help - wife's drinking

[reachingmylimit]

I have been reading others' stories for about six months and have posted a few times. But I have name changed for this.

I am feeling a bit desperate for some ideas about what to do - or reassurance that I should keep doing what I am doing - about my wife's drinking.

She has been drinking at least a bottle of wine most nights for about 10 years. At the moment it is as high as it has ever been - she stops just short of two bottles and manages one night off most but not all weeks.

It doesn't stop her leading a pretty normal life. We can afford it. She works part time; her hours are increasing soon which I think will be hard.

We row a lot - but very rarely about the drinking: I try very hard to bite my tongue and usually succeed. Of course it feels to me that the angry moods are the booze speaking but that's not to say I don't get things wrong at times and deserve it.

For 2-3 years I have been really working at being a supportive partner; not behaving in any way that could feel like criticism or punishment for her drinking. She wants to drink less and has tried a few things - AA which she didn't like and didn't stay with for long; a counsellor who she found very good and got down to drinking 4 days / week. I don't know why that stopped.

It hasn't worked - yet.

I feel it is doing damage to her health - many times she cannot remember conversations / things that happened the next morning and she forgets words for things more and more - so I am scared of Alzheimers. She has some family history of breast cancer and the statistics I have read say she is increasing her risk from about 12/1000 to 18/1000. Is that a big deal? I don't know.

It does not do much for her relationships with friends / family. Our son (young teen) keeps a distance and I cannot help but think this is why - although I know it is pretty normal for teenagers. But he won't bring friends home of an evening.

So help please - maybe I am just making a problem where there isn't one? It's not like she drinks during the day etc etc etc. Maybe it is my fault she drinks as I am such an awful husband.

And if it is a real problem - maybe I am doing the right thing and should just hang on in there?

What is the alternative? Be nasty to her for drinking? Make threats? Ask her friends to talk to her (I have never spoken to anyone about this ever - feels too disloyal)?

Am I being a wimp for not bringing up the subject because I am scared of her anger? Or am I doing the right thing?

answers on a postcard please...

Did some talking this morning but it is still not the moment to mention the drink.

Unless that is me being a doormat again.

Snorbs: no I am not ready to write her off. I do genuinely think she is a great person dragged down by alcohol induced depression / moods. That, I suppose, is what I should try to keep telling her.

I actually look with amazement at what she manages to achieve in spite of the booze: I couldn't do it, I wouldn't even be able to move next morning.

can't respond more just now but I am finding this a real help; thank you all.

reaching

I am going to be a little tough on you here.

You do realise that she is chosing to drink? Just think about that.

Despite what it does to you, your son and her health. Think about that too.

When she choses to stop drinking there will be plenty of help, advice and support out there for her.

At the moment she choses to purchase alcohol, pour it into a glass and drink it. Every time.

What do you think will make her chose to change?

You cannot control any of this. It is not your fault. You cannot make her better.

All you can do is chose whether to continue living like this or not.

Sorry, should have been oo's

Hi reachingmylimit

I would say it is impossible to have a meaningful relationship with a drinking alcoholic. I can say that, because I am an alcoholic. The alcohol comes first for your wife. Before you, before your son, before everything. And if she keeps drinking, over any considerable period of time, things will get worse and not better. You are both enabling her drinking and probably keeping her alive. You are not enabling her because you are foolish or weak or loving or confused or bad. You are doing it because that's what you've always done, meanwhile she's drinking because that's what she's always done and just as she has no choice, she has lost the ability to control the drink, and you have lost (if you ever had it) the ability to control her.

You can go to Al-Anon if you want help enough. Maybe things need to get worse for you - I realised I was an alcoholic last November but I still needed the crap kicking out of me for a while longer, whilst I lost progressively more, and my life got worse. It had to get worse for me to get to the point to realise I was hopeless.

Misery, however, is optional. I am not miserable today because I found a solution that works for me. I would encourage you to put aside whatever pride and self-consciousness is stopping you from making changes and ring Al Anon first on 020 7403 0888. Stop worrying about being loyal to your wife and start being loyal to yourself, and your son. It doesn't have to be like this.

Hello. I am a regular poster but namechanged for another thread and can't be arsed to change back!

My mum started drinking like your wife did. It was v confusing for me as a child and her drinking got far worse and she is still an alcoholic today. I was told that she only had 6 months to live over 20 years ago as her liver was so screwed but by some amazing chance, she is still here today but v ill and suffering now from a terminal illness linked to her drinking.

Please talk to your son about it if you can. Although he may be acting like a teenager, it is also a critical time for him to understand about alcohol and sensible drinking.

You also mentioned violent tempers and mood swings in your wife. Is it possible that she has a mental health problem? It was only after my mother was a serious alcoholic that the doctor diagnosed she had quite severe bipolar disorder and the alcohol (and smoking) were her attempts to self medicate.

What Pan said about fear is, I think, very true. (BTW, hello Pan! Good to see you back! I'm very sorry to hear about your friend though.)

Those with significant alcohol problems live lives dominated by fear. The thought of life without booze is terrifying. They associate drinking with having a good time so strongly that they believe that an alcohol-free life will be a life without any fun or pleasure at all.

On the other side, there is the fear caused by the damage their drinking has caused and may yet still cause. Your wife is undoubtedly aware that her drinking habits are putting your relationship under strain. She will also be aware - to a lesser or greater extent - that she doesn't treat you very well at times albeit she may well self-justify that as you causing it. But every morning she wakes up with a pounding hangover and big holes in her memory of what happened the night before... that's got to be scary. Plus there's the fear of what damage to her health that the drink may be causing. She's been to AA, she's heard the stories, she knows how bad it could get. But she's telling herself that she'll stop before she lets it get that bad.

The first of those fears is the more powerful right now. She's more scared of what life will be like sober than she is of what life could be like as a drunk. And that is because there haven't been any particularly serious consequences for her drunkenness...

...yet.

As drinkers get older their brains and bodies become less and less able to cope with the alcohol. Heavy drinking also has a cumulative effect - if she's doing a couple of bottles of wine per day then she won't be properly sobering up before she's drinking again.

This is a very serious situation and it is likely to get worse before it gets better. Neither you nor she know how far down she has to go, how much she will have to lose, before the fear of how much she stands to further lose outweighs the fear of sobriety.

I remember the fear that coursed through my veins when I considered confronting my ex about her drinking and the way she treated me when she was drunk. I remember the knot of tension and dread I got in the pit of my stomach when I returned from work because I didn't know if I was going to find my ex either (mostly) sober and happy or drunk and aggressive. I remember the feeling that it would be intensely disloyal to tell the truth to anyone else about what was going on in our relationship.

In hindsight, it was crazy. A relationship shouldn't be dominated by that kind of fear, those secrets and lies.

I'm not saying you should write her off. All I can do is tell you the path I walked and what I've learned both from my own experiences and those of others I know who were in similar situations. If I can sum that experience up for you in one sentence it would be (the horribly trite but nevertheless true) "Nothing changes if nothing changes." As long as you keep reacting the way you have always done, you'll get the same results every time.

You can't stop her drinking, but you can change the way you react to her drunkenness and moods. In doing so you can help yourself to break free of limiting your own choices for fear of how she will react.

Until about 2 years ago,I was also drinking a couple of bottles of wine per day. I started after I had an accident that's rendered me housebound,so I can pinpoint a time that the alcohol consumption started creeping up.
My turning point came when my teenage son broke down in tears because of it. He told me how worried he was about my health. I felt bloody awful when I realised how emotionally unavailable I'd become,and how selfish I'd been.
DH had never said anything,so I didn't think that anyone noticed,or cared.
I would definately talk to your son about it,as well as your wife. An emotional approach,rather than a critical one,may work.
I can now drink normally,so I was deliberately choosing to drink.

reaching-

It sounds then like she is a 'functioning alcohol-dependent' - am not sure exactly what this means, but from what I understand it's the ability to maintain the basic stuff of life without too much day-to-day disruption.
Two obv. probs:

1. Life is more than just being 'functioning', and your pain and consequences on family are victims of this state.
2. she may not be able to maintain this state in the future.

Your admiration for her abilities to maintain this state needs tempering, IMHO. IT will feed into her continuance of drinking.

And as has been said, you and family are not her immediate priorities right now - securing some alcohol is prime, and you are "okay" in her eyes as long as you don't compromise this.

do please come back when you can to let us know about things?

i would be worried about the memory problems and the word finding difficulties alcohol misuse can cause permanent memory loss and long term use can cause a type of dementia and the fact that she has problems remembering certain words may indicate some frontal lobe damage if she wont goto the drs maybe you could and discuss everything with your gp

hello all

having bided my time I asked a carefully thought out question - "is there anything I can do to help you drink less".

immediate response - well I wanted to not drink all last week but you didn't etc etc...

The good news is that it didn't turn into a row; I did manage to point out that it was more useful to know before than after if she was trying not to drink; I did manage to ask if it would help to talk about it more (although didn't get a straight answer).

I didn't go on about why she should stop - and actually I don't need to do this if she is doing something about it and getting somewhere.

She is planning to have sunday, monday, weds and thurs dry this coming week.

If she manages that who am I to complain. If she can maintain it as a routine, and start to decrease the amount she drinks on the other three nights that ends up being a pretty normal pattern in this day and age...

I am interested to know if any of you out there have experience of her rather unusual drinking pattern. She never finishes the bottle - at least not without starting the next - which I understand is not the norm. It seems to me she likes to know there is an open bottle ready for the next night. She does seem to be able to limit herself in that whether she starts at 4pm or 8pm she will usually drink the same amount. She seems to find it easier to have a whole night off than drink below whatever that limit is - it has gradually increased to just under two bottles.

I don't know whether she will ever be able to control it rather than stop completely - and I don't think she does either.

hi reaching - stopping to say just that. back shortly.

People with alcohol problems (and drug problems, food issues etc) often have peculiar rituals. It's usually some attempt to exert control over something they feel is uncontrollable. It doesn't mean anything significant.

Thanks for coming back! As a ?private person? it must be something of a compomrise for you to post like this ? tho? hopefully the notion of being disloyal is now dropped?

This thread isn?t about her at all. It?s about you, as we know. And if this thread is of any use to you, you should keep on posting, even/especially when you don?t feel like it.

What?s really useful to know is ?how you have responded to similar problems before?? I mean endemic, daily, relationship, inter-personal, perhaps work-based, demanding issues. Can you recall when you have demonstrated the attitude and skills necessary to come to a resolution to them? ( I don't mean for you to describe them, obv. - am asking you to consider your strengths in previous situations that you can draw on now.).

Hi RML. I think I can explain the 'never finishes the bottle' thing. I am an alcoholic and I was the same. I had a limit, it was more of a wall that I would hit when I would pass out. One bottle (of wine) wasn't nearly enough, but two was too much, I usually hit my wall at around 1.5 bottles, or somewhere between 1 and 2 bottles, anyway. There is also the issue (for alcoholics) about never wanting the booze to run out, so even if she's almost at her limit at the end of a bottle, she may open another just to make sure that it's available to her.

I'm sorry you're having such a difficult time, I can't really help on advising other than commenting on her drinking behaviour as it mirrors my own from what I can tell. She absolutely will have to make the decision to stop all on her own though, that much is true.

Also, it sounds like she knows that her alcohol consumption is a major problem, so I can probably give you some insights into the ways that she's thinking, if you like. At a guess I'd say that at the moment she probably feels that she is stuck with this problem because she's tried things to make it stop (AA, addiction counselling) and so far they haven't worked for her.

Just ask if there's anything you'd like to know, I'm happy to help

It's wonderful that she is able to admit to you that she would like to cut down and that you are able to talk about it to some extent. Deciding to stop forever, or only drink on certain days is an extremely difficult concept and it might be best for her to try this instead.

Each morning, when she wakes up, she decides whether or not she is going to drink that day.

She does not have to tell anyone, just herself.

She gets stocked up with lots of soft drinks, ice, fruit tea, hot chocolate, whatever she likes.

She will need sugary food to replace all the sugar she is used to getting from her alcohol.

She could take a vitamin B supplement.

She plans how not to drink with as much thought as she used to put into how to drink.

She changes her habits instead of drinking, go for a walk, run, swim, take a bath, phone a friend.

If she gets a craving, check HALT (hungry, angry, lonely, tired) and meet those needs first.

If the craving is strong just take it half an hour at a time. Eat, have soft drinks, take a nap, knit, bake. If it's really bad take it minute by minute and it will pass.

Do not think about tomorrow, the weekend, Christmas, birthdays, whatever.

Take it ONE DAY AT A TIME.

Every sober day is a good day. If she has a drink don't worry, don't panic, don't beat yourself up or give up. Just start again the next day. Wake up and decide whether or not you are going to drink that DAY.

If she can get some help in the form of AA or similar that will help. If she will join the Brave Babes thread under relationships on MN, that will help enormously. (You may have read some of it yourself).

HTH

Also, it looks like such a long-term commitment. And I am surely reading that it must be an enormous confidence-drainer? ( it was for my friends partner, and he was mightily resilient.)

Reading, and re-reading,and re-re-reading your last post, reaching, the 'passivity' of it stands out, yes?

I mean,

• "is there anything I can do..", was it well thought out? It does sound like a shared responsibility?

• " the good news is that she didn't turn it into a row." - ( and no she would have had no right to, so why be grateful for that fact?)..

• "pretty normal pattern in this day and age" - but you and she knows you are well beyond taking the benchmark as 'this day and age'

From the evidence from other circs. of substance misuse, users often look for other people/institutions to lay down some boundaries, because they can't do it for themselves.

"She is planning to have sunday, monday, weds and thurs dry this coming week."
In other words, she is planning to have yet another try at controlled drinking. In your OP you mentioned that she'd already tried that (with the support of a counsellor) and failed. I'd guess that she's tried - and failed - on other occasions, too. What is so significantly different this time that makes you believe it will work?

"If she manages that who am I to complain."
This isn't just about the drinking. This is also about the way she treats you when she's drunk. She knows that when she starts drinking she finds it very difficult to not keep drinking until she's drunk. She also knows that when she's drunk she often treats you badly. Yet she's still planning to drink. If she only gets drunk and nasty on Fridays, Saturdays, and Tuesdays, would that then be acceptable to you?

"If she can maintain it as a routine, and start to decrease the amount she drinks on the other three nights that ends up being a pretty normal pattern in this day and age..."
You, and she, are living in the hope that she will go back to being a 'normal drinker'. I'm really sorry but it doesn't work like that. People with significant, long-term alcohol problems cannot turn the clock back and magically regain the ability to reliably control their drinking again. Sure, they want to. But they can't.

"I don't know whether she will ever be able to control it rather than stop completely - and I don't think she does either."

With respect, you do know the answer to that. Or, at least, you do if you consider her drinking patterns over the last decade. She might continue tinkering around with which days she says she'll drink on, or how much she should drink, or exchanging one kind of booze for another etc for another ten years. Would that be acceptable to you?

It took me a long time but I came to realise that I was living my life largely paralyzed in a state of wait-and-see. I had developed this fantasy that when my (then) DP would finally see the light and stop drinking then our relationship would quickly become nice and loving and 'normal'. I spent years of my life in wait-and-see.

In doing that, I became unhealthily fixated on how much she was drinking and when. I kept an eye on how much was left in the wine bottles. I got tense on the days when she'd said she wouldn't drink in expectation/fear of her opening a bottle. When she did, I felt like she was almost daring me to say something about it. The stress eventually made me physically ill, let alone the emotional toll.

Wait-and-see also made me ignore the reality that, just as my (then) DP was responsible for her choices, I am responsible for mine. Wait-and-see was an abdication of that responsibility and, instead, putting the responsibility for my future happiness into the hands of an actively-drinking alcoholic. Frankly, that's nuts. I had to take back that responsibility for myself and realise that my happiness was nobody's responsibility but mine.

I also came to realise that it is pointless listening to what my ex said about her plans for drinking. Someone with a serious drink problem who is saying that they'll only drink on certain days is just a drunk who is determined to keep drinking regardless of the consequences. Once I stopped listening to what my ex said about her drinking and, instead, paid attention to what she did - ie, open yet another box of wine - things became clearer.

I stopped listening to what my ex said about her drinking and, instead, paid attention to what she did

Excellent point Snorbs and also,

putting the responsibility for my future happiness into the hands of an actively-drinking alcoholic

It's important for your future happiness to emotionally separate not the person from the alcoholic as you seem so easily to do, but yourself from the alcoholic. You are not responsible. You will not change her. You can not change her. It is not within your control.

If you were to physically separate you could still help, advise and support her but give her the message that you are getting on with your life regardless of what she does with hers. You are not going to enable her any more. This is actually the kindest course of action for both of you and if you want to trial a separation you will find lots of support and practical advise on these boards.

reachingmylimit,

You are as caught up on the merry go around of alcoholism as your wife is. Sorry but you are her codependent enabler here and you are the last person who can help her (I do not mean that unkindly). She does not want your help. Words are cheap; look at her actions. You are not responsible for her when all is said and done.

Your son is undoubtedly being badly affected here and may well go onto have emotional problems that become only apparant in adulthood. I am not at all surprised he is not bringing any friends home of an evening; he is afraid to do so out of fear, embarrassment and shame because of his mum's alcoholism. You and he both need help and support: Al-anon for you and Al-ateen for your son.

Also long term alcoholism can bring with it memory problems (alcoholism does not just affect the liver). Her alcoholism is also causing her short term memory to fail.

Your wife's future attempt to do controlled drinking will likely end in failure. What happens afterwards?. You should really pay close heed to what Snorbs is writing here. You could easily go on another 10 years like this; that is if her alcoholism does not kill her first.

There are no guarantees here; she could go onto lose everything and still choose to drink afterwards.

You need to remember the 3cs re alcoholism:-
You did not cause it
You cannot control it
You cannot cure it

You love your wife but her primary relationship is with drink and love is just not enough in these situations.

Well, that's some hard reading folks. Your 'wait and see' scenario was particularly chilling, Snorbs.

Snorbs, yet again, the perfect post . I really wish I'd had you to give me advice when I went through hell with my sister.

OK thanks folks. I hear what you are saying.

I read somewhere that of those who get support from the NHS with drinking - which usually takes the form of CBT - a third stop completely; a third do manage to control it (although for how long they don't say); a third continue out of control.

I do believe that some people can go from out of control drinking to in control drinking - indeed I know someone who has. Her max level was not that much short of my wife's current level. But she was only out of control for a year or two.

However I also think it is pretty unlikely that my wife is going to be able to do it.

Watch this space.

I am in virtually the same position. I am seperated and the main cause of that was her excessive drinking and aggressiveness. Despite being done for drink driving last year and told by courts she had to attend counselling, she didn't try to stop drinking. Over the last few years her drinking has got worse and she would regularly drink 2 bottles of wine a night.
It got so bad a couple of months ago that she attacked our 15 year old son and threatened to do same to the other children (boy 13 and girl 9) while I was away on business. When I was leaving kids to school the next morning the 15 y o told me he couldn't take her abuse any more and wanted to kill himself. I make no apologies for my actions after that, I contacted social services and put them in the picture and they advised me to get a non molestation order against her. I did that and she is not allowed to see the kids unless under independant supervision and not allowed to come near the house. The kids have told me and the social worker that they do not want any contact with her at the moment so that's the way it stays until they decide otherwise.

Simples - I wouldn't say that is virtually the same. My wife does still function pretty well most of the time and she is trying to stop - or at least control. However the stories of how bad things can get are worth hearing.

Although I can't do it for her I need to do what I can to support her.

Fairenuff: you are describing quite well what she does do. My only problem with what you suggest is that it helps me a lot to know whether this is a drinking day or not. It avoids me feeling disappointed - not always easy to hide - and gives me a chance to be careful as the sun passes the yard arm.

GollyHolightly: any insights would be really helpful.

I suppose I am really interested in whether having days off is a step in the direction of stopping altogether or a pointless exercise. The Allen Carr approach to stopping smoking is to keep smoking until you have really decided you are going to stop, then completely stop. He would describe the days off thing as the 'willpower' method - which is pointless in his book.

Of course the good thing about 'days off' is that she wakes up realising that you don't have to feel bad in the morning. The bad thing is that the first day off she can't get to sleep; and after a couple of days off the booze really takes effect quickly.

My intention (sorry if this sounds behaviourist) is to dole out the praise liberally.

Should I suggest, on her next drinking day, that she drinks less - or do I let her get on with it without criticism of any sort given that she has set herself targets and is achieving them?