I don't know what happened to my response.... so I will re-write it. Mine would wear the same shirt to bed as he wore to work that morning. He would occassionally brush his teeth before bed (usually when he wanted to get laid) and there was no showering during camping weekends. Yep - pretty gross!

Yep! That's normal - pretty much - just before they start to "wake up and smell the coffeee" or you ditch them for good. About the time that they have a BAC between .25 & whatever just after they've woken up, (that is, they are still drunk even after sleeping all day and haven't drunk anything after they woke up) they gradually lose the awareness of their environment altogether, and don't clean themselves.

Unfortunately the next step is losing control of their bowels and not even getting up to use the toilet - hallucinations, and outbursts of anger because he'll think you've stolen stuff he actually threw in the trash years ago.

I recommend: Be blunt. Tell him he stinks. Tell him that people already complained he stinks. Tell him that nobody wants to be sitting next to him. If he starts to cry and feel sorry for himself tell all about how rehab will get him is "old life" back.

Oh, and move out of the house, if you possibly can. Or if you can't then to another room.

Thank you so much for your replies. And yes, he has peed in both the closet and my sock drawer in lieu of actually using the toilet. I have spent too much of my time wondering how this could possibly be my life. Time to start saving money, and making a plan to move out.

Okay, I must share this with someone. My husband hasn't showered since Christmas. He refuses to bathe. Since he is drunk all day, we are not intimate, no hugs, cuddles, etc. so I don't smell him. His brother tells him all the time but he shrugs it off.

I even offered to scrub him down while he just stands in the shower, no effort on his part. Still a no go.

This is so not him. He is so depressed he feels so dirty on the inside, he doesn't care about his outside. I don't find him gross, I find this incredibly sad.

I really don't understand how they can live this way, especially the not brushing teeth. My AH will go to church without brushing his teeth. I just don't get it. We don't share a room. He doesn't use shampoo. The bathroom he uses becomes so gross and disgusting. His room stinks all of the time. I've given up on finding a laundry detergent that will get that smell out. I no longer wash his clothing with any of the rest of the family's, because the odor gets into everyone else's clothes. And what he wears around the house -- you'd think he was homeless. At work, he didn't flush in the shared bathroom, one day, and the next guy to come in squealed "yuk". My AH was indignant that the next guy made a big deal out of AH's not flushing. And at the dinner table that night, all of us tried to reason with him about it, but he just didn't understand what the big deal was. There are "stains" on the bedskirt on his bed, from some sort of liquid, not small stains, but large ones. He has never made an attempt to clean this. I don't think it's my responsibility to clean up after his drunken bodily functions. It's just disgusting, and I sometimes feel disgusted at myself for having "chosen" him.

My husband falls asleep n the couch almost every night. In shoes, with jeans shirt belt, glasses etc. wears the same clothes for days. When he dies decide it's time for a change he puts his four items of clothing in the washer all by themselves! Then waits for the dryer like a kid waiting fir their security blanket. There is no rhyme or reason to his crazy.
When he shaves, he leaves the trimmings in the sink. Eeew!

That's crazy. My AH has become very slack on his hygiene, where he used to be so on top. Now he showers once a week and thinks it is funny. It's very sad. Takes him weeks to do his laundry. So I guess this is normal behavior for the alcoholic.

Hard to shave and shower when you can hardly stand up. My husband used to be OCD about hygiene. Now it's bottom priority. Funny if he goes a few days without drinking he cleans up and looks like the handsome man I married. Drunk he's just ugly, I swear he looks like s completely different person.

My husband, too, Cadeer. When my FIL saw my AH for the first time in a few years, he pulled me aside and said he wouldn't recognize him if he saw him on the street. It's not just the lack of hygiene, but my AH has lost a lot of weight in the last few years, and his face looks drawn, his skin rough and his eyes are always barely open. He has aged so much in just 10 years.

I'm sitting here feeling like we all married the same man. Crazy how some traits exist in virtually every alcoholic. It's so sad though because I really do miss the man I married.

My AH has always managed to keep him self relatively clean, but that doesn't stop the smell. When he is drinking heavily the entire room he is in wreaks.

Yes! This is a huge problem for my ABF. He also has a very distinctive smell that doesn't go away even with showering. The worst smell is while he is still sleeping in the morning. I guess his body is processing the alcohol? It smells like garbage with a lot of rotten fruit in it.

My husband is the same way. He does brush his teeth daily but he goes days with out showering. The worst part is he pees the bed at night and still doesn't shower. I have to force him to change the bedding. I recently learned he has stopped wearing underwear completely. The ones he had got holes in them and he is to cheap to go buy new ones but yet he can buy alcohol daily. It's so fustrating!