Unable to handle normal things because of past trauma

[Dustland]

I feel a bit silly posting this but I have what feels like a major issue. My ex husband was an alcoholic, terrible things used to happen when he drank. Physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse. I spent weeks hiding bruises, he’d take drugs as a result of drinking which would keep him up for days and he’d get me out of bed, sit me in a chair downstairs and then say ‘I’m going to destroy you’ and then tell me for hours how awful I am, I’m a terrible mother, everyone hates me and laughs at me etc for the whole night until morning when the kids woke up and I’d get them up and ready and leave the house. I developed a real aversion to alcohol, I just hated it, always looking for signs, butterflies in the tummy, fear. I finally got out about 8 years ago and never looked back. But now, I can’t handle if a man drinks. I tell myself it’s normal, he was abnormal, but if a man drinks around me I just want to run. I’ve been with the most amazing guy for a year, he drinks on occasion, yes I’ve been vigilant, watching, observing….he’s shown me that people can drink and bad things don’t always happen. I thought I was over it. But this past week, he’s drank a few times, nothings happened but I can’t cope. I’ve got those butterflies again, those fear responses, I feel angry and tearful. I’m avoiding him and don’t see how I can resolve this. I just despair at ever having a normal relationship because of the way I am, I genuinely think I’m broken.

Not broken at all, normal and life preserving caution based on your experience. Be patient with yourself, as you would a beloved friend. Appreciate your survival instincts. Ask him for a bit of space if you need to, or just make yourself unavailable for a week or so, just to have time to breathe.

Thankyou. This is really helpful and really comforting. Thankyou for being so kind!

I totally understand this and have the same response to men drinking alcohol sadly for the same reasons.
I'm six years into a lovely relationship with a fabulous man who drinks socially. I'm at a stage now that I don't count his drinks any more. I'm even able to have a drink with him sometimes.

I explained to him exactly why I had such a run away response to him drinking and also has some counselling.

Time has made it better although I'm always hyper vigilant to anyone drinking.

I hope that time is a healer for you too

I’m so sorry you’ve gone through this. Have you considered EMDR therapy? It sounds like a trauma response you’re having after that experience which is very understandable.

This sounds absolutely normal and sensible. If you haven't already I'd seek some professional counselling to work through the trauma for yourself.

If you can talk to him, if you say you have had past negative experiences with drinkers, so are wary of it, that's totally understandable. He may not even be bothered by alcohol that much and may be happy to limit or forgo around you. Good luck but you are absolutely not broken, you got away you are thriving.

This is very heartening. I’m glad that it’s worked out for you and that you’ve found someone lovely! This gives me hope, thankyou!

I acknowledge that it’s probably time for me to look into some form of therapy. I thought I’d got there on my own but this week has shown that I haven’t moved forward as much as I thought! Thankyou so much for your kind response

He knows a bit about it and knows that I have struggled to be around drinking. We’ve had conversations, he’s checked in with me about how I’ve felt if he’s had a drink or if we’ve been around alcohol. I didn’t mind, or I thought I didn’t. I told him I’ve got to the point where I was fine, which I thought I had. And now this! So how can I say, sometimes I’m ok with it and sometimes not? As appears to be the case? It doesn’t seem fair to give those mixed messages. And I know that he’d be devastated to learn that he’d upset me in any way, involuntarily when he’s done all he can to make sure I’m ok!

It makes me feel like yes I got away but I’m still not free and that makes me feel a kind of despair if that makes sense? As I said in a reply to a previous poster, I clearly need to seek some help with this. Thankyou for your response, I appreciate so much that you took the time to say these things to make me feel better about it all!

It might help to think on the fact that your ex was not vile to you because he drank. He was just a vile person who happened to drink. Maybe because he thought he could blame the booze and gaslight you.

If a person is a good person, alcohol won't make them into an evil one.

You've been conditioned to associate alcohol and evil. An aversion therapy.

So you've two options as far as I can see.
Either just avoid him when he drinks/ask him not to drink around you. Or hang out with him on occasions when he does drink and sit with the fear until it disappears bit by bit over time as you see he is still his good self when he drinks.

This is a really interesting perspective. After, he’d always be sorry and say ‘that’s not me’ and I’d say ‘it looks like you, it IS you’ but I always saw him as a nice person who was just evil due to substances. But it can only bring out what’s in there already can’t it. This is incredibly helpful and has given me a bit of a lightbulb moment! Thankyou.

And it’s definitely something I want to get on top of and not avoid. I try to remind myself that alcohol is not abnormal, it was just my ex and the way he used it, kind of thing.

I've no advice but I posted the exact same thing a few weeks ago. My exH was a vile drunk, my new bf is like yours, hardly ever drinks but when he does he really lets his hair down. I've noticed if I'm drinking too I'm better, I was driving one night and so anxious. I hope it'll fade with time as my body stops going into fight or flight every time he has a drink. Bf is a funny drunk and the soul of the party, it's definitely a me problem but open to suggestions how to fix it! Following

I really would recommend EMDR. I know a survivor of family SA it really helped.
And please forgive the comparison but I was in an awful car crash (drunk driver actually), and after recovering physically felt “fine”, drove on motorways no bother.
Then something triggered me and it got to the stage I couldn’t even be a passenger in a car without taking valium.
My body was just seeing threat everywhere in that context, I hadn’t processed it fully. EMDR helped lessen that a lot.

It sounds like you’ve done so amazingly and been so strong, but alcohol is acting as this trigger for your trauma response. It may be you never consistently feel comfortable with drinking, maybe you ask your new partner to not drink when you’re there, but hopefully you can access help to take away the power it has on you. Because when things aren’t fully processed they creep out somehow!

You also don’t have to talk in detail or at all about the memories in EMDR so I liked that.
Anyway wishing you the best whatever you find helps and you sound amazing to have got so far

I hope that some of the comments on here are helpful to you, too! It’s hard isn’t it. I don’t drink at all now really, once a year maybe, the negative association extends to myself aswell I think! Hopefully we’ll both get past this.

Thankyou for sharing your experience of EMDR and its effectiveness. It’s interesting the way that you were fine after your accident but then it crept up on you, that makes me feel so much better to know that my response here isn’t unusual. This has helped me so much! I’ve found a counsellor that practices this and looks like she might be a good fit for me, I’m going to take the leap and do it. I’m so glad I posted on here 😊