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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

just found DH in DD's cot

232 replies

sleeplessbunny · 08/09/2012 01:49

where he had passed out drunk. I am still shaking. My first thought was "where is DD?" as I couldn't see her, he was taking up the whole cot. She was fine, curled up in the tiniest corner and hidden from view under (D)H's leg, but still.

There is no point trying to talk about it with him until the morning (or later) but I need to vent and try and get my own thoughts straight. This might be an epic post.

He has always drunk too much, it has got worse over the years though and now it is "normal" for him to have at least 1 bottle of wine every night. On a night like that it doesn't even cross my mind that he is drinking too much, his behaviour is usually fine, or at least unremarkable.

Since DD (1 yo) was born, he has given up smoking which he found very difficult and I think has contributed to his drinking getting worse. He used a particular book/technique to help him stop smoking and in the last couple of weeks he has bought the equivalent book for stopping drinking (but hasn't read it yet) so I am hopeful that he at least has the intention to stop. He has said on a few occasions that he wants to be able to cut down his drinking, but tbh I try not to engage him in conversation about either smoking or drinking as it always tends to end with an argument because our expectations are so different.

Anyway, obv tonight he drank way more than usual. I'm not entirely sure why, but SIL (his sister) and DN are here to visit, perhaps he just got carried away. But he was the only one drinking.

He must have come to bed about 11 ish (I had gone to bed early) but at around midnight he got up to go to the loo, made loads of noise, turned on all the lights etc etc. I was inwardly groaning and just waiting for him to come back to bed. Must have drifted off again and woke up with a start hearing weird noises on the baby monitor, went to investigate and found him sprawled in her cot.

Is it time for me to make a stand? I am so scared for DD right now, I am just thinking of all the other awful things he could have done without realising/thinking. He could so easily have just squashed her. What if he'd decided to take her out and dropped her? Am I an idiot for not having thought about this sort of thing before?

Right now I honestly don't feel safe with him in the house. I can't entertain the thought of going to sleep as I have to be awake to protect DD incase he does something else I haven't thought of. Am I over reacting?

My gut feeling right now is to tell him (in the morning) that he has to stop drinking or get out. To pour all the alcohol down the sink. But I know he can't stop, and so I'm scared of the outcome. I do love him, and 95% of the time his behaviour is fine.

WWYD?

OP posts:
Fairenuff · 09/09/2012 11:16

CouthyMow your earlier post made me cry. Heartbreaking. That poor, poor mother of that innocent baby Sad

Sometimes envisioning the worst case scenario is a good way to assess risk

Yes, absolutely.

bunny just look at the facts.

Your dh may have been thinking about cutting down on or stopping his drinking. He even bought a book. Then he got so drunk that he nearly killed your baby.

The next day he minimised his actions and tried to deflect by being annoyed with you for pouring his drink away.

And he carried on drinking.

What do you think it will take for him to decide to stop? If he actually had killed her do you think he would be drowning his sorrows with a few bottles of wine?

CouthyMowWearingOrange · 09/09/2012 12:10

13 years down the line, she is remarried, has 3 younger children, and is doing as well as can be expected. But nothing will erase the memory of her throwing herself at her baby's coffin and having to be held back from strangling her mother who had the audacity to turn up to the funeral, drunk, and shouting about how she didn't kill him and it wasn't her fault. It took 6 of us to prise the mother off the grandmother's neck, and another 4 to remove the grandmother from the church where the funeral was being held. Sad

Fairenuff · 09/09/2012 12:17

her mother who had the audacity to turn up to the funeral, drunk, and shouting about how she didn't kill him and it wasn't her fault

Still in denial. Not her fault.

OP there are terrifying similarities here aren't there.

Don't want to scare you, but this frightens the living daylights out of me.

tb · 09/09/2012 13:01

Finally he was told when he was in hospital that he was not an alcoholic - that was why he wasn't given antabuse, and why, when he went out from the hospital in to Chester, he was able to have a glass of beer when he felt like it.

The reason why I'm angry with my 'd'm was that she married him for financial security, to have a child to make her sister jealous, she blamed me for his drinking, and she rang him at work, told him she'd left him and asked him what he was going to do about it, when she found out she was pregnant. This was in the 1950s. She'd been a typist and he was a senior manager in a shipping line, and never worked again.

maras2 · 09/09/2012 13:57

Don't want to sound too flippant after all of the wonderful advice given here but,'how do you know when an alcoholic is lying?' 'His mouth moves'.Good luck with which ever option you choose to take. Mx.

AnotherMumOnHere · 09/09/2012 15:23

Another bit of advice ........ UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES when/if you go to the Alanon meeting DO NOT LEAVE YOUR DD WITH HER FATHER. He just cannot be trusted. Even if he is 'disgusted' that you 'cannot trust him' then that is HIS PROBLEM, not yours.

Mechavivzilla · 11/09/2012 11:04

Hey SleeplessBunny I know a few days have passed but this was on the news today and I thought of you. Hope all is going well

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19553239

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