How to support partner with an alcoholic mother?

[radishvradish]

Hi. My lovely partner, unfortunately, has an alcoholic mother. She is early 60s and been drinking heavily for years, and before that a social drinker.

DP had very unhappy teenage years due to this. He is in contact, but tries to keep it at a minimum. We do visit every few months, as DP wants to see his father who does not want to leave her. It clearly very badly affects DP, and gets him down. He describes how is feels that he's just waiting for her to die.

She has diagnosed alcoholic dementia. She has very strange behaviour. Sometimes unkind other-times just odd. She has fallen several times. She becomes violent when refused alcohol, and has had the police called on her several times. DP worries a lot about his father, but there's not much more he can do if he won't leave.

She has no friends whatsoever. It is heart breaking, because, just occasionally, you get glimpses of the kind woman who was once there. She clearly adores DP, but her own behaviour pushes him away. Clearly she is a very troubled woman.

DP has given up hope of getting her to change. So I wonder, how might I best support DP?

Has he gone to Al-anon? Or had any therapy? Those would be the things I'd recommend. Obviously those are things he has to do himself, but it could be something you suggest and then pick up the slack to allow him time to do that (for example, if you have children or other responsibilities, taking some of those off him to give him time for seeking support).

I don't have an alcoholic parent, but I do have a parent who is alive but no longer present in my life. You experience something called living grief (loss of someone who is still alive as if they have died), but in his case, also anticipated grief (he knows she will die from this and is likely living in a state of constantly anticipating this loss). Having someone to talk to about how I was feeling, and having my sense of loss validated really helped.