Hi y’all.  First time here but definitely not the first time I have dealt with this non-sense.  I have been married to my husband for 12 years this year.  He is incredibly successful as an industrial firefighter in our area and I recent purchased a business and own my own preschool this is highly regarded in our area.  We have 2 kids, 8 and 9, with our 9 year old being a competitive gymnast that travels all over the state.  

Alcohol is definitely not a new thing to our relationship.  He has always been a drinker but I guess I felt like I could save him.  I know that isn’t possible.  

Drinking is a daily thing with the exception of his 24 hour shifts at work.  Any time he is not on shift, you can almost bet there is a beer in his hand. Normal consumption for him is anywhere from 8 to 24, depending on what time he starts drinking.  

The “normal” routine when it gets bad is that he drinks, we get into an arguement and he leaves, driving to our lake house to drink himself into oblivion.  I have lost count how often this has happened.  I have left once as I have was scared of him coming back.  My kids were 2 and 11 months then.  I agreed to have a big talk in which he groveled and begged, saying never again.  We all know how that goes.  On August 11th, 5 years ago this year he entered rehab here locally.  He had an exceptionally rough year at work and kinda spiraled even further down the rabbit hole.  He had made a fool of himself on our daughters 5 birthday and she asked why “daddy had to ruin her birthday.”  That is where I snapped and gave him an ultimatum.  Needless to say, he was able to talk himself out of rehab with the doctors in 5 days.  His sobriety lasted 20 days.  

There is so much more stuff I wanted to tell y’all but you will get bored because it is all the stuff we as wives deal with.  Having children lie for them, guilt trips, you know the routine.  

He has progressively improved and regressed over the last 5 years until 2 weeks ago.  I drove our daughter 9 hours to a gymnastics camp and got a phone call from my 8 year old that dad had gone drinking at the bar.  Long story short, he got incredibly wasted while he was suppose to be taking care of our 8 year old.  Being so far away I could do nothing so I called his mom and she dealt with it.  She is amazing and often helps diffuse the situations.  But this time around during the groveling the next day she told me “you can’t leave him because he will spiral out of control.”  That stuck with me.  The typical I’m sorry and I’ll change and I am suppose t just forget.  This past week he didn’t drink until 3pm and wanted a “great job” for it even though by 10 pm that night he was smashed.  I lost it the next day, told him I was done with this, he never changes and even sent him a pick of all his I’ll change texts that I have.  I didn’t speak to him for 24 hours.  He stayed sober, BECAUSE HE WAS AT WORK.  We spoke the next day and he has decided to stay sober for 30 days, he is going to see his PCP this week to see if there is any meds he can take to help.  He says that after 30 days we will see how he feels and then he can allow him self a few at a time.  I know this isn’t going to work.  He can’t control himself because this isn’t a choice, it’s an illness.  I don’t think we even have a consequence lined up if he fails.  I can’t remember, it all jut blends together.  

I apologize this is so long and rambling.  I have been looking for somewhere like here for years and with 12 years of marriage and 2 years of dating and ALL THOSE DRINKS AND INCIDENTS, I have a lot to get off my chest.  Sorry!