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Thank you, some of you, who i met in the chat room earlier.
this is the first time i have attempted to get help. i am the spouse of an alcoholic, who feels i am his biggest trigger right now. i am scared.
my husband relapsed after 3 and 1/2 years of sobriety. i may have triggered him....pushed him , because he has been pushing me recently or because i have my own demons to handle, because i am selfish? and ignorant of the urges he may have been having. we argued, he drank, and then he exposed himself to aids (he has done this before when he was an alcoholic in denial, before his sobriety). he did it several times then.
some of you said its not my fault, i try to believe it, and even if it is true...it doesnt make anything better. there seems to be just horrors ahead.
i love my husband, but hate how much he has hurt me in the past. but i still want to help him, but he doesnt accept it.
i underestimated the power of an addiction....after so many years sober, he did it again.
i really wonder if there is an end to this cycle....is there a good ending? a bad ending? how to end it? there is no professional or group outreach etc available to us where we live.
Do you have a private doctor? If so, talk to them--they should be able to help to find a place that you can go for help. Call your local hospital and explain your situation, they can help. You may also have a county mental health department. If not, you should have a local county health department. (Look in the phone book under government) Your local government offices (city hall, county office and such) may be able to help stear you in the right direction. If all else fails contact your local elected officials office (many have email addresses), they may have more ideas. I wish you luck and most of all keep safe!!!!
I am so sorry this has happened. I can only imagine how you must be feeling. After that amount of sobriety you don't really expect a relapse do you? Is this out of the blue? Does your husband have a sponsor? If yes, have you spoken to him or other AA friends from his home group? Maybe they can help get him back on track. They rally around their's as quickly as we rally around our's.
You must feel like the floor just fell out from under you. You can get through this again. You know so much more now then you did then. As far as it being your fault, unless you physically poured it down his throat, you didn't make him drink. He is responsible for his own actions. He had the choice between calling an AA friend or having a drink regaurdless of what was going on around him. Can't cause, can't cure, can't control.
Take a deep breath. Get a good night sleep. Things may seem clearer in the morning. Even from the worst things, good can come.
thanks for the advice. unfortunately none of the options are readily available to us, we live in a country where we dont speak the language and have to depend on translators. besides, this is a country where issues like addiction, mental health are still taboo/unacknowledged. i am going to try to get him to the hospital, but he will likely refuse. i dont even know if the post-aids-exposure treatment is available in this small town. i must try.
but thank you nevertheless. knowing someone read my post and gave it thought, and replied means much. thanks.
trying to stay calm, to stay positive. he keeps blaming me for this and its very painful. thanks for your reply, i have been trying to call his AA friends in our home country ( we are in a country where we dont speak the language and have no support network.)....hopefully will find someone. he says it all too late, and he will 12 step when he is ready. i guess he knows the nature of his illness better than me.
and yes, it really feels like the my world collapsed again. thanks for your support.
I'm sorry you are going through a rough time right now. Keep coming back, try to make sure to take care of yourself first. You're in my thoughts and prayers.
Please don't blame yourself for your husband's actions. You said he had been pushing you, evidently he wanted a fight. That fight gave him the excuse he was looking for to drink.
Alcoholics tend to use many of the same tactics. They start fights for a excuse to drink. They blame others so they don't have to take responsibility for their own actions. If we feel guilty, it makes it that much easier for them to blame us. Alcohol loves to suck us in to the madness. That is such a standard for them.
My suggestion is to deny any part of it, put the responsibility back where it belongs, on him. Don't get sucked in to the guilt. If he was sober that long, he knew what he was doing and had choices. No one person can make us do anything we don't want to do. Including him. This was totally his choice. Could you have have forced him to drink when he was sober and trying to recover? No, you couldn't..it's the same with the opposite scenerio. Plain and simple..He is using the argument for an excuse.
May ask where he was that he was around the aids? Were these medical aids? I'm just curious.
In the interrum, try to let that guilt you are carrying go. It is truly not yours to carry.
Love,
Christy
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If we think that miracles are normal, we will expect them. And expecting a miracle is the surest way to get one.
If he says he will 12 step when he's ready, he can't get much clearer then that. His Higher Power must have other plans for him at the moment other then sobriety. As empty and hollow as that must sound. Believe me, I am not trying to brush off what has happened. I thought about you most of the night.
Taking care of his Aids exposure is top priority. Your right. I'm woundering if after you have done what you can do regaurding that, if your next step might be to sit down and review your options. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying leave. I just know that for myself, when I had a "just incase" plan It went a long way in relieving that trapped, panicky feeling. Once those feels were replaced with knowing I had an out "just incase" I needed it, I could think much clearer and focus the tasks at hand.
Are you in a country where you could leave with out your husband if you had too? Being away sure compounds the situation. Are you going to be there long?
If you understand nothing else right now , know that you are not the reason he drank, you are not powerful enough to make him drink or stop. He chose to drink again and blamming others is what they do. The A will do and say anything to get the focus off them.
I hope u will try Al-Anon meetings f2f u need support , people who can go for coffee on a bad day people who can pick up the phone when in crisis. Annonymity is the foundation of our program it is a safe place to share and learn . Regardless of what he says you are NOT the reason he drinks. Louise
You can't *make* him drink anymore than you can make him stop drinking or stay sober. You simply don't have that power. Noone does. Of course he blames you, his disease won't allow him to take the responsibility of it. This is normal in an alcoholic/addict relationship. If you allow too much time listening to his words and not enough time working a program and surrounding yourself with program people and literature........you might very well start to believe his lies that you are to blame.
Regardless if you were bickering with him, regardless if you acted selfishly, regardless if you had an affair, walked out on him or any other number of things.......you STILL are not responsible for him drinking again. The more you learn about this disease the more you will understand how true this is.
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Kathy S --
~*I trust my Higher Power that I am exactly where I am supposed to be in my life today.*~
dear kathys, abbayal, agatha, christy, megan, jolert.... thank you, thank you, thank you all
i am moved and touched that total strangers can rally so much support for another total stranger. it is pretty amazing, this network, and i plan to stay in touch. you guys helped much more than u can imagine, and i have been able to function and get through the first day.
when i made tea for us and sat on the couch together, just drained and emptied, and i tried to be normal and speak of other things.... my A said that i was happy this had happened, that i wanted this all along....i told him about you guys and how i am able to get through the day because of your help.
yes i have thought of leaving and do have a plan....i just wish it could be done while he is sober. we discussed it before when he was sober, we mutually felt it was the right thing to do after all that we had been thru... the damage and the hurt....when i discussed my options with him, he didnt seem very happy, and made strange objections to my plan...finding fault with it, discouraging me, yet never saying "stay, lets make it work".
now he says, after this relapse we can never be together because i ruined him. as if he had to have the final say in our break up, and that it couldnt be done in a less traumatic way, where we could try to help each other out with the separation, for old times sake (17years 2gether), because we are in a strange land, and because we still love each other.
well, from reading things on this website, on postings....i am trying to just be kind and gentle with him, and still keeping in mind my plan about myself and giving myself a chance to be sane...caring more for myself, my own health. i dont worry so much now about if he loves me or how he loves me, why he trys to hurt me or himself, why he can be so wonderful and then show some really cruel streaks that makes me wonder why i ever loved a man so shallow and corrupt...i dont want to analyse any more. havent the energy....and didnt i read somewhere on these pages that it is futile anyways...i cant cure whatever it is he suffers from...or even i suffer from....
I am just praying real hard. one day at a time sounds soothing to me.
My dear, NONE of it is your fault. And for heaven's sake, don't let him put that guilt trip on you. Remember you didn't cause it, and you cannot cure it. His demons are his own to deal with. You need face-to-face AlAnon meetings so that you can talk with others who understand, and begin to realize that YOU are worthy of having and expecting a peaceful, gentle existence.
My A took a fall after 25 years sober. I thought I would die! It was so awful. He is sober again now...over a year, and swears it will never happen again. But I learned one thing; it really is one day at a time with an A. I drew the "line in the sand," and I am fully prepared to keep my promise to divorce him if it ever happens again. No one deserves to suffer because of an A, and I, for one, won't have it. Maybe you need to set some boundaries of your own, and stick to them.
I wish you well. With great concern, Diva
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"Speak your truth quietly and clearly..." Desiderata
Do you have a private doctor? If so, talk to them--they should be able to help to find a place that you can go for help. Call your local hospital and explain your situation, they can help. You may also have a county mental health department. If not, you should have a local county health department. (Look in the phone book under government) Your local government offices (city hall, county office and such) may be able to help stear you in the right direction. If all else fails contact your local elected officials office (many have email addresses), they may have more ideas. I wish you luck and most of all keep safe!!!!
