recently he has been labelling himself as an alcoholic, I'm not sure he really believes it as he minimises it a lot and says that there would be no point going to the GP because he'd "probably lie to them about how much I have and even if I didn't and they gave me advice, its highly unlikely I'd follow it".
He also says if he couldn't or wouldn't give up when he was here, how could he when he's living on his own, bored in the back of a van.

I find it weird that he doesn't even want to try and stop drinking. I know he said his life would be boring without it but.... why would he want to continue?

I might try smart recovery because I'm really just waiting for him to turn around and say he wants to move back in - but if he did that, at best all I'd get is him only drinking at the weekend and being depressed the rest of the week.

Having said that, I am guilty of suggesting drinking mid way through the week sometimes, even when he had said he wouldn't drink. I don't know why, other than I know deep down that's what makes him happiest and I didn't want him to feel uncomfortable. Also it would've been nice just to be able to "have a drink" now and again without all the hand wringing - because anytime he suggested a drink, I'd just be tense and upset, even if I said no and he agreed not to, I'd be on pins then feeling rubbish.

That's why I'm finding it so hard, I think.
He did stick to only drinking at weekends some weeks when I asked him to, then sometimes he would hint at drinking again on Sunday, Monday or Tuesday and I'd usually agree, with the caveat that we stopped "tomorrow".
Then he would ask again mid week and I'd go off on one at him, he would then be confused because sometimes I mention it midweek and he said its mixed messages.

I wonder whether the mixed messages were a lot the problem and would things have been different if I'd set firmer boundaries? Or would he just turn into a secret drinker then?

I'll look into smart recovery family and friends but alanon doesn't appeal to me...

Al-Anon doesn't appeal to me either, the group I'm part of is independent but runs much more along SMART lines.

You've got a lot of things tangled up in your head - part of it is you're enabling because you want the man you loved back, part of it is that you want normality, and that includes normal drinking (but you know that isn't possible for him) and part of it is that the anxiety of living with an alcoholic just colours everything you think and do. I think a CB T based approach will really help you unpick all that so that you can develop clear responses and coping strategies.

And love yourself a little more, you aren't the problem here.

Please stop trying to think of things you could have done differently
There is nothing you have done which has caused this
I'm guilty of doing the same but really I know the only thing I did wrong was giving him too many chances and letting it get too far . He would have drank no matter what I did .

If there's 'a script' for cheaters there's definitely one for addicts too
All our stories are so similar

Hello everyone, I've been advised to join this thread by a very kind MNetter who received support from here with her alcoholic partner. I posted recently about my 'D'P and was querying if his behaviour was abusive. The example I posted is just one of many situations with him.
www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/4632080-is-this-abusive (link for anyone who wants some context)
He currently has covid and has been even worse to be around. I at least get some respite from him when he's at work normally. He stayed in bed all day yesterday "cos covid🙄" then sat up all night drinking. Back in bed now and will be there all day. This is normal behaviour of him when he's not ill too. I essentially feel like he's only with me as I make his life a little easier. I know I enable so much of his behaviour, but he would be absolutely intolerable if I didn't. He quite often behaves as if he doesn't even like me. He had me in tears about something this morning and was so cold about it. Our sex life is rubbish. He would prefer to watch porn than have intimacy with me. I don't know whether this is typical alcoholic behaviour or just him. I suppose it doesn't really matter but it hurts to know that "even an abusive alcoholic" doesn't want me if that makes sense? I know in the grand scheme of things the intimacy should be the least of my concerns but for some warped reason it's one of the things that bothers me the most. Has anyone else experienced similar?

I read your original thread. This isn't just an alcohol situation, this man is abusive in any case.

Your thinking currently is 'what am I like if even an abusive alcoholic doesn't want me' when it needs to be 'bloody hell, I deserve better than an abusive alcoholic'. I would recommend doing the Freedom Programme and generally working on your self esteem.

It does sound as if he also has a dysfunctional relationship with alcohol, and given the state of the rest of your relationship I would just get the hell out. The getting out is hard work but the end result is worth it. Then spend some time being single and learning to love being single so that you won't go for some second rate shitty abusive man in your next relationship!

It's good that you understand that you are enabling him and understandable that you are concerned about his reaction when you stop - but ending the relationship it ultimately the answer to that proble,. Good luck! Keep posting here for support and to vent, we will always tell you honestly what we think (it'll be 'it's not you, it's him').

Hello everyone. I need some support and advice please. I don't even know where to start, really.

If my DP has an unhealthy relationship with alcohol, but simply denies that, even though its 90% the reason we are in the process of deciding whether to split up, there's no hope, is there. It's heartbreaking. He lives beer more than me, but he scoffs if I say that.

Sorry, loves beer...

@Lieslies if he loves beer more than he loves you, then breaking up is the right thing to do. It hurts (pretty much everyone on this thread has been there) but it's the best thing. I know a few alcoholics who have found recovery with their partner standing by (my Dsis' partner is one) but I know far more who have not.

Please get some support for yourself to help you detach and cope with the feelings of loss and guilt. The two obvious sources are Al-Anon (the branch of AA for relatives of addicts) and SMART Family& Friends. Which one is best for you depends whether the AA approach works for you or whether you prefer something based in CBT.

Whenever I get pissed off with the fact that my stbxh chose booze over me I think of my mother who absolutely loved my father as much as anyone could love anyone... yet still would not quit the drink and eventually he left her
She spent the next 8 years until she died (and many years before that as he'd had an affair 15 years previously too) totally bitter and angry, yet would not address the root cause, which was her ridiculous drinking.
I'm 100% convinced they would have stayed together had it not been for her drinking.

It's hard because a lot of the time he can drink fairly normally, but when he doesn't, it's really bad. Binge drinking? So he sees it as going a bit mad sometimes but not a big deal. But I can't live with that any longer.

He recently promised not to drink for a month (it was making him very depressed), as part of us working on our relationship, and he managed 3 days. His attitude is that as he didn't get actually drunk (which he didn't) , it doesn't matter. But it's made me feel one beer is worth more than our relationship. He thinks I'm being OTT about it.

@Lieslies if he can't manage more than 3 days without alcohol then there's a problem worth walking away from. My late husband was also depressed, but persisted in drinking despite knowing alcohol is a depressant.

If you look at the criteria for whether someone is a problem drinker, you'll find that one of them is whether alcohol is affecting the person's relationships with friends and loved ones. Look up the AUDIT questionnaire online and score it as if you were him, you'll see.

I was reminiscing last night and remembered when we both went 6 weeks without a drink
This seems totally baffling to me now considering how bad his drinking was both before and after this stint
I wonder if he was secret drinking at the time but I think I would have noticed
So why could he go 6 weeks then but couldn't even abstain when I was a week overdue with ds and could have had to go to hospital at any moment ?

Thank you all for the advice.