Continuing support group for those affected by someone else's drinking

[pointythings]

Our current thread is nearly full, and it's too valuable to lose in the mists of time, so this is thread 2. Come here if you are struggling with a loved one's drinking - partner, parent, child, friend, there's support for you here no matter which person in your life is struggling with the drink and having an adverse impact on you. The women on here have all been there or are still going through it. We support and advise each other, we don't judge, we listen.

Original thread here to refer back to: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/alcohol_support/4581221-support-group-for-those-affected-by-someone-elses-drinking

@CharlotteByrde thanks for the advice! Thankfully, I have a stable and well-paid job, and since he's contributed so little for so long, I know I can manage fine financially. I would hope to buy him out of the house, which I should be able to afford. I've spoken to a lawyer before so I know the basics of how assets/debt would be dealt with. Again thankfully, our finance are completely separate (being financially separate and independent would be my one piece of life advice), but I don't know how much he owes and I'll confess that I have been in denial about that. I keep an eye on my credit rating, and I've got nothing to suggest that he's taken out any debt in my name or on the house.

@Seaside1234 I’m so glad to hear that you’re on top of things financially . I read your post incorrectly and thought your mortgage etc hadn’t been paid since lockdown and was terribly worried for you. It sounds like you are in a much solid position than I imagined which is a relief. My basic comment remains fhe same though- get the wheels turning and go for it.

@CharlotteByrde no, sorry, it doesn't read very clearly! I meant that I've been paying everything - have been carrying us almost completely financially and practically for years.

Place marking for when I feel able to speak and share my experience. I have read every post on this thread and it resonates so much with me ❤️

I'm glad I have found this nice support group.

My mum is an alcoholic. From when I could remember, she had always drank weekends and most evenings, but she was functioning and held down a job when I was younger.
Then around 16 years ago now, she met her (deceased now) partner who was also an alcoholic. She lost her job and basically sat in the living room with him drinking for 16 years.

During those 16 years, she had a few blackouts/collapses and as a result fractured her back, burnt herself with a boiling kettle, and bruised her face so badly she was admitted to hospital to check for broken facial bones. The doctors at the hospital suspected DV as she looked so awful (there was no DV, they very much loved each other and he was far far too frail to hurt her) so they reported it to the police.

After this instance, my mum decided to stop drinking vodka, but still drank cider and 6% wine daily.

My mums partner died of liver cirrhosis back in October, and she has been very upset and I guess as a result, drinking more than normal.
Then on Sunday morning, I received a text from her telling me that she had fallen down the stairs and fallen again in the bathroom, now she was scared to get out of bed to get herself water.

I went round to my mums and she was in bed in a lot of pain, so I took her to the hospital where they did some scans and x-rays. It turns out she fractured two more vertebrae in her upper back and a vertebrae in her neck!

The hospital staff were great with her and urged her to stop drinking because of her chronic liver failure. They sent an alcohol nurse to speak with her, and the nurse advised we get her an appointment with a local centre who can help her with a plan to gradually reduce then stop drinking. At the time my mum seemed onboard with this, and I think it's the first time she has admitted to me that she does have a problem. So I told her to write down exactly what she is drinking daily, which she has been doing.

Her appointment is booked for Monday.
I talked to her yesterday and she said that once she has been detoxed and she's better, she will just drink on the weekends
I told her it was a very slippery slope, and it's likely she will slip back into the habit of drinking daily. I reminded her of her chronic liver disease and told her that the next stop will be cirrhosis of the liver and she will end up dead.

If you have got this far, thank you for reading. I guess I just need a handhold. Or any advice would be great. I think that alcohol has been the main point of her existence for so long that she's really daunted by the idea of never drinking again.

@HazeBaze glad you found us. You need to do your best to emotionally detach as much as you can (I know that is very much easier said than done). Your mum has been drinking to excess for a very long time and it sounds as if she isn't ready or able to give up alcohol. As you suspect, the likelihood is that she will quickly go back to her old habits. Did the hospital staff say she had chronic liver failure, because if that is the case the liver damage is probably beyond the point of being reversible?

After drinking each day over Christmas my DH says he is going back to not drinking on weekdays and has managed that this week

However his sleep is really poor, he is struggling to get and stay asleep. I'm worried he will be back to drinking again soon to help with this and because it is the weekend.

Still teetotal myself and have been over six months now (was not that heavy a drinker in the first place).

Thank you for your reply.
They said it was chronic liver disease. I'm just hoping that the people we meet with Monday can try to spur her on to quit completely.

Hello @HazeBaze welcome to this lovely, kind group. I haven't got much sensible to say today but I did quickly want to reply as another member of the alcoholic mum club. More a brief understanding hug rather than any solid advice.

I think I only want to say that you must remember (or accept, if the idea is new to you) that you cannot do anything to change or cure her. Sadly it simply isn't possible. Only she can change things.

@Orangesandlemons77 I think if you accept he drinks because he's an alcoholic it might be easier for you to make decisions about whether you want to continue to live with his drinking. Alcoholics are far more likely to have sleep problems than the general population. There's absolutely nothing you can do about that and worrying about whether he is sleeping or not and going to use alcohol to self-medicate is just distressing you. It isn't helping him - no amount of worrying is going to change things and his promises may well turn out to be meaningless. Can you keep living like that?

Thing is, alcohol messes with sleep. If your husband wants good quality natural sleep, he needs a longer period of complete sobriety for his brain to reset. This is the first and most obvious benefit of doing a dry month; you reset your sleep. I would suggest he tries a whole month dry.

Thank you for your lovely message. I hope your mum gets herself better.
I know it's only them that can decide, I just hope that she decides enough is enough.

@HazeBaze my fingers are crossed for your mum's appointment on Monday.

This is quite an interesting article on alcohol's effects on sleep re alcoholics. It seems quite a complicated relationship. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2778757/#:~:text=Among%20patients%20admitted%20for%20alcoholism,)%20(see%20table%201).

I am another who dealing with what I think is descending in to alcoholism in my mum. I think she is probably drinking a whole bottle of red wine a day and she is in her 70s. Is this likely to bring about liver disease/failure? Or do some people have very tolerant/robust livers and seem to cope with it?

Thank you so much, I will come back here to say how it went.

Hi Yumyi, I'm not sure if you read my post above, but I have a mum who has pretty much been drinking daily for 16 years, but who has had an unhealthy relationship with alcohol my whole life (I'm 37) and she's recently been told that she has chronic liver disease. So I think some people's livers may just be a bit more robust as you said, because I'm surprised she's been able to drink like she does for so long.

Harsh as this will sound, it doesn't matter how much your mums drink, @HazeBaze and @Yumyi . What matters is how you protect yourselves and how you look after your own sanity. There is nothing wrong with helping the person you love who is in addiction, but you can't pour from an empty cup. There's a lot of talk about boundaries in the world of addiction and there is a good reason for that. You and you alone can decide where those boundaries are, but the important thing to remember is that self care is not selfish. You need to be your best self so that you can help and support (but not enable) when the shit inevitably hits the fan.

So try as @CharlotteByrde said to detach emotionally. That means trying not to fret about how much your mothers are drinking. Because you can't stop them doing it.

Keep posting here, this is a safe place for you to get your feelings out among people who have been or still are where you are now.

Thank you pointythings. I really appreciate everyone's advice. I think I am probably worrying too much about will she/won't she. I suppose I'll just try to put it to the back of my mind and try to support her through her appointment. What will be will be.

Thanks. Yes I did see your message. It does sound quite similar. It’s hard to say with my mum how bad it is now or how long it has been going on for as I don’t live with her. She wasn’t drinking daily as we grew up but I do remember her often having wine in the evenings. I have given up phoning her or popping in to see her in the evening as she often seems out of it after a few glasses and can’t focus on the conversation. I feel sad as I was a mum who I can go to when I want mum comfort or a chat. But that opportunity is not really there much now. She seems to have signs of dementia too which I don’t know if it is cause of the alcohol or not. I am wondering what the likely track will be at this point. I read that only 10-25% or alcoholics get cirrhosis. For others it’s more just the physical and psychological impacts which is hard to predict.

Thanks so much for your kind words. I will try to emotionally detach. It’s hard when it’s someone so important in your life. I am pretty sure my mum won’t stop drinking. She has mild dementia I am sure so the concept of it all is probably too much to take on

It does sound very similar @Yumyi. And I completely relate to what you're saying about being sad that you can't go to her for a chat/comfort as that's what mothers are for. I remember when I had my first child, I was so upset that she couldn't help/advise me. She also doesn't have much of a relationship with my children as all she does is stays in her house drinking and when they were younger I didn't want to bring them to her house to be around that all the time, and now they're a bit older, they don't want to go there.

Regarding the dementia, could it be just the drink affecting her mind?
Before mums fall Sunday, she would repeat herself all the time. Just before Christmas, I popped into hers for 20 minutes and in that 20 minutes she told me the same thing about 8 times!
But since she fell, she hasn't been drinking quite as much and I've noticed she's not repeating herself as much as she was.

Oh that’s interesting @HazeBaze she does have some days are better than others and I do wonder if the drink doesn’t help. It’s so hard to know. I would need to move back in to her house to properly monitor.

yes I wish we could be invited round maybe Make us dinner etc and get that warm fuzzy feeling being with mum/nana but all those things don’t happen.

@Yumyi I lost my mother to alcohol as well. I got the double - my husband first, then my mum. She always had issues with alcohol, mainly due to unresolved trauma dating back to her very early childhood during the end of WW2. And of course back then they barely did PTSD, and if they did, they assumer children didn't get it...

My dad was her rock. He kept her steady and they were together for 50 years, during which she was a drinker but not usually an excessive one. Then he got Parkinsons and dementia, and that was when she started hitting it. She got worse when he had to go into a nursing home, and worse still when he died. Within 18 months after his death, she had drunk herself into full blown alcohol induced dementia.

So I know how you feel. I know the powerlessness, the enormous loss of the mother you remember and still need. You'll be in my thoughts, both of you.

Thank you @pointythings thats so sad. I am so sorry you had to go through that. Thanks so much for your message though, it does help to hear from people who have been through it.