not to do anythijg about dh 's 50 unit per week drinking

[badger2005]

I barely drink, but dh drinks this much. He thinks it's normal really but gets pissed office I ever raise it (about twice a year when I feel anxious) .he never seems legless, sometimes slightly drunk. I don't reallly see what I can do, especially as he doesn't want to talk about it. So I am currently just ignoring it. Do youthink that's.okay? Anyone else share his view that it's a fairly normal amount to drink? Thanks for any advice!

" It's about the quality of his life, not a long life filled with pain, ulcers, amputations, wheezing."

Sadly you are correct. A diabetic friend of ours who has been pretty cavalier about his drinking and diet ended up in ICU last year after suffering from a severe heart attack. The doctors were at pains to point out that it was directly as a result of not taking his diabetes seriously.

Agree with poster above who mentioned Life Insurance. Also consider mortgage insurance.

Yes, life insurance is important and he must be honest about his intake of cigs and wine or they may not pay out if he is ill, also I would think it will be pretty expensive which might make him think about giving up something.

Isn't the limit 21 units a week for a bloke? Can you print out some official info on alcohol limits and the problem with excess. You can at least educate him a little so that he knows what damage he is doing to his body

I was going to suggest trying to take out life insurance, but he will have to tell the truth about drinking/smoking, or the policy will be invalid & pointless.

My DH had a bit of a wake-up call when admitting on the life insurance form just how much he drank, caused a lot of 'computer says no' things, lots of phone calls back and forth, and a big hike in premium over a 'normal' drinker.

My xh didn't drink. Then once married he used to drink 10-15 pints every night after work this was normal apparently. He'd decided to drink in secret whilst we were dating... I LTB after a year. Don't know why it took me that long!

Hello,

I'm the OP, back with an update, and asking for help/advice. My husband has just quit smoking (I guess I probably did pressurize him into it to some extent... I made him talk about it at any rate, and when he said "I am going to quit" I said 'when?" etc etc). We are on day 3. He has been very strange and grumpy, and also has drunk a lot more. Yesterday he was actually really drunk for the first time in a while (normally he drinks but without really becoming drunk) and he has just come back from an attempt to go to work and gone to bed. This is basically never happened before. I tried to talk to him about it, but he said that I was over-reacting and it was just a one off. I don't want to over-dramatize, and perhaps it all is normal etc etc, but my worry is that quitting smoking has tipped him from being a functioning alcohol into being a non-functioning alcoholic.

He has also recently been ill (unrelatedly - with some diarrhea thing) and so says that this flared up again and is partly why he has come home. There are other possible explanations for the grumpiness/sadness (I just got back from a work trip - which I enjoyed - and was too quick to talk about childcare arrangements for next week when I am away again, when he has just taken leave... he talked about how much he didn't like it when I did this, and I can see it's maybe annoying of me, but I would have thought, not a big deal and easily forgiven and forgotten?). In short, I don't think the alternative explanations for the grumpiness or illness add up.

What should I do? I feel that he should reverse his quit decision, recognize that things are quite serious, and get some help before trying again. I said as much, but I think I am just going to be cast as the reason why his quit failed - because I "told him to stop quitting"! At the moment I feel like I am walking on eggshells and can't do right for doing wrong. Please can you either advise me what to do, (or tell me that everything is going to be fine!?)

You cannot control your husband's addictions or tell him what to do, you can only express concern about the effect on his health and well being and point out how it is affecting the family.
In the final instance you can decide whether or not you want to stay with him-but only threaten to leave if you are serious and prepared to follow through on it.
Your DH is the only one with control over this-repeatedly trying to manage his behaviour for him will be counter-productive. Perhaps you could contact Al-Anon for support and advice for yourself. Life sounds very difficult for you at the moment.
I think he already knows he has a problem so perhaps back off whilst you consider your position?

OP like a previous poster I grew up in a family with a culture of drinking so the equivalent of 3.5 pints a night didn't found that bad to me.

However, you've since said DH is diabetic, smokes and restricts meals to keep his weight down - let's nit best around the bush, he's limiting his food so he can continue to drink alcohol and a diabetic that would fuck with their diet to facilitate alcohol consumption has a problem.

I agree with you that dropping hints is patronising and will be completely obvious. I disagree that there is no point mentioning it. You say you wont leave him over it. It doesn't have to be one thing or another. You can say "DH I love you but I'm worried about you. I can't buy you alcohol. If you want it fine, but buy it yourself". You can tell him you're worried. You can ask him if he worries about leaving you a widow.

I hope he changes.

Cross post - even more worrying.

You can't make him get support and men are often very reluctant to admit there's a problem until it's impossible to ignore. (I did walk out on my husband over a drinking problem and he did eventually get help).

Re the fags, what about an electronic cigarette? People with "addictive personalities" often find it far harder than others to give up substances they are dependent on. Going electronic may help him to gradually break his habit and reduce his nicotine dependence - the electronic cigarette that I bought for my DH comes with cartridges with different nicotine concentrations right down to zero.

My brother drank at that sort of level.
He was 51 when he died.

OP, please try Al-Anon. I think it might really help you. . You're in a tough situation with no easy answers.

I'm in two minds about this. I have worked in hospital fields that deal with this. On the one hand most people can drink quite a bit more than the recommended units without doing themselves any harm at all. I know when I worked in a toxicology department they completely ignored 21 as being the 'safe' level of drinking and started from 30 to assess a risk, (they may say 21 in public but most clinicians know in reality there is virtually no risk up to 30 to the point where they won't screen people who drink under that for problems. And having seen the levels of what most people coming in with serious problems were drinking your husband is really drinking a comparatively low amount. Of course you will get the mumsnet pearl clutchers who will tell you that it's shocking. But if you actually speak to people who deal with the health problems of drinking it certainly wouldn't be a particularly shocking or concerning amount.

What your husband is drinking is also the average amount for a French person and they have significantly better health than most of the rest of Europe.

But on the other hand there are some people who can be harmed by drinking 30 units a week. They're not the norm, they tend to be anomalies. We would sometimes get people who had drunk 5 pints a night but never any more for years needing liver transplants, but they were very much the exception rather than the rule. But the recommended drinking levels are so low they are set to guarantee that even the anomalies won't have problems, but actually most people can safely drink much more.

Your DH is gambling that he's not one of them. He's gambling with good odds, but it's still a gamble. He may feel though that alcohol improves his quality of life so much that he's prepared to take that risk.

TBH, if he's not being nasty (and you say he never appears drunk) he's not missing work or missing out on family life because he's staying in bed late or not helping with the kids you can't really make him do anything. If it's affecting you then of course you should decide if you want to stay in the relationship. But if it's not actually affecting your lives negatively and he's happy with the way things are then I think it's really his choice and his body.

"When I have asked him why he's pissed off when I raise the drinking he has said 'because I don't want to change'. And 'this is just a conversation about me being shit ' ...
He eats no breakfast or lunch mon - fri to stay slim"

Is he still doing this? My dad is alcoholic and similarly very defensive, as if whenever we mention his alcoholism we are attacking him. Despite this, I wish that 10 years ago we had, as a family, tackled the problem more directly. Now I think it's too late for my dad. He's in his 70s and has drunk everyday for nearly 20 years (min 2 bottles of wine a day). So for that reason, I'd say talk to your DH now, whilst you might still make a difference. Yes, the decision eventually has to come from him but you (and others) expressing a concern may add up over time. People who are alcohol dependent are likely to become more and more dependent until they have done irreversible damage. But bear in mind his sensitivities and reassure him it's not an attack on him as a person - you're concerned about his relationship with alcohol.

And that's a ridiculous eating pattern for anyone. He could stay slim by cutting out alcohol and then consume actual food that contains nutrients.

Ok, your DH is an alcoholic smoker who ignores his health and his diabetes but is just about getting away with it so far, and has been in denial for years. Well done for persuading him to give up smoking! He has made a huge change, and it'll be really hard, and he'll feel like shite physically and he will probably feel like shite emotionally if he's facing up to what he's doing to his health.
Just keep expressing concern and love and support, along the lines of you know it's hard but you want to grow old with him and enjoy grandchildren etc, not lose him/ end up as his carer etc. He doesn't want to change for his own sake, but sounds as though he might do it for the family. And it'll be bloody hard.
Seriously though, you might want to rethink the childcare arrangments temporarily, being left with in the care of a grumpy alcoholic in nicotine withdrawal is unlikely to be much fun.

Good luck! See what support you and he can get with change, al-anon, health coach, whatever.

Badger - its great that he's given smoking. He will be feeling like crap (bitter voice of experience) and may eat/drink more to replace smoking.

Don't panic just yet about his change in behaviour - being grumpy/ill is all part of quitting.

I'm afraid this would be a deal breaker for me. I grew up with an alcoholic father. I won't put my kids through that.
Thought this thread had resurfaced due to the news about Charles Kennedy.

Thank you everyone. This evening has been a lot better. He seemed shaken up earlier by my reaction to last night and this morning. He doesn't want to quit the quit (the smoking I mean), and has just had a can or two this evening, and seems much calmer.