AIBU? DH’s drinking

[Oreoqueen87]

DH and I are at an impasse about his drinking and I really need some perspective.

DH has 1-3 beers every day without fail. I’m not too worried about the amount, it’s not excessive but it’s the how he’s drinking and the background.

For context, we don’t live in the UK, culturally it’s similar in many ways but there are way less pubs and alcohol is less present in everyday life. We are later in life parents, I’m mid forties and DH is 50.

My issue with DH’s drinking is that it’s always in front of our 7 year old boy, who idolises his dad. He will often crack open a beer at 3pm on the weekends, and have two or three as he’s pottering about the garden with DS.

When he gets home from work he’ll have opened a beer by 5pm, and have a couple of beers before DS goes to bed.

There have been a couple of weekend afternoons when DS’s friends have called in (with their parents!) and he’s been having a beer. That would be unusual here and I felt a bit uncomfortable.

He gets very defensive if I try broach it gently with him and says I’m being judgemental. His dad is a hardcore alcoholic, his brother was an alcoholic who died an alcohol related death two years ago and his entire family are heavy drinkers. I feel like he just doesn’t see how unhealthy it is for DS to see alcohol as part of his daily routine every single day. That dads always having a beer while he watches tv with him of an evening. He thinks I’m super controlling and uptight.

I genuinely would not care if he drank after DS went to bed at 7pm. Or it was a couple of times a week, a in the evening the other times. But he just won’t hear it at all.

AIBU?

I’d just put in a word of warning about banning booze from the house: my ex was an alcoholic and I can trace the descent into dependency back to the point where he started dropping into the pub on the way home from work and “a pint” became several. The other patrons at that time of day were also people using booze as a crutch. There was no one in there telling them to take it easy, they were all just reassuring each other that they were the normal ones.

@FormerCautiousLurker you raise good points. I probably should have been clearer in earlier posts , I have ADHD, as do all my siblings. My mum is diagnosed autistic. DS is a replica of my brother when young.

DH is dyslexic but other than that I’m pretty sure he and his family are NT. They don’t have any of the typical ADHD/AU symptoms. My ADHD is well controlled at this stage thankfully.

Alcoholics are devious. A ban of alcohol will just mean he finds cunning ways of concealing his drinking. If indeed he is an alcoholic - has the amount escalated or remained steady? Does he hide alcohol? Has it always been just beer or has he added spirits to the mix?

Personally, the amount and frequency is less of an issue on the face of it for me than the fact that he seems unable to flex according to any change in situation. I like a drink and probably drink a small - medium glass of wine about 5 nights a week. BUT, if we go over to a muslim friend's house, I have no problem skipping the wine. If I have to drive to fetch the DC from activities, I skip the wine, and it's not a problem for me.

However, at this point, I don't think it's causing specific issues with your DH. I can see your DS being embarassed about it if it's not culturally normal as he gets older though.

What sort of number of units is he drinking a week? 2-3 beers is almost meaningless without knowing the strength. The free drinkaware app is great for keeping track.

My ex used to drink similar. But he liked scottish craft ales which were often 2.5-3 units each. 3 a night could be 8+ units = over 50 units a week.

I did leave due to this and increasing issues with behaviour/dv linked to alcohol. He didn't get as much as 50:50 but contact was still a nightmare and court couldn't care less about his abuse or drinking. However, the kids are far better off having one happy safe stable parent even if they aren't there all the time.

Does he ever hide alcohol to your knowledge? Or misrepresent how much he is drinking? In later stages my ex used to lie about how much he'd had.

I'd be annoyed by that. Its the expectation that, for example, if there's an emergency you will be the one doing the driving if you had to take child to hospital. Or if you want to spontaneously go out all together you would have to do the driving. The mentality that "Its fine for me to be mildly inebriated all the time because she's holding the fort" kind of thing. Parenting should be a team effort - all of it. I wouldn't want an adult who'd had even a couple of drinks to be responsible for a young child.

He definitely has a problem.

Quite apart from the (poor) social and role-modeling aspects, as others have also said the quantity your DH is drinking is well over the recommended amount. Perhaps encourage him to use an app to track the units, and he'd be faced with the stark reality of the extent of the drinking? Might be more receptive to the evidence than conversations with you to which he might have become resistant/irritable etc. It also takes your personal judgment out of the equation (for him) so harder to bat it away.

I am in a very similar situation. I lived with an alcoholic as a teenager and it has really affected me. I do not want my daughter growing up around daily drinking. When I ask him why will say it’s just 1!!!! Like that’s an answer. He says that sometimes he is stressed. I told him that he’s dependent on alcohol and that he needs to stop. I absolutely hate it. Every now and then he goes out and binges, gets really bad beer fear the next day. I no longer care. He swears of alcohol for a couple of weeks then starts again. But apparently it’s not a problem 🙄

But it's ok for women to have a bottle of wine every night?

What? Who said that was ok?