I can't get married can I?

[HopefulHatter]

My fiancé and I have planned a whirlwind wedding for December. We've been talking about it for ages and I've been so excited for it. The deposits have been paid and it's just starting to all come together.

BUT

Tonight I feel like I've been hit by reality.

My fiancés mum turned up at our house having driven from her's (obviously drunk) because she has had a drunken row with her raging drunk husband (fiancés Dad) this is a regular occurance for them. Loud screaming matches etc. She is now sleeping in the spare room after getting more drunk with my fiancé. She usually goes to SIL's house but she didn't want her there tonight.

I feel like I've just been granted a glimpse in to my future. Fiancé has caused lots of problems with his problem drinking over the last six years. He isn't violent but he needs beer to relax, when he's happy, when he's sad, when the sky is blue (you get the picture) he can be verbally aggressive. He generally starts droning on about something you can't even make sense of or repeating himself and then getting arsey when you aren't listening. And he can never stop at a couple. Never. Once he's had one he will drink everything he can that's in the house, even my cooking wine at times. Then if he can he will usually find an excuse to go to the shop to buy more.

Over the years even though he has said lots about how he will change things only get better for a couple of weeks then we are right back to square one. Plus he says he doesn't have a problem because he doesn't drink in the mornings or every single day (he would and does when he isn't at work)

A couple of incidents have nearly made me leave. Once he got so drunk he started accusing me of having an affair and yelling that an empty beer can was proof (it was his) And the worst was when our daughter was born via csection. The day after we came home he got plastered, started swearing then passed out on the sofa. I had to carry my daughter upstairs to bed and pulled a stitch out of my Csection. One Christmas he accused me of offering his sisters partner a blowjob, that was when I was 6 months pregnant.

I feel like I've been sucker punched tonight. I've been deluding myself thinking that things will sort themselves out and they wont will they? I have a two year old daughter and I feel like I'm failing her. She's too young to notice now I hope but what about when she does start to see him drunk. I don't want her to grow up thinking that it's normal to drink like that.

I'd managed to push all my doubts aside but now my gut is really telling me I shouldn't.

Or am I overreacting? I know fiancé and probably his family will say I am. My family have remained very quiet about the wedding. Fiancé has embarrassed me a few times with his slurring and drinking at family do's before so I can kind of guess what they are thinking.

I feel torn between the life I want and the life I'm actually (will actually) live. I love him so much when he is sober.

Fuck

This is what engagement is for. It's a time to focus on the future, and to decide that it is, really is, the future you want.
There is no shame in deciding that you want something different.

Otherwise you'd marry straight away.

we've had engagements far longer than we've been hosting elaborate parties.

It sounds like you've seen a future you don't wish for your self or your daughter, and it may be that next step is to be brave, find supportive family/friends/refuge and to step away from your relationship with this man.

They really don't change, no matter how nice when sober, not matter how sorry they are for getting in a state, they don't

so, he has left?

Run.

People can and do get over bad childhoods and substance abuse problems, but they have to recognise there is a problem, want change and initiate and work on change themselves. They need to be very motivated.

I see you've thrown him out. I know this is probably going to sound fucking dreadful, but as you're unmarried you have a lot less rights to pensions, his money, his property etc which presumably some of which he would have accrued while your earning potential was curtailed by having children. If that's the case and there is money like that involved, I would have been tempted to advise you to marry him THEN kick him out so you had financial security.

Oh well done.

By the same token though, he might then have had a claim to her house. Much cleaner this way. Besides OPs dc is only 2, so she's not missed out on a lot of work time.

Also alcoholism is an illness and this man was raised by two alcoholics. The odds were stacked against him from the start. I dont think it would be right to enter a marriage with the sole intention of getting a favourable divorce. OP can protect herself without being cruel, which marrying hom for those reasons would be.

Well done OP. My friend's sister was in a similar situation to you - alcoholic partner and a lot of alcoholism in her family - but she went ahead with the wedding. She was punched on her wedding night by her ExH's uncle and there was a big brawl which ruined the wedding...poor girl knew she had made an awful mistake but it took a few more years to extricate herself.

You have done yourself and your DD a massive favour.

I didn't want to read and dash and felt I had to post - I've only just seen this thread now, but what a strong and fantastic role model you are for your daughter. Very inspirational and I wanted to wish you all the best!

OP- you sounds like such a trouper/star. You are a brilliant mum, putting your DD first. You sounds sorted, confident, intelligent, orgnaised and like you will definitely make this all work out for the better. You have just shedded some very negative, draining, heavy, dark baggage, life can only get lighter now x

OurDearLeader When you say

I know this is probably going to sound fucking dreadful, but as you're unmarried you have a lot less rights to pensions, his money, his property etc which presumably some of which he would have accrued while your earning potential was curtailed by having children. If that's the case and there is money like that involved, I would have been tempted to advise you to marry him THEN kick him out so you had financial security.

you are right. It does sound fucking dreadful.

Two years without a drink. That was brilliant, OP. You've been very clear with him the minimum you expect and clear with yourself that there is no question of reconciliation for a long time.

Don't let anyone (least of all yourself) talk you over that line in the sand.

Well done OP. I see you have made him leave. I can give you two scenarios (2nd one involved a child)

1. Best friend told her DH to leave because of drinking. She bought him out of the house (no children). He started going to AA meetings regularly and when he had been sober for 12 months, they started meeting for Saturday breakfast. After 18 months (still going to AA) they started to talk about trying again. She, like you, saw 2 years as the time to trust again. So he moved back in on the 2nd anniversary of total sobriety. He has been sober for 35 years (and still goes to AA meetings / friend still attends Alanon).

He proved me wrong. I was the one that the police phoned in the early hours of the morning when my friend needed a safe place after windows were smashed. She had to live with me during the buy-out period. She feel in love with a lovely guy and knew he was still there somewhere...... she just couldn't live with the drunk.

1. My youngest brother was an alcoholic. For the sake of DN 5yrs, my SIL sold the house, bought another smaller one outright and then told my DB that he wasn't moving with them. (She says that she DID tell him a few months before, but DB wasn't listening). Anyway, he had to come and live with me "as an emergency" but actually stayed 2 years. Contact with DN was cut immediately, but that had to be resolved after 3 months as DN was missing Daddy.

We agreed that contact at first was to be at MY home with SIL coming for tea also. That was every Sunday. SIL brought DN and sometimes her own DSis with her. DB and DN would build dens in his bedroom, play chess, read books etc. We stayed downstairs and would chat whilst I was finishing off our meal. After 4 weeks, DB was allowed to take DN to a local park for 1.5 hours (and would usually take my dog to help with a fun time.) I had to 'poilce him' during the morning to make sure that he hadn't had a drink before they arrived.

When it appeared that he was able to NOT drink for a day, he was allowed to visit DN at SIL's house - and she would allow the 1.5 hour rule of taking DN out. This got extended to taking DN into the City for a whole afternoon. (Again, I policed his drinking in the morning.) There was only one time he had managed to buy vodka and drank it in the taxi on the way over to the visit. She wouldn't let him in and phoned me. I told her to call another taxi and send him back to me. That was the last time he ever messed around on his visitation day.

DN was NEVER allowed to do over-night sleeps at my house with Daddy because we felt that he would never manage to NOT drink at night. So, even though I was a sober, responsible adult, DN would have been exposed to excessive drinking (and all that comes with it).

Sadly, DB died when he was walking back home from the local pub. He felt unwell, sat on a wall at the top of my road, rolled backwards and to the left and fell so awkwardly that he suffocated himself. (We know the details because of the inquest)

After DB died, DN used to stay with me almost every weekend and lots of holidays so that SIL could re-build her life. Of course, he slept in "Daddy's Room" where he had so many happy memories of playing. I didn't know, but DN and DB used to make 'memory capsules' and hide them in what they called 'the secret cupboard'. DN was a bereaved child, but at least he wasn't damaged any further by an alcoholic Daddy. He knows that Daddy died because of his 'drinking illness' but he wasn't exposed to the drunken rants, the wetting the sofa, the black-outs, the intimidation - and everything else that goes with excessive drinking.

DN is a lovely, well-balanced 15.5 year old now. He doesn't remember his Daddy's drinking because he was protected from it by caring adults working together.

HTH

Well done for going through with it and trusting your gut feeling.

If you feel you are weakening, just listen to it again.

well done OP xxx you have been very brave x

I guess it depends on who has most of the assets in the relationship. But if it is the man and the woman has less because she has taken time out because of the children I always think it's very sad when the woman walks away with very little and the man walks away with money he has partly been able to make because someone else has been looking after his kids and his home. Because just getting child maintenance isn't much. And with the cuts in tax credits it will be very tough.

I have to say in that situation I would probably bide my time, get married and then kick him out afterwards. For the security of my children if nothing else. It doesn't sound like he doesn't deserve it anyway.

Thank you all again, your posts and stories are keeping me strong.

I have had one phone call, sounded sober, to tell me he is staying at his sisters. I'm surprised as she hates drinking, the upbringing had the opposite effect on her.

Again the same promises of AA etc.

If he does manage to stop for two years then that would be wonderful as I said but I'm not willing to do anything with him before that.

Thank you for the advice about tax credits above, I had completely forgotten about those.

Also I left work when my dd was born and started an access course. I actually start university in September so fingers crossed my earning potential will increase!

My family have been absolutely wonderful and I feel much more secure and confident already and it's not even been 24 hours.

Most of us who marry do so hoping and intending that the marriage will end in death, not in an early divorce and a financial settlement.

In our case ex really doesn't have anything to his name. The house and everything are mine. However I've been discussing with my dm having another small loan just to pay him what I feel would be right and his share for the mortgage and contributions he paid in the two years I haven't been working.

I'm trying to do everything fairly so I know personally I haven't done anything to be ashamed of. Though I'm certain some of his family will call me to high heaven anyway.

If I can have a clean break, feeling like I owe nothing, I could move on quicker and happier if that makes sense?

sadwidow

Sorry I've just read that!

No, I couldn't have walked up the aisle with someone I really really didn't want to marry.

My sister married a man like this. He started beating her almost immediately. She stuck it out for 10 months. Thankfully, she left him and is now waiting on a divorce. (Stupid Irish laws requiring four years of separation before allowing a divorce.)

Save yourself the hassle and get out now.

why are you taking out a loan to give him money?

He would have been having to fund his accommodation and utilities should he have been living elsewhere and he would have been having to fund to fund things for your child is a normal expense.

Anyways that's an aside point just thought you might be interested to know that even the Catholics will allow you to obtain a religious annulment if you marry an alcoholic,can't remember the exact reason why but it's so,etching to do with them not being able to commit validly to a marrige.

Well done OP for your resolve and for following through with it.

I wouldn't personally take out a loan to give him money. At this stage you can't even be sure he wouldn't go and spend it all on booze. It is still very early days to say whether or not he can remain sober.

Alcoholism seems to run in the maternal side of my DH's family (though he is OK, fortunately). One uncle is an alcoholic, but has managed for the sake of his family to remain sober for well over 40 years now. Still goes to Al Anon regularly.

BIL on the other hand, continues to bury his head in the sand and pretend there is no problem. I think he probably always will.

With regard to your now ex, his actions will speak louder than his words. If he really wants to marry you he surely realises that he must kick the habit. Time will tell whether or not he can do that. My BIL can occasionally stay sober for several months, but always reverts to type sooner or later.

you owe him nowt.
he had bed and board while he lived at yours so he did all right.
any money you give him now will be drank. guaranteed.
you could do with that money for uni, surely.