Boyfriend Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde pattern

[whythehelldoesthiskeephappenin]

I've been seeing someone for a year, first of all casually, but over the last 6 months, seriously. I find it quite hard to describe how he behaves with me, and some of my examples might seem trite, but I'm basically confused about whether I am too sensitive or he is deliberately (or perhaps not deliberately) creating a problem or avoiding intimacy.

He is a functioning alcoholic. He never gets steaming drunk, but he just drinks a lot and becomes extremely warm and open and jovial when he is drunk. I'm only mentioning this here because it is relevant later.

We have periods of weeks (usually when he is drinking quite regularly) where everything is fantastic. He tells me I am the love of his life, he wants to know about every detail of my life, whether I've got home okay, he plays me songs which remind him of me, shows me clips of movies which "remind him" of us, we see each other every day and we speak every night until the early hours.

Then one morning, after one of these intense periods, I can call him and he will be nice, but business like. Phonecalls are short (he yawns while I am on the line,) says he's got a lot of work, doesn't have much time to meet, asks what the time is, sighs, or loses battery, cuts off and doesn't call me back for a a couple of days. Fine, a few days here and there of this in a relationship, someone can be busy, but it probably goes on for about 5 days. When I call him and he is this person on the other end of the line and I know it has turned again, I feel a huge sinking feeling in my stomach that IT is happening again and I just can't cope. It's like falling from a great height. Those calls/meetings go a bit like this:

Me: Is everything okay? You are being a bit cold
Him: What do you mean? Why are you saying that?
Me: Because compared to how we were yesterday, this is a huge difference
Him: I have a hangover, I think I was drunk. What did we even do or say yesterday?
Me: You don't remember?
Him: No, sorry! I told you I was trouble.
Me: Sorry? You didn't say that. What are you talking about?
Him: I don't know. Maybe I am a terrible person or a psychopath or something.
Me: Why are you saying that?
Him: Why do you always have to complicate things?

The chill is palpable and the contact is suddenly dropped, and my reaction is to withdraw and feel awful. After about three days of my withdrawal/shut down of communication he gets extremely upset and starts bombarding me with messages and calls asking why am I ignoring him, how could I do this to him? I explain to him over and over again about this pattern, but he mostly refuses to engage about it.

Then 24 hours later after confronting him and explaining for the millionth time why I withdrew, he calls me, tipsy and says he knows and understands and it will never happen again and he does not want to lose me and he will do ANYTHING, anything to make up for it. He always has some kind of excuse like he is a flawed person and I am the only good thing in his life, and he is astounded by my unconditional and generous love, even when he is damaged and confused.

My only request is for him to not do it again. But he does it again - it's farcical.

The only one improvement he has made is recently when he has gone into a cold and uncommunicative period he will occasionally send the odd "x" or heart eyes emoji "to let me know it's okay" (apparently.) Lucky me! Pecking at crumbs.

What is going on here?

A better question would be “why am I with someone who treats me like this?”.

He's only likeable when he's drunk?

He needs to stay sober and be a normal human being, or you need to dump him.

He’s broken. And not your responsibility to fix. The phrase “functional alcoholic” is an oxymoron. Doesn’t exist any more than an honest politician.
IF he gets help for his alcohol dependency perhaps he could be a decent boyfriend but honestly for your own sanity you’d be better walking away.

All of this is explained by the fact that he is an alcoholic, which you are ignoring.

Alcohol is what he loves, not you. He’s even telling you that he’s a bad egg, and you’re hooked into it. Yes he’s avoiding intimacy because he can’t give you it. And he’s treating you badly when you question him, so you don’t.

If you don’t feel good when this happens, this is an enormous warning sign that that he is going to treat you badly, as well as his faux warning he might be a psychopath.

I would find someone else before you find out that this man has a litany of crazy exes or the usual.

I only got to here:

We have periods of weeks (usually when he is drinking quite regularly) where everything is fantastic. He tells me I am the love of his life

Get out now! What part of "we only get on while he's pissed" do you need explaining? His drinking will only get worse. What the fuck are you thinking

My mind is boggling as why you are even asking on opinions on a relationship with an alcoholic. It’s not like you have a mortgage and two kids with this guy so why are you considering it.

Be pickier and have higher expectations.

You have the wrong question. Just the first three sentences of your OP are screaming to all of us "this is not a healthy relationship, why is she with him? Run..."
No one is using to explain what he is doing or what you can do about it because it's pointless. You have to leave him he really is bad news, he even said so himself. You need to ask yourself why you could even think this is worth continuing.

This won't have a happy ending and he will keep doing this for as long as you let him.

Him: No, sorry! I told you I was trouble.
Me: Sorry? You didn't say that. What are you talking about?
Him: I don't know. Maybe I am a terrible person or a psychopath or something.

"I told you I was trouble." I don't think you see what this particular red flag is saying.He's completely abdicating responsibility for his behaviour, it's All. Your. Own. Fault. Anything he does - your fault for being around to be mistreated, he warned you. What a manipulative little shite he is!

You accept he's an alcoholic, but you don't seem to understand what this means. His primary relationship is not with you, it's with alcohol. You've been through this cycle with him several times now, enough to recognise the pattern. It's not going to change.

Get out. Now. Stay with him and you will get more damaged by every cycle. Your self-esteem will be non-existent. Do not fool yourself that 'the love of a good woman' will fix him - it won't. You can't fix him. Fix yourself by working out why you are still with him.

You need to end it with him as he’s very damaged. He is using alcohol to cover a whole heap of issues. He is not your problem to fix. You could go to an Alanon meeting or go to a CODA meeting to look at the reasons you want to stay with this man.

Why is it good enough for you to be with someone who's only nice to you sometimes? Its shit. Dump him

Stop analysing his behaviour and pay attention to your own instead. What are you doing with this man?

I think I’ve dated this person! Certainly someone very like him. Get out. You cannot change him. The love bombing, the blowing hot and cold, the addiction - they’re all narcissistic traits. I’m not saying he has it because I’m not a psychologist but he is exhibiting a lot of behaviours that will not be changed and will eventually lead to you being unhappy all the time. It’s really hard, but really necessary, to break the cord.

I don't understand why you would choose to pursue a relationship with someone you know to have a drinking problem. And if he's functional, he's going to continue drinking.

And as for the "I told you I was trouble" stuff. Believe him. Life is too short.

Nice when drunk, cold when not/hungover ... He's an alcoholic; who could be bothered with that.

The nice isn't the real him, is it.