acknowledge the white elephant? - Al-Anon Family Group

ddub · ~*Service Worker*~

acknowledge the white elephant?

Jerry F · ~*Service Worker*~

Aloha ddub!!

He already knows that you know. He also knows that the kids know. He can read your body language and his concern and guilt about his addiction is bigger to him at the moment than it is with you. Yes don't keep secrets. You are going to Al-Anon for you and you alone for many real reasons. If he asks you can share those reasons with him. Your changes from attending to your Al-Anon program will alert him that you will no longer be participating in the disease that is taking down the whole family; not only him. If he is isolating in his drinking and not participating in the family alcohol owns him, mind, body, spirit and emotions. He is not being treated with love and care in his relationship with alcohol. Alcoholics have three choices; sobriety, insanity or death. Isolation with a mood and mind altering chemical is the insane phase that may indicate either a direction toward change or death.

You could lovingly and caringly reveal your thoughts and feelings to him about what it is doing to your mind, body, spirit and emotions. In the same manner you could also lovingly tell him that you will also not participate or support the drinking and then you can listen if he wants to talk about it also. When that is done it will be time to get back with people in the program to learn more.

There are thousands of things NOT to do because they don't work. Go learn the things not to do. Don't blame, argue, judge, control or manipulate, set guidelines and ultimatums, etc. Those things you learn about the disease of alcoholism pass on to your children. If they are Alateen age, get them to an Alateen meeting or if they can follow meeting guidelines and are Alateen qualified, they can sit in on open Al-Anon meetings. Alateen is a part of the Al-Anon Family Groups. They also must learn NOT to use what they have learned against the alcoholic. That doesn't work except to make things worse for them and the family.

This is the first time I have heard that the elephant was white. Ours was a plain ole grey one except during the active drinking at which time of course it was pink. LOL

Glad to have you here. Keep coming back and sharing your story with us.

Of course get your (((((hugs)))))

babysteps · Senior Member

((ddub))

Jerry has some great insight for you that I can only reinforce. Sometimes we want to talk about their drinking with them because we hope to make them realize how bad off they are, other times just to get it off our chest how much it is hurting us to watch. I have done both, many times. The only time I have ever had a fruitful conversation is when it was done with love and concern. We have been able to speak openly about AH's addiction, but it has not changed anything. After a while I stopped talking about it with him altogether because it didn't change anything no matter what the motivation was.

I am so happy you found this board. Keep coming back! Babysteps

QOD · ~*Service Worker*~

You need to do what ever helps you cope with situations in your life. Al-Anon is an AWESOME tool to help you deal with this disease. It will eventually come up. He may even be resentful towards you and the program. But that will only be b/c he sees you getting healthy and he is not. Work on you, your happiness, your peace of mind, your serenity. The rest will eventually fall into place as they should be. Good luck to you and keep coming back.

Sincerely,
QOD

Tiger2006 · ~*Service Worker*~

I read a (non-Confrence Approved Literature) book called TOXIC PARENTS. It called alcholism "The Dinosaur in the Room." Of course everyone WANTS to acknowledge it. But if you do, it's a feeling of that you broke "the code."
I'm really disturbed by the dr, personally. I would have told him "If he wants to go to treatment, he needs to make the decision to get sober and live sober for himself, by himself." The fact is, no one can help your loved one get sober and stay sober. Ultimately, he is responsible for his sobriety, or his lack thereof. And the dr really put you in a no win situation with that question: if you said "yes I will support him," you were put in a position where you were expected to go at it till an undetermined end. If you said "no I will not support him" you may have come across as a "bad and unloving wife" who "didn't take her wedding vows to heart." So really, in my opinion, the dr was setting you up. Probably, the dr was a victim himself, being set up by your loved one, who probably said something to the effect of "I can't do this without the support of my wife."
This leads directly to the question about your enabling. It is very frightening to think that maybe our loved ones may drive under the influence and put themselves and others at risk. It is extermely horrifying to believe they are driving drunk with our children in the car. We can set boundries and enforce them here. Perhaps you can set something up so that your husband cannot drive with your children in the car, or cannot drive your car. But ultimately, the fact that you are wondering how much good your picking him up from bars is doing tells me that you are growing tired of the practice and are ready to change your life. Ultimately, your loved one may need to drive drunk and get caught, frightening as it may be, without your involvement. You are not alone in the reality that you have picked up your loved one from bars, hospitals or whever else. If you were to ask the board about "enabling behaviors" that we collectively have engaged in, we could go on for years--it's not that we didn't love our loved ones who have alchol and drug problems; quite the contrary. We thought that if we saved them from themselves, we would save them from their disease. But we came to find out that by saving them from their disease, we were also causing their disease to become more dangerous, rather than run its course and end as quickly as possible.
You could also ask the board, in addition to members of your local al anon meetings, of boundries that we set up to keep from engaging in enabling behaviors. Again, this took time, but when we learned how to do this, and stick with it, we found our lives improved vastly.
Please, keep coming back.

thinkstoomuch · Senior Member

Have you gone to an open AA meeting yet? I know of several people whose spouses are active who do this regularly and who say it's a huge help in understanding the disease. Perhaps you'll hear someone speak who has long-term sobriety, and it would be fine to approach such a person after the meeting and share your concerns about your spouse. Or if you feel uncomfortable going alone, ask one of the people from your Alanon group to go with you the first time.

I remember one of the first AA shares I heard was at an anniversary Alanon meeting (they had speakers from both programs). He talked about how, when he was drinking, he'd be at the bar, and want to be home with his wife and family, but literally didn't know how to make it happen. To us this may sound insane - how obvious can it be? - but from another perspective, the fact that they CAN'T see can show US how powerful the disease is. I've heard it described as "a physical addiction coupled with a mental obsession".

Only you can decide what's right for you, but here's my thinking on the 5 days without kids: If you bring up your concerns, what will be the focus of the 5 days? Will YOU have a good time? If you don't bring them up for now, but use the time to practice enjoying the time you can with him, then not rescuing him from the consequences of his own behaviour - have a plan B if necessary - ("Actually, I've realized I'm not comfortable drinking with you (or, staying around you when you've had more than 3 drinks), I'm going to go across the street and see a movie", or "...hang out at the bookstore") ...... will you have a better time?

My now sober AH had an incident, when he was drinking, where he ended up in the hospital with "water toxicity". Naturally (!) I left work immediately and flew to his side. Among other things, the doctor asked him, gently, how much do you drink, really? And he said, straight-faced, not that much. Later, he said to me something like, it's not so bad is it, and I said, calmly (which wasn't easy), I think when the doctor asks you how much do you drink really, it's that bad. (In retrospect, this must have been my HP guiding me, because I wasn't yet in Alanon, and I didn't understand myself how bad it was, or that he was an alcoholic, or what that meant.) Yet it was another 8 months, a lost job and and accident dui before he was finally scared enough to get and stay sober. HE had to be willing to reach out for help to those who could help him - which didn't mean me, it meant other alcoholics. Me reaching out for help FOR him just made my arms tired and my brain crazy.

Welcome to Alanon.

The material presented here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method to exchange information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal level.