Support group for those affected by someone else's drinking - thread 3

[pointythings]

Link to previous thread here: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/alcoholsupport/5177307-continuing-support-group-for-those-affected-by-someone-elses-drinking?page=40&reply=147449407

Continuing our series of threads for people who have an alcoholic in their lives. This is a safe space to vent, look for advice and support and maybe find some strength.

And we are now stuck with 1000 posts of a thread with a spelling error in the title - I'll chase up HQ to see if they can help.

We all covered

i think I did as ashamed and embarrassed that it had gone so wrong

and that people would think my fault. Look down on me etc

I didn’t know about the 4th C.

It is very hard not to cover for someone. It looks from the outside like indifference or cruelty, not to step in and fix things, or keep them from embarrassing themselves, or anticipate disasters and intervene to stop them happening.

Particularly when the alcoholic in question is elderly and frail.

I often feel like I am being set up, put in a position where my only options are taking total responsibility for my mother - who may or may not be capable of making her own decisions, as her baseline cognitive function is hard to assess in amidst the drinking and the anxiety - or becoming the neglectful daughter who abandons her.

It’s a world of total psychological binaries, where trying to maintain a sane middle ground is a relentless battle.

@VoltaireMittyDream Yes, that must make it particularly difficult. Battling to maintain a sane middle ground sounds apt.

@VoltaireMittyDream I worry too about what other people will think when I don't live up to their idea of what I should be doing to help my alcoholic parents whose problems are of their own making. I live far away and have to protect myself and my life with my DH and DCs by maintaining some distance. I will do what I can re making sure they have the care they need without personally doing more than I can handle emotionally and physically and know in my head that I am doing what feels right for me and in the context of my actual relationship with them, not what other people see from the outside.

Your options aren't binary between sacrificing yourself and being a neglectful daughter. Do what you can reasonably handle. Other people don't have the same history as you with your parents and if they are anything other than supportive or at the very least neutral in their opinion of you, they aren't worth your time. I choose not to think about them and their opinions. If they want to be the ones on call to pick my DM up off the floor (literally), clean her house and feed her because she can't maintain enough sobriety to do so they are free to do so. If they would rather just crime, again I will ignore them.

@VoltaireMittyDream I totally get where you are coming from. When my mother was drinking herself to death, my Dsis and I were under enormous pressure from people around her who didn't have a clue - mainly her neighbours. I ended up blocking one of them completely after receiving a WhatsApp rant about how Dsis and I should be either moving in with her or moving her in with us. Aside from the fact that the actual professionals involved in her care were advising against this and that she would have refused it (and at that point had legal capacity to do so), it would not have been possible. Dsis and I live in the UK, my mum lived in the Netherlands where we are from - and this was after Brexit.

You can only do what you can do, and develop a thick skin. And it isn't easy.

Thanks everyone for your comments. I’m still here, reading. It’s been a busy but nice weekend with the children, but I’m thinking, digesting and planning every moment. Will write more soon.

Hello all 👋hope you don't mind me poking my nose back in here. I used to post on these threads/board ages ago under different user names but stopped when my relative entered end-stage alcoholism and shit really hit the fan. Then sadly he died and for a few years I wasn't really ready to talk about it or in a place to offer any support to others. I still don't really have any happy ending hope (obviously) or anything like that to offer, but pleased to see the support here is still going. Although of course sorry that that means there's so many people still going through it...

Hello @NoctuaAthene and welcome back. There are quite a few of us here who didn't get a happy ending... I think your wisdom will be useful here; we do deal in tough love when we need to.

What is a happy ending

loved one stopping drinking forever
or

leaving loved ones and coping alone while they still drink

obv not happy ending is death tho for some that can be a relief

That's a really good question.

I think it's a very individual thing. For me, the happiness I felt when he was no longer living with me and DC in the family home was indescribable. All the other stuff was still there, but just having a calm, happy home where everything functioned and nobody walked on eggshells ever was happiness beyond imagination. The first time I heard DC1 singing in the shower, I almost cried. It was 3 days after the police took him away. He would have shouted at DC to stop. I didn't see it as 'coping alone', I saw it as freedom from the thundercloud that had lived in our home for so long.

Obviously what I wanted to happen was for him to get sober, rebuild his life and his relationship with DC, possibly meet someone else. That didn't happen, but actually I don't feel guilty about admitting that there was an element of happiness when he was dead too. Not immediately, but longer term. I felt the same when DM died - sad at first but actually glad she was no longer living the way she did and dragging everyone else with her.

My Dsis got the proper happy ending with her DP stopping drinking and them still being together now and happy with each other. It's so rare I haven't got over being delighted for her.

Yes my friend has the happy ending. Her husband is now 4yrs sober. What mine should have been if stuck to aa

she knows he could fall off the wagon but he’s made such good progress and puts in the hard work thAt I don’t think he would

but sadly you can’t never say never

I think I have the happy ever after. We have a happy household now as dh isn’t here

No more treading on eggshells. Tbh I didn’t reliese how much I did it till I wasn’t iyswim 😢

When it comes to recovery, some people make it. Most don't. And yes, if they don't put the work in then they'll get nowhere. My husband only went into rehab because I gave him an ultimatum - and he never took it seriously, I found that out after he died when DC and I found his workbook from rehab, in which he blamed me for his drinking on pretty much every page. If you don't actually try, you will always fail.

Treasure the happy household. You and I both know what life looks like when you don't have that.

Realistically though, happy endings are for fairytales. Whatever decisions we make regarding the alcoholics in our lives, there will continue to be disappointments and sadness along with the happy times. The difference is that if we decide to leave, the constant gnawing anxiety about whether he does/does not keep drinking is a thing of the past, and that brings a very welcome peace. In some ways the periods of sobriety were more scary, because I was always on edge, waiting for the house of cards I was building to collapse.

Just sad for our children. They lose a parent even tho not dead but could be

Happy ending... hmm, well, for my family, things are better.

For my dad, life is calmer and healthier. A clean, aired house, much happier pets. I no longer constantly worry he's about to have a heart attack from stress. I'm no longer confused and angry, because through the inquest process, I found so many of the answers I needed. In fact, right now, I feel the healthiest and most relaxed I've ever been. And we are looking forward to the most amazing change for our wider family, which is totally outing if I share it but we are all very excited.

We'll always be sad and wish things had been different. She should be here, part of family life, as excited as the rest of us. But if she was still here, she'd still be in oblivion and we'd all still be suffering.

That made me really teary @CharlotteByrde. It’s so true. I never got many weeks of sobriety, because the longest ex managed post rehab was 6 weeks. But they were scary, a constant knife edge. That constant sick feeling in the pit of your stomach. Makes me shudder even now.

Somewhere way up these threads I commented about ‘Hollywood’ rehab, before I lived with my husband my awareness of alcoholism was what I saw on Grey’s Anatomy and the happily ever after was what they portrayed (with minor relapses). Nothing like reality with my husband. It is coming up to a year since he died, I still ache often for missing him and that fantasy of the happy ending, Life is in many ways better, and I am in a position to move on with my life, but it is not what I imagined it would be when we were happy together. 🌼

DH’s dad died yesterday. He was the cause of the trauma, so things will either get better or worse now. DH has always been very good about seeking therapy, so it could be a positive.

Sorry for those who have had partners /parents die

can I ask how they die if not too rude /personal

is it liver problems v or Pancreas or other health ailments but caused by alcohol

Of course you can ask. Alcohol attacks so many systems of the body that it can be fatal in many ways.

My husband died of heart disease. There was already a strong family history on his side (3 uncles died of it, all also heavy drinkers). It was extremely sudden.

My mother fell down the stairs in her home and broke her neck. She would have been 9n her way to the kitchen for a quick slurp from the vodka in the fridge. Dsis and I asked her whether it wouldn't be more sensible to keep a bottle by the bed, but she refused. That would have meant admitting there was a real problem, you see.

I'm sorry to hear this. I've talked a bit on this thread (and the last thread) about how my alcoholic mother's death pretty much set me free to see and understand things clearly. When the insanity ended, the calm was transformative.

It might take some time and your DH might need that outside help you mention, but yeah, I think you can have cautious, quiet optimism.

I think as long as you both keep an eye out for complex bereavement, you will be fine. Being willing and able to seek help is everything. I wish you a peaceful and happy future.

With my dad it was a heart attack, very quick and (we hope) painless. As premature deaths go not a bad way to go. However it was on a background of quite long term and unpleasant physical consequences of alcoholism including cirrhosis and other liver problems, plus a couple of near death experiences with DTs and an alcohol induced serious physical injury/trauma too, so it was sort of expected/unexpected if you see what I mean. His own dad/my grandfather (also an alcoholic) went just the same way, sudden massive heart attack. But his two brothers/my uncles (both also alcoholics, are you seeing the pattern) had much more prolonged suffering, one eventually died from an alcohol related cancer (very drawn out and painful) and one is still with us but I'm not sure for how much longer as is extremely frail and repeated hospital admissions for ascites as well as pneumonias and sepsis. So it can vary a lot...

My husband took his own life, but in the preceding months he had fallen down stairs and cracked vertebrae, had a cardiac arrest and apparently was told his brain mass was less than it should have been. He made a choice that he could not overcome the alcohol and was terrified of dementia. It does cause me great sadness that he couldn’t see a way to recoverery but at least he made the decision of when and how he would die.

Thank you @pointythings @NoctuaAtheneand @Userccjlnhibibljn8 for your honestly

and sorry for suicide 💐

ex eh def wouldn’t take his life. He’s too much of a coward

I just wonder if he will die via booze issues

seems heart attack is the more common guess after abusing body