He has just cracked open bottle number 4

[Lablo]

DP is amazing, honestly in everyway. Apart from his drinking. Every single night. A couple of beers and then at least 2 bottles of red wine. I am working nights tonight and he is still up and has just opened bottle number 4, that’s insane. He is on A/L this week so doesn’t have work.

He is never aggressive or anything when drinking but obviously can barely talk and stumbles around. Yet when he is working he is up at 6:30 bright and breezy, popping his multi vitamins with a big glass of water in his shirt whistling off to work.

I have mentioned this before but he just says everyone likes a drink and he likes a bit more.

bottle number 4?! WTAF???

Four bottles of wine. In one evening. Whilst this is probably more than he usually drinks, he's slowly cranking up the volume of alcohol. It's doesn't get better.

And this has been going on for years?

One day, he will look on the mirror and see the whites of his eyes are slightly yellow. Then yellower. And yellower. And his skin. His liver will pack up as it becomes more scar tissue than functioning liver tissue.

His belly will swell from ascites. He will look pregnant.

Please ask him to stop. Get help. Get a liver check. You're going to lose him.

Drinking that amount of alcohol on a regular basic he's probably got early stage liver cirrhosis. If he carries on it'll be beyond repair and It's really not a pleasant way to go...

I'll be honest, if you don't tell him that him driving in the mornings after drinking is a dealbreaker or report him yourself then you're enabling a dangerous driver.

People like him ruin lives. Mine was one of the ones ruined. It's taken me years to move on from and I'll always have a lifelong condition as a result of someone as selfish and reckless as your husband.

I couldn't bare to look at someone so selfish they put other people at risk every single morning and don't give a shit as long as they get to drink the night before and still enjoy the convenience of driving to work.

the trouble with alcoholic liver disease in my (limited) experience is that by the time there are signs, it is already very serious. my ex was told that he would be dead within 5 years if he didn't stop drinking, the first time he needed to see a dr

Popping back on to confirm something.
My lovely late brother lost his licence. His financee shopped him. He was banned for two years. My sister was outraged she reported him. I wasn't. It didn't save him in the end and we are all devastated. He drank a three litre wine box a night. A bottle of brandy if he was flush. He never got angry over the police, I think he was relieved. Our parent was a police officer.
And all the things your DP can do so could I on two bottles a night. Morning person me. Jolly drunk too. I am a big cheese but my drinking reached the point of effecting my professional reputation. I haven't worked for a year of my twenty month sobriety. I start my new job next week. I have a second chance, some don't. I didn't want to leave my young adult children motherless.
I actually think you need to get angry. Nothing else will work. And FWIW my friend who lost her husband to the drink at Christmas is so fucking angry with him she has changed her name. X

Hats off to you @WendyWagon .
I wish you all the best in the new job and for the future.

@ThePoshUns thank you, that's very kind.

I'm not going to do this to my xbf but how did your late brother's fiancee shop him, did she say ''if you follow him from x to y'' kind of thing. Apologies if that seems really nosy @WendyWagon I don't blame her at all. It's what I would have done out of desperation.

Good luck in the new job @WendyWagon

I'm really sorry to say this but your conversation will probably make no difference at all. There is absolutely nothing you can say or do. It's all on him. It's an addiction. You seem to think that by using the right words you'll change his drinking habits.
My ex was an alcoholic. We had literally hundreds of conversations on the issue. I tried everything I could think of to help him. I tried so many different approaches. He'd make the right noises, sometimes stop drinking for a week or two but he'd always go back to it. The doctor told him he'd be dead within two years if he carried on. His blood tests were actually OK but the doctor knew he'd go downhill quickly if he continued to drink that amount. That scared him in to stopping for 3 weeks then he started drinking more than ever again.
The only thing I didn't do early enough was issue an ultimatum "it's me or the drink". I wish I had. I wish I hadn't stayed with him for so many years, stressed out of my mind. It was utterly miserable and frightening.

This.. also he is drinking behind closed doors which gives it an air of respectability but he's not a million miles away from a street drinker, he's just got more money and a job ( at the moment)
Can you help get him in rehab, this will not end well otherwise.

@Raggammuffin my brother's financee rang the police and gave his registration.
They were living apart when he died. He had his first heart attack at 46. Not overweight, tall, strong, dead.
We make our choices. I would be happy to stand up and say what I use to drink but my friends would be horrified. Female alcoholism is a dirty secret. We have a great thread on alcohol support if anyone reading this needs help.

@WendyWagon what did you use to drink? And how did you stop? What was the lightbulb moment?

And OP my brother was lovely. Kind, generous & talented. Children and animals loved him. Champion fisherman, three girls left without their dad. His best friend died in an accident. He never got over it.

Thanks for your candour @WendyWagon , the xbf I mentioned up thread, I was tempted to secretly order suboxen off the internet and sneak it in his food. But I thought, what if I kill him. So I didn't.
To being with, being with him made me drink more and then after about 2 years I went off alcohol really suddenly. I'd have about 2 units per week. He's doing ok in his job still has even had a promotion since I ended it for his drinking, which he takes as proof I was wrong. And sorry if this sounds insensitive but I reckon it'll be a situation like your brother's. He will be ''ok'' ie, functioning until he collapses. Sorry for you loss. It's such a shame. Wish it had been different. Wish he'd woken up and wanted to CHANGE

He must be so depressed

OP can you give us an update please?like @WendyWagon I was a 49 yr old female alcoholic. Great childhood, very good education, lovely kids, senior job in marketing/PR but it all went downhill when I split from my husband. I'd always liked a drink, from 15. I was drinking at home because I couldn't go out and was bored and lonely and stressed out (two kids in bed and only stayed either dad eow). Working full time in a stressful job. So I had friends round and we'd drink. Thing was, it was a once a week thing for them where as I had different friends around every night, so was drinking every night. Then every afternoon. Then every morning before pony/yard duties and work. Then at work (I kept a bottle in my car and used to pop out frequently). Yes I did, to my shame, drive over the limit. Looking back, I can't believe that I did.
Just sharing this OP so you can see that it's a downward spiral.
You sound lovely but very naive about alcohol dependency. He won't get better until he accepts he is alcohol dependant and gets help. Like the amazing @WendyWagon, I went to a counsellor who helped me realise that I was the only person that could help me.
Yes it cost £50 a week but I was spending more than than on wine.
I hope you are ok and have given him an ultimatum.

Him pottering around in the garden this afternoon doesn't make him not alcoholic. I hope he's not drinking now.

@BlastedPimples wine was my poison. Savigion blanc, champagne, but any wine really. The more expensive the better I collected it, bored the arse of people talking about it and drank it until I fell asleep most nights. My lunches were legendry. I stopped to have weight loss surgery and give my brother a kidney. However I had fallen over at a trade event and flashed my Spankz. I am still mortified. This is the tame version.

From bitter, bitter experience, "a chat" won't change anything. Please seek help/support from people IRL and organisations like Al-Anon. It sounds like you're beginning to see your life for what it is, keep going. Good luck.

Brilliant post @WendyWagon sending you much love and support.

@Paq oh thank you. I'm a bit of a conisor of the AF drinks now.
I have just enjoyed a Cordino.

I use to look like a female version of Sir Les Patterson (Barry humphries character). Funny but not for your loved ones.
Personally I recommend AA. It will shock the beJesus out of the DP. Either it's full of tearful souls or they look like they will have your handbag! Different meetings, different people. Same problem.
And a warning, you can never drink normally again. It's not in your dna. Moderation is the way of madness. It takes too much headspace for alcohol dependant people.
We're sneaky too. I use to fill up my bottles with water , one of our number use to hide them in her hedge!

So @WendyWagon you were pissed most of the time?

And yet you've turned everything around. And look at you now!

Op, I really hope your dh can see how dangerous his drinking is and he needs to reign it in.

My friend's brother, aged 48, is currently dying of liver failure in hospital. They're trying to arrange 24 hour palliative care for him at home so he can die at home.

Nobody can drink as much alcohol as your dh without sustaining serious damage. He's not Superman. Nobody is.

She isn't going to phone the police and give them his reg etc. Fact of the matter is you can talk to him until you're blue in the face but nothing can be done unless he wants to stop drinking. It's a shame because everything else sounds great. He's an alcoholic plain & simple & he will die if he doesn't stop it.

I knew a guy who did this. Two bottles of red religiously every night. Up for work in the morning. Normal, happy life. At the weekends he often had more. It was absolutely nuts. Anyway, he died in his late 70s of something or other but he was basically functioning for his whole entire life. I think his family expected him to eventually hit the wall but he never did.

If you think about your down time, the evenings when you are not working abd he’s drunk, slurring, staggering around, you must know that all of your life together isn’t wonderful. Those evenings are not wonderful. As someone else said, he’s a functioning alcoholic. One day in the not too distant future (based in his level of consumption), he won’t be functioning. If his account that he’s been drinking like this for many years, is true. He won’t be fine, it’s almost inevitable that he will have liver damage by now. The liver is a remarkable organ. It just keeps going with no outward symptoms of damage until it’s totally fucked. My DH (married 8 years, together 15) was a functioning alcoholic in the early years. When that changes, it goes quickly.