Husband drinking is destroying our relationship

[Kingk1]

Needing advice please. My husband drinking is getting out of control and I feel like leaving him. He has always liked a drink but since we have moved to a new area with pubs in walking distance his drinking is getting out of control. I have spoke to him when he's sober and explained how I feel he promises to cut down then couple of nights later hes bck binge drinking again. He owns a small company and work can be stressful but he has hired an excellent manager who takes alot of the stress off him but he still drinks heavily. When he goes out most times straight after work he gets so drunk he has to be carried home from pub in early hours, he causes arguments with me which I hve now learnt to ignore, a few occasions he has fallen when walking home and injured himself. Recently he has been getting into fights. Last nights shangiangs he went out at 5pm on his own to see a local singer I stayed at home as my son and his girlfriend visited from university for the weekend. He said he be home about 8pm at 1.00am my son woke me as a guy from the pub had carried him home because he was in a fight. He had blood on his face and clothes his lip was swollen and his ankle had a bone stuck out. I had to ring an ambulance. He has smashed in ankle in 3 places and needs surgery , hospital are keeping him in for a Wk. I got home at 6am from hospital totally exhausted, and feeling so let down again.
My dilemma: he has no phone, money, cigs and needs PJ's and toothbrush etc I feel like just leaving him there with nothing and letting him feel the brunt of his actions. I'm fed up covering for him with work, his family etc because he promises he will cut down but he's actually getting worse! Am I cruel to want to leave him in hospital with nothing or do I stand by him. My son who is 18 and lives with us is witnessing all this behaviour and I feel it's not fair on him . Sorry for the long post.

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

Have you dealt with an alcoholic family member, Dre?

Many posters here have, myself included. The advice we give: cut all ties, protect yourself, let them work through it alone, is based on us having all made the same mistakes. We all supported, tried to make them comfortable, nursed them through their worst times, made excuses to all and sundry... and one day we snapped and walked away.


Years on we are the same posters who tell OPs to walk away. We use quite absolute terms, are blunt about it because we know that had enough people told us that we weren't being wicked when we wished our alcoholic gone we might have cut our misery short. In my case my alcoholic would have had 17 years less of supported drinking and might have been well enough to make better decisions.

Disagree we the me / us by all means but DO NOT use emotional blackmail to persuade OP to play nice. She'll have enough of that in real life and it really doesn't help anyone.

If right now is OPs right time to make her stand then nobody should try to dissuade her.


If it is not then we can all be here to support and advise her.

[DockerDre]

I think the OP wants to punish him rather than actually leave the marriage.
I don't think that's right.

I don't believe in punishing people. If you can't stand it, then walk away.

[CarolDanvers]

If she was just wanting to punish him she wouldn't be posting here! Asking what was best. There's a lot of confusing advice around dealing with addicts; ranging from Jeremy Kyle type punitive shrieking to gentle but distant support. No one knows the right thing to do when they're so close to it. It's fine to get a range of opinions.

Again Dockerdre, have you an alcoholic in your family?

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

I don't see her trying to punish him. She's asking for advice... and we are all saying walk away.


Which part of OPs posts suggests punishment? Maybe, if we can see that we wouldn't be, possibly, talking at cross purposes.

[DockerDre]

The advice here from alanons etc. is that she'd be doing him a favour by leaving him high and dry when he's on the ground in hospital. That what it teaches you? He has to hit his rock bottom right? And preferably get a kick in while he's there?

The advice from me, is that you should start to think more about yourself OP. Trying to manipulate an alcoholic won't work. Same as trying to manipulate any human being rarely works.

Ask yourself - do I love him enough to put up with more of the same? If the answer is no, there's no need to be cruel, just initiate divorce proceedings.

[DockerDre]

Which part of OPs posts suggests punishment? The part that suggests leaving him without anything like money, cigarettes, phone etc.

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

So, your advice is identical to mine and other posters but you want to add some odd emotional bollocks to it!

[CarolDanvers]

I think you're responding to advice given by other posters on this thread, not the OP. OP doesn't know what to do and has asked what people think. She is confused and worried she is being cruel. Others have told her to drop him and walk away.

[DockerDre]

@CarolDanvers - Why do you keep asking whether I have an alcoholic in the family?

[Hithere12]

I agree with DockerDre a little bit: AA has a terrible success rate

However, the 12 steps programme literally changes lives when it is applied spiritually

That’s the problem with AA though. A lot of it focuses on god, religion and faith and if you aren’t religious the advice can seem pretty ridiculous.

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

As Carol says, you may be responding to advice from others. OP is asking for help and quite clearly has little idea if what is best to do, whose best she should be protecting etc.

[MitziK]

It's not punishing a drunk to say that they can't come back once they've managed to get themselves smacked in the face once too many times from being a belligerent pisshead.

It's not punishing a drunk to leave them where they are least likely to be able to nip out for a sneaky few cans or pints.

It's not punishing a drunk to not chauffeur them back to a comfortable home where they can be waited on and bought just a little drink because they are in pain and it's just a little treat when they are so unhappy.


It's not punishing a drunk to save a teenage boy from seeing the aggression, the violence, the smell of piss and stale beer and knowing that half the village know his father is the village alcoholic.

It's not punishing a drunk to refuse to be made responsible for picking up the pieces, washing the blood off clothes, having to make sure they don't stop breathing overnight or choke to death on their own vomit so that a teenage boy finds them dead in the morning.


It's safeguarding. Safeguarding a dependent teenager and herself, who have had no say in what has gone on.

He's given her cause to say 'I'm done'. Give her the credit to know when she's had enough as her husband certainly fucking doesn't and don't use an alcoholic's reasoning, such as 'that's cruel, don't punish him, he's vulnerable, don't kick him when he's down' and all that bullshit he'll use.

[OutInTheCountry]

Sorry you're in this position OP. You say, twice, that his drinking is getting out of control? It's already way out of control!

Personally I couldn't just leave him there with nothing, I would take in what he needs but I would stop covering for him and let his family know exactly what is going on and then speak to some-one to get advice.

Work out which things are within your sphere of influence and which are not - sadly whether or not he stops drinking isn't, I'd do what I could to help him but you should stop enabling or covering for him.

[DockerDre]

My advice is that she should not be cruel to him in hospital but to decide what SHE wants when he comes out.
Before I commented everyone was gleefully encouraging her to leave him lying on the hospital bed 'to realise' what he had done.
You really don't give alcoholics much credence for intelligence, do you?

[pinkstripeycat]

My DH was like this for years. I knew he had depression and was an alcoholic. He had a nervous breakdown, got help (privately as GP was useless) and stopped drinking. If he hadn’t changed I would have left.

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

And Al Anon can be irritating but is a rock solid support for kids and teens when they are trying to work through living the person, hating the disease!

[CarolDanvers]

I've asked twice as you didn't answer. So has someone else...

I ask because I think it makes a huge difference to how a person advises. Others have shared advice and detailed their own experiences that bring them to this conclusion. You're throwing accusations of cruelty around, which is not fair on the OP and is bordering on emotional blackmail tbh. I'd like to know what your experience of living with an alcoholic is to see where you're coming from.

[comingintomyown]

I was an enabler in hindsight I can’t believe what I put up with in secret, never asked him to stop though or issued ultimatums . In the end he left me and now a decade on his drinking is worse than ever.
In your situation I would have taken everything to the hospital but looking back I can see I shouldn’t have if that makes sense.

[DockerDre]

I'd like to know what your experience of living with an alcoholic is to see where you're coming from.

I'm not coming from anywhere.

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

What's intelligence got to do with it?


Most alcoholics I have known are highly intelligent. But they are also keen manipulators and finagle their friends and family into positions of Support Crew. That emotional co dependency is the single most destructive part of alcoholism. If it cannot be broken then nobody can change their behaviour.


That's what is meant by 'leaving him to get on with it' Withdraw the unfailing support, break the codeoendency, give everyone a different experience. You know the saying about doing what you have always done and getting the same results?

[CuriousaboutSamphire]

Please Dre, it is much more helpful to people living with an alcoholic to know if the person giving advice has any first hand experience.

It is hard enough making the decisions that have to be made without someone telling you that you are being cruel and making you the Bad Guy when you are desperately trying to hold your life together.

[CarolDanvers]

Of course you are. Everyone is coming from a position of experience or lack of that impacts on advice they give and choices they make. Clearly you're defensive about giving that information and that's fine. You don't have to tell me a thing and I will draw my own conclusions. I don't think you'd be on this thread if you didn't have some experience of family alcoholism, you sound personally affected. I think you should stop telling the OP she's being cruel though, she certainly isn't, she's asking for advice on the best way to handle it and emotive language and accusations like yours are unhelpful. Other people have managed to say that they'd help out practically without laying into the OP and as I said previously you seem to be responding to other posters who did say it not the actual OP.

[bourbonbiccy]

I can't believe people are actually saying to just leave him in the hospital, don't see him, don't take him any belongings - how some people treat the people they are supposed to love amazes me !!!!

Your husband clearly has an alcohol problem, he quite clearly does not know when to stop.

What has your husband said previously about why he drinks so much ?
It's easy for people to say they will stop and they mean it but they need to sort out why they are drinking so much
Now is a good time to have a heart to heart about why he drinks ?
Explain again how it makes you feel ?
I think he needs to talk to somebody and get help with the support of his family

[Daffodils07]

Coming from someone who has an alcoholic father please leave this man until he sorts himself out.
My dad is 66 now and has no life, he is wheelchair bound, has ataxia and no one wants to know him due to being a nasty person while drunk.
He still drinks and thinks it funny to laugh at my sister while she is trying to help him.
I gave up on him 5 years ago, unfortunately unless they want to help themselves they just wont give a shit.

[DockerDre]

He's not a fucking project - 'getting the same results' FFS! What he chooses to do is his own problem!

What the OP needs to do is to decide what SHE wants to do.

My point is, when he's in hospital is not the time to be cruel. Fine, if she wants to leave him, but for God's sake, just bring him his cigarettes and phone. It's not that difficult! It's just basic human decency.

THEN kick his ass to the kerb if you like!