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Im very new here and navigating my way through what i have been denying for five years. That my significant other is indeed an addict and alcoholic. His prior relationships have been people with significant disorders of their own. Almost enabling his behavioyr. The biggest influence inhis life is his mother. She is a sick hateful manipulative mindbending woman. Such textbook co dependant behaviour. She has destroyed every relationship he has had and has tried to with us. She almost encourages his drinking by causing stressful situations which i then have to deal with.His siblings all which are addicts think i am to blame for his unhappiness, even though his has been an alcoholic since he was 14. I just wonder what othe mothers fathers and siblings do in regard to their family members alciholism....do tgey help hinder ir blame
Lisa, from my perspective, my husbands family are all drinkers and don't seem to have any real grip on reality. I just focus on myself and the present time. Working the Al-Anon program helps us to not look to justify or find blame for the alcoholic in our lives.
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"Forgiveness doesn't excuse bad behavior, but it
does prevent bad behavior from destroying your heart". ~ unknown
Alcoholism is a family disease. I grew up in a family filled with alcoholics although they woold never admit it. Alanon stresses the fact that we are powerless over people,places and things and we need to focus al our attention on improving our behavior, attitudes and feelings so that we can respond in a healthy fashion to life . No more blaming judging or critiquing others to avoid the responsibility for our actions.
Focus on yourself,live one day at a time trusting HP and you will find the actions of others is unimportant.
Meetings, Steps and a Sponsor are the key to freedom.
Sometimes alcoholics come from moderately functional families. More often they dont. Or...if they were functional, the alcoholism of one or more members turms them in to a mess of codependent craziness. I had to turn the attention to myself. Why did I always buy into relationships where I "hated" the other person's "crazy mother. " Having disdain for your significant other's family is not the kindest thing either. This is frequent in alcoholic marriages. Wife blames mother, mother blames wife, alcoholic blames everyone and keeps drinking as the attention is off them. What's your role here? Maybe time to practice some detachment.
I have only been not communication what so ever with my XBf (addict and alcoholic that seriously relapsed for the past 11 months) for a week now. It has been very challenging. I have spent a few weeks here actively participating and prior a few months just learning about things as I watched my life unravel. When I look back at the past I see a pattern for both of us. I realize I was foolish to think anything would be any different from how he was with other relationships in his life, until he took steps to improve his life, and I took care of my life. Unfortunately I see the pattern repeating again for him, but I'm slowly just trying to let it go because it is totally out of my control.
I keep hearing the expression not my monkey, not my circus. I am starting to appreciate no longer being at the circus!
Yes, his mother detests me and our child...i am to blame for his behaviour and if i go so will his dangerous choices. So not the case. I chose to take a break in june and he went into a tailspin. He was at the bar non stop, bought a harley and crashed it pretty severly thereafter. Of course i was to blame. Disregarding his mothers sneaky manipulative behaviour is so hard especially when it affects my children...i steuggle with this, and she manipulates him to thinking she does care. She even denid he was his child to the point he did a parenity test to prove he was indeed the father. That killed me.....
I found it difficult to deal with my A's mother for similar reasons. In the end the only healthy action I could take was to sever contact with her and ask him not to tell me what his mother said about me because it just didn't bring anything positive to my life at all. After a little while I really did stop caring what she might be saying or thinking about me...because it really doesn't matter.
Can you avoid contact with her and focus on you without her negativity?
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If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see? (Lewis Caroll)
Yes, i have cut off contact with her completely....i struggle with some ofvher past actions which still effect our luves...mbut im learning to dalm..damn its hard though
You are dealing with such mental illness. That caused by the alcohol/drugs that affect the brain one chemical at a time, and that caused by the insanity of loving that person with the brain that is chemically altered. My hubby's family was/is whacked too, but there always were pieces of good in there. My MIL would babysit the kids when they were little and needed to be controlled for safety reasons. When my kids got older they asked me to not have to go there anymore because she tried to control them more and more, not just safety but what clothes they wore and who their friends were and what they did. So she was good for under 5 yr olds, but terrible for anyone who started to think on their own.
She always disliked me from the first time we met. She thought my skirts were too short. That was her reason that she told the hubby. That was in 1968 and skirts were very short, but I was in style and not showing anything that shouldn't be shown. And what a thing to tell a 19 yr old boy who LOVED short skirts. So that was just the beginning. She lived up to 5 yrs ago when she died at age 101. We had a long turbulent relationship. I can tell you that if you want any peace in your life you have to change your attitude. You can NOT expect anything different from her. Not if you get to know her better or she gets to know you better. She is toxic. I tried and I tried.... and I could bend and bend, but I could never break through. The hubby like it the way it was because he was used to keeping secrets from her and he liked having me to take the heat from her. One time, after 15 yrs of marriage, we were deciding a point about religion and I said I would not/could not do it and he actually said to me, "Won't you do it for my mother?" I just looked at him and again said no, but something changed in me after that time. The relationship, that I thought was about us, happened to have another person in it.
Take care of yourself. Good that you broke things off with her. You sig. other is still her son, though. She will never give him up (and that is totally between the two of them.) I had to not see my MIL either, but by that time I sure was ready for the break. The more time that goes by and you don't see her the better off you will be. Now you have to be prepared for the "push" from your sig. other that he will not be happy about your decision. You will feel the pressure from him to keep her in the middle between you two. I totally refused to even talk about her or to listen when he talked about her. It was hard (to be so rude) and not listen or respond, but with practice it gets easier. We have been married since 1971 and there are many "topics".... mostly his family, that I will not talk about because it always ends up with a fight.
Negativity will suck the soul out of you and make you just as negative. I prefer to be happy. Take care of yourself.
My story is so complex. I wish i could just tell one person of all the hell and abuse ive put up with. Things my younger self would never tolerate. Theres more to our story. There is another player in our movie of life. Shevis a one night stand he had which resulted in a child. He never had a relationship with yer for she is even more troubled than him....a convicted criminal drug user and dealer. Ive received harassement from her and her mother as well, trying to tell me i am the reason for his alcoholism and she is the one he wants. His mother has even used this girl to try to break us up, telling her if our arguments etc. His mother thinks the child from this girl is her husband reincarnated and as i mentioned befire shes denied our child completely ....
Ive never encountered such toxicity anx hate in my life. I know he sits in tbe middle if it all, but i cant take much more of it. I stay only for my children....once i am able to support my family on my iwn, i will have a choice to make. I know he will never choose sobriety, i see this killing him. Until then i have to figure out how to protect myself mentally....after five years my soul is beat down....i hope this place will privide me some solace
Hi Lisa. Its crazy making how dysfunction operates and it sounds like there is a hook in your pond, via mil. Ive a wickedly alciholic aunt married to a wickedly alcoholic and schizophrenic man for around forty years. The way my cousins were raised was hell on earth. The things that they were shown well, even a blind man could see why they turned out the way they did, just bloody sad really. However, alcoholic blindness is an entity to itself, alcoholism being a family disease, which uses denial and fear and a bunch of other maladaptive processes to get by. By the time one cousin was married, he'd had a good 25 years in his family of origin, his wife was a pretty, caring, christian virgin and guess whose fault it was that her husband was a screwed up angry mess? Yep. Hers. Insane. In my own marriage, we were both 30, he started drinking at daddy's soirees from the age of nine, and was a full fledged black out alcoholic by 17. But its the fault of his first girlfriend, and then later it was mine, according to them. Really, no one is to blame and only the alcoholic can take responsibility. Of course, ive pretty much cooked my eggs in regard to that scenario, and became as bad as them, returning scorn with vitriol. I regret that now. And the poison also extended to our first two children, in a passive aggressive way. They have never laid eyes on the third, but you know what? Its not our loss because my babies are amazing. Someone just said to me on another thread I started that pouring love onto our little ones helps lessen the sting of parents gone bad, and I agree. Love the little one and grow him good, sorry for all your hurt in this situation,keep coming back here.
