Urgent help please I just found out my boyfriend is an addict and I've left left him alone

[user1485367344]

Suspected for a while that my very new boyfriend had a problem with drink. He is about 10 years older than me.

The times I see him he barely has any food in the house, will constantly want to meet to have a drink etc., but the type of job he has would make this quite normal socially (banker) and so I didn't really question it immediately.

However warning signs came when he started to look gaunt, would cancel dates because he was feeling sad and most unnervinng to me, would talk about past trauma in his life. Then the lack of money came - although a high salaried job, he would often struggle towards the end of the month with money to the point where I would offer to lend him money, which he did always pay back.

Anyway tonight I met him after work. He was wasted when I got there, staggering about and eyes half closed. I was a bit sad and tried to sober him up. However he got to the point where he started to tell me to fuck off and that I was a fucking cunt. I got upset and left, he followed me begging me to go back to his and forget it. I lost my patience a little bit said I wanted to go home and that he was an alcoholic and needed some help.

I got a taxi back and realised as I walked in the house that his keys are in my bag (he put them there saying he would lose them).

I looked at the keys and there is a UKAT Keyring on there. After googling I found that it is an addiction rehabilitation centre.

I feel so panicky right now - I've left him in town intoxicated and unbeknownst to me without keys. His phone is now off.

I Don't know what to do - I tried ringing the bar he was in and asking but they said they were closing. I'm a 40 minute drive away now.

I feel so guilty. He text me after I left saying please don't leave me and I just didn't respond. I've sent numerous texts now and calls to him and his friends but no response.

Can someone please help me what should I do?? I'm scared for his safety. I don't care that he's an alcoholic, I just want him safe and indoors it's so cold outside

Call his work? Or drop them off there

He'll be sleeping it off somewhere, not thinking about you at all. He probably thinks he lost his keys. Addicts are single minded & selfish. Don't waste your energy on him. I say that from experience.

If he is an addict this won't be the first time he has misplaced keys..it will have happened lots of times and he will have sorted it out.

I think you are being over responsible. Do you feel you have a professional responsibility to ensure his safety. You know you can't fix him and I doubt he has reached rock bottom. By the end of the week I am sure he will have lined up another woman. This isn't about not showing compassion but being realistic, he is not wanting to change yet so there is little you can do.

What happened, OP? Was he okay?

OP do you have professional supervision and are you a trained addiction counsellor? I think you have been incredibly naive and you need to talk this through in supervision

Any news

I second what Windygate says about supervision. I felt concerned when you said "I am also counsellor so I find it hard to walk away when I know he's struggling"

Have you done any reflection on your boundaries? If as a counsellor you find it hard to walk away from people that are struggling, you are heading for burn out. That's not to devalue the empathy and kindness that you clearly show and that are important qualities - but this is about self-care.

Also, are you properly separating your role as a counsellor from your relationships outside work? In what you say I see a blurring of boundaries here - you have to be very clear that you are NOT your (ex?) partner's counsellor. You can't counsel someone you are close to. It is deeply unhealthy.

I'm sure of you know all of this, but looking at your language I see there may be a danger of you losing sight of it. The reason therapists have supervision is that it's a really easy trap to fall into (I'm in a similar field to you) and you need to make sure you are exercising self care and not getting into unhealthy relationship patterns yourself.

I hope the key situation resolved and that you are OK.

I've been in your position OP and the best thing you can do is get out of the relationship ASAP. Do NOT feel guilty - it's not your problem or your job to help him sort his life out. If he doesn't want to face up to his addictions, then there's no way in hell that ANYONE can help him if he doesn't want it.

Get rid..

Eventually found him on Thursday. His phone was apparently lost and he didn't have the common sense to let me know where he was... If he hadnt have looked so rough I would have assumed another woman, but at that point I didn't care.

I rang around all the hospitals after helpful instructions from the police (who said I had done the right thing by ringing given his problems). They also told me to ring the pub he was last seen at (and others he would go to).

I had to check his flat and everything before I recieved a chipper text on Thursday morning

He thought it was hilarious. He also said it was partly my fault because of the fact I took his keys and he said "don't ever do that again"

He tried to arrange to see me on Friday but canceled because of a hangover.

I told him we were over yesterday and deleted all this contact details. He's tried to contact me in every imaginable way pretending everything is fine sending me stuff on Facebook...

Ah well, I feel a weight has been lifted, hell find another woman to look after him in the next week or so no doubt

Thanks for the update.
Well done OP.
Glad hes safe too
Move on, be strong and listen to the advice given about being a councellor and needing your own space and boundaries from your work.

Well done for getting rid.
You need to learn to discern the difference between addiction and arseholeness. Yes they cross over but he is an arsehole who may have an addiction. Why did you defend him so vigorously?

You did the right thing. SIL's husband is an alcoholic, and she should have left him years ago. Only she didn't, and endured years and years of unhappy marriage. Now he is in a care home with a deprivation of liberty order as he now has alcohol induced encephalopathy which presents itself as severe dementia.

IMO SIL loves to play the martyr, and the children all hate their father, and resent the fact that their mother didn't kick him out.