DM, childcare. Was I unreasonable?

[T33l9]

My mother was a recovering alcoholic with many months of sobriety under her belt and was doing brilliantly. I trusted that those days were behind her. She was never a "wake up and drink every day" type of alcoholic, but a binge drinker.

I was offered a little part time cleaning job that conflicts with my OH's job so he wouldn't be able to have the children, my mother was insistent I take it. It's only 8 hours a week.

"it will be good for you to have some time away from the children, it'll be good for your mental health, go on - do it. I'd love to spend more time with the children. I'll have them. Please, do it. Think how lovely that little bit of extra money will be at christmas"

So I reluctantly took the job and even started to get excited about it.

Week 1 all goes great, the children are happy that grandma comes to sit with them at my place for 4 hours 2 days a week.

Week 2 she's decided to start drinking again, after months of being dry. She turned her phone off and left me in the lurch. Not so much as a phone call to tell me she isn't coming and has screwed me over with work.

What I want to know is was I unreasonable to trust her in the first place? I'm upset, at both her for doing this to us and myself for being such a fucking idiot.

To add: she has never drank around my children and wouldn't. I would never leave them in the care of somebody who is drunk or drinking.

YABU - you shouldn't have trusted her in the first place

YANBU - she has let you down, she's in the wrong.

It's horrible isn't it, the uncertainty. The phone goes, you see it's them and you don't know if you're getting normal conversation or drunken stupor. Mine is like yours with the voice too - you can tell after a drink, it totally changes. If her lip twitches too I'll think mine has a doppelganger!

It takes a long time to find peace with NC, and it is difficult. I've tried again several times - it's like she can make an effort for a while and be a nice normal mum/gran but then after a while the mask drops. In my case the trying again was triggered both time by deaths in the family- her sibling, then a few years later my sibling. But she can't sustain it and as my DD got older I just didn't want that in her life.

It is exceptionally hard to give up on a parent though, especially a mother. People don't understand, even relatives don't get it (in my case siblings do/did, but nobody further out) and it can be a very lonely stance. I have a relative who leaves their children with her all the time, regular overnights. Talking to her on the phone one evening, hearing the drunk voice, then her shouting at one of them to go to bed was a real turning point for me realising that she couldn't be trusted because she just sees nothing wrong with it I don't think. It's not everyday therefore not a problem. Except it is, isn't it?

Mine thought nothing of being drunk the night before I had exams - meaning no sleep for me - or being in a ridiculously state by the time I got home from school because "something" had happened, or because she'd had lunch with someone and then come home and just carried on. Sounds like you lived with similar. I think a challenge for me is that lots of people don't see it as alcoholism or a problem as it's not daily.

If her lip twitches too I'll think mine has a doppelganger!

Oh wow, it actually does. This is another tell tale sign from her when she's had a drink, even hours later when she's sobering up.

I can also relate to what you had to put up with during school years, I always hated her drinking even then. Whenever she got paid she would buy one of those miniature bottles of whiskey and that would start it all off.

I have memories of her bringing me home from a school friends party, where she had got drunk, and thinking it's a good idea to give me a piggy back on the way home. That resulted in her dropping me. I was around 6 at the time and we lived with my grandparents. My grandfather was livid and I can still remember now how he bollocked her and told her about herself.

Another similar memory was her taking me to another friends house as a child, her having a drink with the parents and going overboard, vomiting on their new carpet and falling asleep on the floor. Humiliating.

The thing is she didn't drink half as much then as she did now, but the signs were always there.

She moved back to her hometown when I was 16, leaving me behind, and it's when she moved here things ramped up tenfold because she didn't have me playing the saffy role (from absolutely fabulous if you've seen it) and policing her.

I stupidly moved here too some years later as I missed her and was confronted with what she had become.

Don't be hard on yourself. I think it's ingrained to want your mum - to want that close relationship that you see other people having. I think I miss the idea of a mum more than my actual mother if that makes sense?

I hear you re the Saffy role - I remember once (I must have been about 9 or 10) she had a bottle of whisky and was getting blotto. Every time I went to the kitchen I'd pour a bit away. It took her a few hours to realise; when she did she was convinced she was being haunted by the ghost of her dead mother

The combination of drink and narcissism gives rise to some particular stonkers. In the run up to my wedding I decided to have a very small hen (just me and bridesmaids). Workmates found out and insisted on throwing a small do for me too which was very sweet. It was literally me, girls from work, and I invited the bridesmaids as they were all very similar ages so thought it would be nice for them to meet first. Mother went apeshit - she had apparently been planning something (without me knowing) and basically blew up our phone screaming and yelling. Eventually now DH answered and told her I was out. I could hear her from across the room ranting on and on about how awful it was not to invite her, and how "the hen night is about the mother"... she genuinely believed it should revolve around her.

@T33l9

I have compassion fatigue as far as her drinking goes.

I've supported her alot over the years as have many others, me to my detriment. I can no longer sympathise with somebody whos selfishness negatively impacts my life.

The trust I afforded her this time was the last straw.

Alcoholism isn’t being ‘selfish’. It’s an addiction that’s nigh on impossible to overcome in that you’ll always have the addiction. That being said, I think you were misguided in thinking that she would be fine looking after your children. You’ve tried it, it hasn’t worked out. Please don’t blame your dm, blame her illness.

Don't be so hard on yourself. You made the best decision at the time given the facts as they stood and it's sad that now you know you will never ever be able to give her the benefit of the doubt again, no matter how much time passes.

Alcoholism is selfish.

If you are not physically dependent on it and you have abstained for months/years then what you are left with is a battle on impulse control. If after abstaining for X amount of months you decide to pick up the bottle and drink, knowing full well the devastating effects it has on your loved one, then you are selfish.

I wasn't going to mention this here but I know only too well what it is like to have an addiction. I had one myself from 17-22.

That being said I can accept that some people are predisposed to addiction especially when there are environmental factors thrown in, but accountability is paramount. Even at a young age I knew exactly what i was doing, so she certainly does.

My addiction began as a coping mechanism after I was left to fend for myself at 16, with no family around and found myself in a physically and sexually abusive relationship with a man who had a (diagnosed) narcissistic personality disorder and BPD.

When I eventually left the relationship I sought therapy and sorted my act out so by the time I had children later on I was completely drug free and in a better place mentally.

What I didn't do however, was absolve myself of blame by telling anybody who would listen that I'm ill or had a disease.

For every year that I stayed in active addiction I was making a choice to do so, a selfish choice that served only me.

I'm mentioning this only because some comments have insinuated that I don't know about addiction. I do.

If I can do it as a young woman with no family support and a shit load of trauma, there's no reason my mother can't do the same with all of the support she is given - especially when she has the additional incentive of children and grandchildren.

If I decided today that I was bored of sobriety and missed getting high, and found a drug dealer to score, I would be one selfish fucker - to do that knowing I have people in my life who will be negatively impacted.

So the urge is there, you deal with it, find healthy coping mechanisms.

I've had a shit few years as of late not helped by having to deal with this from my mother and at no point have I used drugs, or even alcohol, to cope.

With all of that in mind you'll have to excuse me for not rolling out the sympathy carpet for somebody who brings nothing but stress because she lacks impulse control.

A shining example of her selfishness:

She has called this morning telling me how she won't drink again now because she's had a "warning" from her body, the binge gave her diarreah.

No apology for costing me my job. No consideration for me about the stress she caused yesterday.

Just how unfortunate she is that her self indulgent binge left her with an upset stomach.

She will drink again of course, now she has the taste for it again. The negative consequences will be forgotten about or downplayed by tomorrow.

She is the epitome of selfish.

See, if i was selfish I would use all of this as excuse to go and get high myself.

"Oh I'm just so overwhelmed, I need something to chill me out"

But i won't do that, because I'm not selfish and I also care about my children.

Excuse the rant. I'm angry all over again.

Addiction is selfish, no arguements there. But psychological addiction is far harder to break than physical addiction. Most alcoholics never manage it which is why they go tee total rather than become moderate drinkers. Or why lots of people spend a lifetime struggling with their weight.

When she rings asking for money, it's no I don't have any spare remember you promised to be sober and look after my children. No childcare no extra job.
How would you feel about blocking her for a bit. Give yourself space to think.

I'd say after that call you really need some space from her. She is selfish - drinking can be selfish, but inherently selfish people can also be drinkers and it sounds like she may be the latter.

The thing is she isn't physically dependent as she can and does go days without it. It is predominantly psychological.

Somebody who was chronically addicted couldn't do that - they would need to drink to ward off DT's. I know that for some people, not having alcohol can be dangerous. That's not what happens with my mother.

If she needed it because not having it would be dangerous then I'd have alot more sympathy.

As it stands she has an impulse control problem, not a severe physical dependence.

I agree that blocking her for a while is a good idea, I'll do it in a moment.

I have absolutely no sympathy whatsoever for alcoholics. Not even a tiny bit. I feel horrendous for the people around them and the long lasting scars they inflict, however.
You haven’t done anything wrong OP. You put your faith in your mum and she let you down. Lesson learned hopefully. I wish you the best.

Ah I read one of the above replies incorrectly, apologies. I thought that said physical addiction is harder to break than psychological addiction.

Thank you Abouttime, definitely a lesson learned here.

NC will give you peace and you’re in real need of that.

She has to fix herself- or not - on her own. Anything less than this is facilitating her and that keeps her from rock bottom.

Maybe this is just mine, but I think part of the problem with this sort of functional binge drinker is that they don't seem to hit rock bottom so easily (and I know it's never easy) - but because they see it that they can take it or leave it? Mine would think nothing of being drunk as a skunk at important times like me prepping for exams but she would never have let a teacher see it. And because it's not every day, people who would see it at an event or party would just think she'd had a few too many and never realise it was more serious. It's only those closest who realise the true frequency and that they're not just a funny/bad drunk.