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.
I feel like I can't handle it anymore. He drinks usually 2 750 ML Whiskey or Vodka a week. All I do is worry about him. I tell him how I feel and he either jokes about, tells me to just worry about myself, or turns it around and says that there are things I do that bother him but he doesn't bug me about it. If I get really upset and ignore him or threaten to leave him then he gets extra nice and will stop drinking for a short time. But anything stressful st work and he is right back at it. He doesn't like to go out, he had zero sex drive. He never really listens to me either. I'm just at a loss. He has never been violent or controlling at all but I still can't handle.
Welcome Tracy from just down the road in Indianapolis. My wife did that same thing until she found recovery. I didn't force her into it, she found it herself during a second rehab fter a rehab stint and 10 days of jail. Once she found it she vowed to maintain it.
While active she would drink, hide it, not hide it and scream if I wouldn't buy her wine, missed picking our son up from school because she was passed out etc.
She went for a month to prove she didn't need alcohol once. Then she went right back on it.
At her second rehab when she found recovery, I found I could recover too. I had lots of things wrong with me too, many due to reacting to her alcoholism, many due to a dysfunctional family of original, some from who-knows-what? Al anon helped me immensely stopping reacting to my wife, and helped me get my sanity back from the irrationality that had taken over. I could make rational decisions again, based on what I feel rather than how to react.
I recommend you get to an Al anon meeting and keep coming back here and sharing and learning. Doing those two things has improved my life so much I can't believe it!
Ive learned reacting is when ive got emotional, ive let the person control my feelings and emotions. So if i get angry or hurt then thats reacting to the words of a sick person which is silly in a way. Its not about ignoring either. Ignoring someone is reacting with passive aggression. Setting a clear boundary and saying i will talk to you tomorrow or i will talk to you when you feel better or something else thats courteous is better for us and them. If they are abusive then its about us taking ourselves out of the room or house even and showing that we wont accept it. Its al in alanon meetings and literature. If you want to learn it thats the place to get it.
React is not thinking First but reacting first to the situation.
You are suppose to think It thru first, feel your feelings and
then do the next best thing for you not the alcoholic. Thats
What loving detachment and healthy boundaries are about.
It is not easy changing tactics in a relationship. Thats where
Face to face meetings come in so handy learning the tools.
You can also buy three daily readers that help you understand
The program.
Alanon is all about helping us keep our sanity and try to
Have an emotionally healthy life in spite of the disease.
Do what Is in our best interest not the alcoholics.
Welcome to the newcomer. I have been reading the Al-Anon book "How Al-Anon Works For Families & Friends of Alcoholics", and it talks about how alcoholics act and everyone else reacts, likening the situation someone holding a rope and then the alcoholic grabs and pulls on it. It makes the suggestion that we can choose to drop the rope, change our actions and not do the same thing as we always have done before. We don't have to tug back and feel we have no other choices. (page 30)
I currently interpret this to mean becoming more aware to how I act in response to the alcoholic (or for that matter, anyone) around me. I might still choose to confront a person, I might choose to walk away. But reacting, in my experience, means doing the same thing over and over again without realizing I am doing it. Still working on it, but the good thing about Al-Anon is that it's progress and not perfection and I only have to worry about today. Thanks everyone for sharing.
My situation is similar to yours. I've been going to al anon for 4 months, and my outlook has improved greatly. I've learned to start keeping my mouth closed, as nothing I can say or do will sober him up. He has to decide that on his own, for his own reasons. I've gotten my own life-- spending time with friends I've long neglected, doing fun stuff with my daughter, going to meetings, hiking with my dog. I'm working the steps with a sponsor and really am incorporating the slogans and steps into my own life. Nothing in this household has changed in the last 4 months except me, and that's been enough to start to lead me out of that deep hole of confusion and hopeless despair and into a better place. I'm grateful for al anon; going to that first meeting and seeing that I'm not alone has been a great source of comfort. Stick around here and soak it in--al anon works when nothing else has. Hugs to you.
Welcome to the boards. Last night my AH celebrated 90 days sober. Later this week I will celebrate my 90 days in Al-anon.
I went at first to meetings to learn to cope with him. the first thing I learned was that's not the way to do it. I have to go to meetings to learn to cope with ME. I have to go to meetings and get a sponsor and work the steps to learn to fix me. Fixing me helps him.
As you have seen threats don't work.
He has a disease. He can't control it. and you can't either.
All YOU can do is take care of yourself.
When I found out how to detach with love, my life at home changed. I still have the insanity of a dry drunk (he acts like he does when he drinks minus the violence) but now I am at peace with "I'm sorry you feel that way I'm going to bed now" and then I walk away and let him be. I'm not angry any more. and if he comes to me later and is rational I can speak with him without resentment.
I know that threats don't work. I also know he has to get sober for himself. Last night he pointed out that the first two weeks in rehab were for me, after that he figured it out and it's for him.
Both of us need to be working our programs in order for our marriage to be healthy. BUT he can work his program and get healthy for himself and/or I can work mine and be healthy for me. IF we BOTH get healthy then the marriage may survive and that's the bonus. If he stops working his program then I will leave. Because that's my boundary with him and I can do so. I do not think I could do this with an active A in my life.
My biggest fear in working Al-anon (and once I admitted this to myself I was able to find a sponsor and start really working) was that I would get "so healthy" I would leave my marriage. And I know that if he ever drinks again I will leave. But that's MY boundary. I never said "i'm leaving if you drink again" I was truly blessed when he got arrested (for trying to kill me when blackout drunk) and when he asked me if I was going to help with bail I said "if you go to detox and rehab and complete rehab and are ACTIVELY working a program"
Now this won't work for everyone and if he had not been already out of our home I do not think I could have pulled this off. But our HP gives us what we need when we need it. He needed to be arrested. He needed a bottom line and I needed to be pushed enough to know that it had to stop or I was going to be killed. All of that happened in a perfect storm. Seems weird to be grateful that my husband tried to kill me but I am. Because the husband that tried to kill me is not the man I married. And it's not the man who I go home to every day now.
I strongly urge Newcomers to go to as many face to face meetings in as many different places as possible (I am blessed to have multiple meetings daily to choose from) and keep going for as long as it takes to "get it" I sat in meetings 3-5 times a week for about 2 months before it clicked. But once I "drank the kool-aid" I got it. And yes once you get it you want to SHARE IT... with EVERYONE.
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-- ladybug
We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.
