My husband - How to help him without leaving?

[SubtlePanic]

My husband drinks one bottle of wine a day. He does this after work which finishes (for him) at 10pm and before he goes to bed at midnight. So it’s a lot of alcohol to consume within 2 hours. In the day he gets up at 7, brings me coffee and breakfast and then walks (often runs) a 5k with the dog. He cooks, cleans and makes me laugh. He is a kind and gentle husband. He is very attractive, looks as fit as a fiddle, well dressed, well respected at work. He basically seems like he has his shit together to everyone in the outside world. He goes to work in the afternoon and whilst he finds his job a bit mundane, he earns decent money. He doesn’t really have friends anymore, he did have a large group of childhood friends and is still connected with them on social media but they party pretty hard every weekend it seems (all 40 somethings like us) and he doesn’t really have the energy for that and i don’t drink. He’s also an introvert and would rather not socialise if he can help it. He loves my parents and my Dad is probably his best friend. we see them frequently. My family is full of male heavy drinkers , so my husbands habits just sort of blend in.

As a drunk he just becomes quiet and a shadow of himself. It’s like he isn’t really there. He doesn’t say or do anything hurtful to me, he’s just….boring to be honest. I don’t think anyone could consider his behaviour abusive towards me. I’m completely financially independent, we share one property but I own another in my name alone, so I could easily leave if I wanted to, but I don’t want to. I love every single thing about him, except the alcohol. The only person he is abusing is himself and it is painful to watch at times, and I worry why he feels this need to sink into the abyss most nights.

At the weekend he’ll have 2 bottles on a Saturday and sometimes 2 on a Sunday, sometime he’ll have none at all. The occasional ‘nothing’ day leads him to believe he can take it or leave it, thus his ongoing belief that he is a not alcoholic. Of course I know he is. His father was an alcoholic. The type that drinks with breakfast and has his own stool at the pub. I think that’s what my husband uses as the benchmark of ‘official alcoholic’. But he knows really, deep down, that he has the same problem in a slightly different shaped bottle.

He drank 3 bottles of wine today. Well, it was a box which contains 3 bottles worth. He did this last weekend too. So it seems his limit is increasing. He was properly drunk, slurring his words, glassy eyed, which I haven’t seen for a while. His poor body was so used to 2 bottles. It made me angry. I stupidly confronted him while he was drunk and we had a pointless conversation with me crying and begging him to stop but he won’t fully remember it tomorrow. He will probably be remorseful and might even not drink anything. The cycle briefly interrupted.

I do not want to leave my husband. The thought makes me feel sick. I don’t even know where I would start. My reason would only be his drinking. I’d prefer to stay and support him through quitting. He does try to quit from time to time. He has read a couple of books. But he can only last a week, maybe a few weeks sometimes. Then something triggers him (he doesn’t know what) and he very casually says “I just fancy a drink you know? Just one, nothing mental” and before the week is through, he’s back to his usual 2 bottles. Or I guess it might be a box from now on.

I’ve suggested AA but he says it’s just religious nonsense. I found what looks like nom-secular group locally but he says not to worry, it’s fine and he can do it on his own.

I’ve had counselling in the past and I was advised not to intervene when his drinking increases. If I wish to ‘hang around’ and support him that is my choice, but to not deprive him of the rock bottom he may need to hit in order to get proper help.

I think a rock bottom may be approaching, but it is so hard to watch. A big part of me feels angry with him, but I know this addiction isn’t his fault and I want to stay compassionate and supportive.

There are lots of alcoholics in this forum yet all the advice to spouses of alcoholics seems to be a blanket ‘you must leave him’. I don’t understand the logic of this and it’s not what addiction specialists advise either, from what I’ve read anyway. So how do I stay and support him? What do I say? What do I do?

Im curious, if you are an alcoholic, did your spouse leave you? Or are you being supported by them? What do they say/do to help you? What doesn’t help?

Sorry, long post. Didn’t want to drip feed.

Thank you. I do have loads of swirling thoughts. I feel sick most of the time and haven’t eaten properly since Monday.

For the first time, I feel like I’m having a shift in mind set, towards that of leaving. But the thought honestly terrifies me and I feel nauseous just typing it. All the upset that would cause, he is so deeply rooted in my family. My family love him to bits and my Dad, especially, has a really close bond with him. He’s like the Dad my DH never had. Our dog 🥺. However, I honestly don’t know how unhappy he would be. I feel certain he hasn’t drank since Saturday (I’m not going out of my way to check, but can’t see any empties, but he has been known to hide booze so no point relying on this) and I’ve largely stayed out of his way. He’s being pleasant, but doesn’t seem worried. He hasn’t asked if we can chat even though everything has changed since Saturday.

So I feel more as if I would be breaking other peoples hearts now, but not so much my own, and possibly not his either. But it’s still making me feel sick so maybe I’m not that comfortable.

I dreading this weekend as I can’t keep avoiding him. But thanks for saying there’s no need to rush. And this isn’t an emergency, I’m perfectly safe here with him.

How did I get here? 🙈

But dealing with it that way has been your coping mechanism, and it’s understandable

I am glad that it was me that was the drinker and not the partner. I honestly think being the partner and having no say in it must be harder than being the addict and the person with the responsibility.

I hope he’s able to change OP x

@SubtlePanic

Look up Fear, Obligation, and Guilt (FOG).

I think you're mired in it. It's really easy to get stuck in it.

If you do look it up, do a bit of reading about it, and reflect on it.

@SubtlePanic none of this is on you. He is the one doing the damage. You need to stop stressing about how your decision will affect other people. They are not having to live with this and you are. Stop searching for bottles -you can be virtually certain that he is drinking, if not now then tomorrow. Accept that this is the situation and think about what YOU want from life. If you feel that you can live like this, then nobody on here can make you leave. But he is clearly in denial and has been for years, and it is very likely that his behaviour will deteriorate to a point where living with him becomes unbearable.

This really spoke to me, as the ex-wife of an alcoholic. A successful, educated man, who used to be on 1 bottle of wine a night, then two. I think I always wanted to rescue him. It became so lonely; I would look after the kids in the evenings and, when I'd got them to bed, he was too far gone to be good company. Our sex life declined because of the drink too. As our kids got older I didn't want them to see him drunk at night. I never asked him to give up for me because I knew he wouldn't do it. You're right; his primary relationship was with alcohol - I never thought of it that way before.
I did ring AlAnon once, years ago, asking them if 1 bottle of wine a night was dangerous for him. I was really thrown when the person on the helpline asked how I felt about the drinking, and batted that aside; I was only concerned for his health. They told me that how I felt about this did matter. I was uncomfortable with this and ended the call, but that brief conversation did help me over the years. I stayed with him for at least 5 years too long, maybe 10; I look back now and see I made so many excuses. OP, it sounds like you don't have children ; that at least makes it much easier for you to think clearly.

This post made me really sad. This was me 5 years ago. Except my ex partner continued increasing. Eventually I was brave enough to leave. Within 10 months she was dead. At just over 40.

What can you do? Stop suggesting things like AA. He doesn't want to stop. He isn't ready/can't stop. If he wants to go to AA, by all means support him. But you know that this is a man firmly entrenched in regular, heavy, dangerous level drinking - and it is increasing.

You say there's no problem as he's just 'a bit boring' (which by itself is enough to want to leave - if your partner is boring every single night, why stay?) but you know his drinking is increasing. And alcoholism is a condition/disease/problem (however you view it) where typically it will get worse. and worse. and worse.

The best thing you could do is to read a lot about enabling, and co-dependency, and what end-stage alcoholism and liver failure is like, as this may well be in his/your future if nothing changes.

I haven't read more than your OP as it's too triggering for the hell I went through, but I hope that you don't have kids. Please be brave enough to look at this situation without the pull of 'but I love him' and ask yourself what your future realistically looks like with this man. There is no shame in walking away. Good luck and very best wishes to you. Here if you want to DM. x

I also want to say something I wish someone had said to me a couple of years before my DP died of liver failure. Stop waiting for 'rock bottom'. It can take a very long time to get there - and once there, there's no guarantee that the alcoholic will have some epiphany and suddenly want to recover (and continue to want to recover!) For some, rock bottom is the start of a very slow, painful end. Not everybody comes back up from rock bottom.

Someone told me I was stealing DH's rock bottom.....they were right, and I think it gave me an extra two years of hell before he died. I felt I had no choice but to call him ambulances but now I'm not so sure

@BritInAus I've always felt that what matters isn't the drinker's rock bottom but your own - the point where you really feel the 'no more' in your gut and it gives you the strength to come out of the FOG. I can identify exactly when that moment happened for me, down to the date and time of day. OP feels like she's heading that way. Detachment is good, keep working at it, OP.

@pointythings oh, absolutely. I remember (several) of these moments for me in the last 3 or 4 years of our relationship. And the final one wasn't really a big deal at all in many ways - but in that moment I had absolutely clarity, I was done. I was so resolute that this was actually it - it gave me the strength to say those words out loud.