Alcoholism Support Group
Alcoholism is the continued consumption of alcoholic beverages, even when it is negatively affecting your health, work, relationships and life. If you think alcohol is causing you to lose control, it's time to seek help. Our group is a safe place to vent, check in, get back up if you fall, and reach sobriety.
This is the first time I have ever sought out support. I am afraid as I type, the words and tears will not stop.
My husband is an amazing man and we have been married for over 20 years. We have two wonderful teenagers and have built an amazing life. Despite all of the great things in our lives he struggles with alcohol and his struggles come in cycles. When we were first married, we were very young and I did not seem to notice the cycles. Maybe they have always been there or maybe as we became older and the stresses of life began to hit he developed them.
When our children were very young he traveled a lot with a sports team. This is when the signs started to become obvious. I was not with him so I do not know how much he drank but I believe it was a lot. This seemed to allow him to feed his need for alcohol without directly hurting our marriage. However, there would be periods of time when he was traveling that I could not reach him because he was drinking with his team. Now that he no longer travels and is home on a consistent basis, this need has become extremely obvious.
Over the years we have been in many fights about the amount of alcohol he would drink, how it would change his personality, choosing to drive and drinking around our children. In hindsight I realize all of the arguments came with excuses from him and mechanisms to place blame on me for small things to avoid the real issue.
After all the fights and him trying to make changes but us ultimately cycling back to some of the same issues, last night was the breaking point for me. He called me from work and it was obvious he had been at work, alone and drinking. After several lies during our conversation and me begging him to stay at work, he finally promised he would wait until I could come pick him up. Before I could get there he left and decided to drive home anyway. Thank God he made it home safely! I have lost count how many times this has happened and there are probably many I am not aware of, but this morning I finally gave him an ultimatum. If he wants to remain married then he has to address his issues with alcohol.
He has already started looking for a therapist and admitted he has a problem. I know he is scared that he cannot control it, partly because his father was an alcoholic. I know this is huge but I am still reluctant because of all the years we have been through the same problems. Right now I do not want anything to do with him and quite honestly would be just fine if he moved out for a little while but what is the right thing to do? How do I support him if he really wants to change and deal with my own emotions? He has a tendency to think my emotions are me only trying to make this problem about myself. I feel like this is just another excuse to not deal with the real issue. How do I make sure my children are not impacted by this? I do not think he truly sees how his problems have affected everyone who loves him.
I feel lost and broken, extremely angry and simply do not know the best way to move forward. The only thing I am sure of is something must change in order for our marriage to continue. I can no longer live with this sick feeling in my stomach and the fear of the devastation his drinking could create.
-
I invited Bill to have dinner with me last Sunday. He wasn't willing to drive 7 hours to mid Michigan and teased me with his beautiful ribs!!! So, of course I ate alone and had cedar salmon
-
check out that smoke ring. It tasted really good. I smothered it with Maulls BBQ sauce which is Local to St. Louis and one of the best I ever had.....
You, and your kids need alot of support and al anon is a great place to find that support! You can google meetings in your area.
I will keep you and your family in my thoughts and prayers!
God Bless
You are already making good progress in dealing with this as you are seeing through the excuses etc. and realise that you are dealing with a serious issue. What you need now is guidance so that you can avoid making common mistakes that can make the situation worse. I would repeat what the others have said - go to Al-Anon. Dry up the tears and raise your head in hope.
There are two important points to etch into your memory. The first is that you are powerless over your husband’s drinking and the second is that you do have control over your own life.
As you have seen, it is useless to fight with an alcoholic. It is also a common tactic to try and shift the blame to other people so don’t fall for that. Nothing that you have said or done is in any way responsible for your husband’s drinking. My suggestion to you is to make firm suggestions to him but do not nag or fight.
With the help of people at Al-Anon, you can learn to detach with love. In this way, you can stop clearing up the mess and let your husband take responsibility for his own actions. Hopefully, he will soon get sober but either way, you need to live your own life and protect your teenage children.
There is hope for your husband and with the right help, he can recover completely. He may be feeling scared and hopeless as he knows that he has lost control over alcohol and cannot see any way forward. As well as seeing a therapist, I would suggest AA meetings for him.
Take a look at the video at the link below as it explains alcoholism very well and if possible, try to get your husband to watch it too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMC62Y_5dyE