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My AH is just starting down the road to recovery, and so am I. I know there are a lot of things that I need to focus on within myself as I am a broken version of what I once was. I am a work in progress. I am working on detaching from my husband as I know that this disease is his problem and I cant fix it for him, but I have so many questions as I have never been through this before. I love my husband very much and want to support him through his road to recovery but also not let him drag me back into the depths of despair that I have been in. He has gone through the withdrawl symptoms and is 2 weeks clean. But now he is dealing with the cravings and is angry. He says he hates everyone. His attitude is worst toward me, as he says I am the one that made him quit. We have 4 young children who don't understand what is going on and just want to be with their Daddy, but he is very distant. There is very little love and comfort coming from him at this time. The most affection is being shown to the baby. I know this hurts them and in turn hurts me. Having never been through this before I am unsure of how to act around him, how long this anger will last, and what the normal phases of recovery are like. Is this normal? I have just been going about my business as if nothing was wrong with him, if he is crabby I avoid him and do my own thing with the kids. Is this right? I don't want to hurt his recovery by making him feel alone either. Are there families that make it through recovery and have a good relationship again? I feel so lost in all of this and have no one to talk to, and just need to know if I am doing things right for myself, my kids, and finally my husband as I still do love him and want to support him the best way I can.
Welcome gettingbacktome, It certainly sounds as if you have some great insight into the disease of alcoholism and how it has affected you and your family. To answer your question, yes, there are many families who reconnect in a healthy fashion after the alcoholic has looked for recovery. The period of time right after stopping drinking is a difficult one because the person who drinks no longer has alcohol to soothe the anxieties and fears. They become resentful of the world in general and that is why a program of recovery in AA is essential.
Alcoholism is a progressive chronic threefold disease that can be arrested but never cured. We are powerless over this disease. It affects the person who drinks physically, emotionally and spiritually. Once the drinking stops in the physical cravings lesson the physical part has been addressed. However, the emotional and spiritual needs are still unteated and that is where AA and a recovery program comes in.
We who live with the disease also require a recovery program of our own because in attempting to cope with the insanity that we've lived with, we have abandoned our own needs and lost ourselves. Al-Anon is the recovery program for family members and face-to-face meetings are held in most communities.
At these meeting, I was able to break the isolation caused by the disease, develop new and constructive tools to live by and still love and support my partner. It is important to note that we need to love ourselves first before we can extend that love to others so that attending Al-Anon meetings helped me to do just that.
Welcome to MIP GBTM! So glad you found us and so glad you shared...Betty's point about the disease being progressive is spot on. It's also very powerful and truly affects the person's feelings, actions, emotions, maturity, etc. Every element of a human you can consider is affected by this disease. There is no true cure - only recovery through abstinence and support. Alcoholism is considered a family disease as it affects almost all who live with the disease. Every member of the family is touched by the disease and will be touched by recovery as well...
We can always hope for the best, however it makes sense for you to take a break from what's been happening, and try to just stay present. We talk in Al-Anon about one moment at a time, one day at a time, and keeping our focus on us and the next right thing. I strongly encourage you to attend some Al-Anon meetings and explore recovery for you. You will find local support who understand and can guide you to and through the program if you choose to work on yourself.
As far as moods, anger, etc. - every person is different so abstinence/recovery will also be different. Most who have been indulging in mind/mood altering substances need a long while to adjust/adapt to living without the crutch of substance.
Keep coming back - you are worth it and there is hope!!
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Practice the PAUSE...Pause before judging. Pause before assuming. Pause before accusing. Pause whenever you are about to react harshly and you will avoid doing and saying things you will later regret. ~~~~ Lori Deschene
Aloha GBH and welcome to the MIP family glad you made it. We can and will support you on this journey which all of us have taken also...either willingly or against our wills. Alcoholism as Betty mentioned can and will never be cured... only arrested by total abstinence. The alcoholic has to abstain from drinking and thinking and acting like the affecter person and we also have to learn how to abstain from behaviors, thoughts and feelings which have not worked for us.
You love him as I did my own alcoholic/addict wife and we have to learn how to love ourselves as much also. That is where the Al-Anon Family Groups came into my life. This was and is a very different way of living and it works for us. The alcoholic/addict wife had problems with it and she was supposed to because I stopped living the "usual" way we did and started the "unusual way" she didn't understand or like the changes and she wanted her "enabler" back...who was me and not continuing with my behavior made her confused and angry as it was with other alcoholics who's enablers were changing.
Unusual meant very many different things like loving her and not needing her, loving her and allowing her to be ill and in trouble as the alcoholic/addict, loving her and not making myself the victim of her choice to drink and use, loving her while making the decision to love myself as much too.
One of the markers of alcoholism and drug addiction is the insanity in the spouse and/or family. I was a huge marker and friends and family knew what was going on even when I was deciding I had to keep doing the same things over and over again expecting that some vast miracle would come about to change her, me, us though I was thinking that it had nothing to do with me. Wrong.
Recovery is learning everything I could about this fatal incurable disease and to find out how and where it came into my life. Surprise!! I was born into it, continuously made decisions to be with addicted partners and then after 9 years in Al-Anon, sober discovered I was alcoholic myself.
Alcoholism is a disease not a moral issue...it is not about bad it is about being very sick moving on to insane and dead.
I pray and hope you stick around for yourself and children and for your spouse. Miracles happen here. Keep coming back ((((hugs))))
Thank you everyone for your kind replies. I am trying to take it one day at a time and just stay positive for myself and my kids. He came home today saying its not the cravings that make him angry it is everything else and he just doesnt have anything to mask it anymore. I dont know. He is very angry, not violent, but miserable. I know he needs to learn how to cope and I am working on not letting it make me miserable. I feed off his emotion, if he is crabby so am I. Separating that is hard but I am doing better than I was. The hardest part for me is that he was never this angry, and wishing I could just have the man I married back. My husband was always a heavy drinker when he drank but I never thought he was a full blown alcoholic till recently. He didnt drink at all for like 4 months and its only the last 2 that it got out of control. I dont understand how it is so difficult when he hasnt been drinking like this for years like many others I have known. He would binge previously but never had issues stopping. Why is this time so different?
GBTM The disease of alcoholism takes many forms and is cunning and powerful as well as progressive.
Remember he no longer has alcohol to smooth out the rough spots so anger and fear need to be addressed with tools that he does not currently possess.
Please keep coming back and leraning new tools to live by. It works.
I found the early sobriety stage about as difficult as anything I have ever been through! I thought it was great that AH had stopped drinking and I had expectations that he would be my lovely husband again but lots of the weird mood swings, anger et al continued for quite a long time. It is, in my experience, just as difficult as living with an active alcoholic, especially in the early months. But it has also been a time for learning, for both of us I think.
I have learnt how to say no, how to let someone else solve their own problems, how to speak up for myself and how to ask if I don't understand something - and just as importantly, how to trust that whatever answers I need will turn up when the time is right. In the meantime, I have a precious day to live, so how would I like to spend my time? I am learning to enjoy without feeling guilty. I think that I am growing into my own two feet, if that makes any sense!!! I wanted to help and be supportive to my husband, of course - its normal! But I had to learn to let him support and trust in himself, learn to ask for help when he needed it and not just as a way of getting attention, learn to give as well as receive. We are a work in progress!!!!
Diving into Alanon during this time has saved my sanity - we don't have to do this alone, and I found that Alanon people understand the situations we face really well.
I hope you keep coming back. Sending (((((hugs)))))))
PS I have also learnt that my husband's angry words don't kill me and are rarely even about me, although they do undermine my love and respect for him. It is not ok for me to have to bare the brunt of his anger. That doesn't mean that I can stop what he is saying, but I can change my reaction to it. When I learnt a way to do that in a way that worked for me his angry words dried up!
-- Edited by milkwood on Tuesday 19th of July 2016 01:29:36 AM
