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 do know its disease and I guess I should know by now that they are sick. But I still atruggle with how can they give up someone they love (wife, gf, kids, parents) just for a drink? Even during early recovery it seems they would rather lose it all than have the most supportive people around them. Is it shame, guilt? do they really hate us so much for trying to get them help? I know.. focus on me. I do.. but how can they let things go knowing they are the best things in their life, for a drink or even for a âslip upâ drink during recovery? Donât they feel any kind of feelings? Please.. any former alcoholics give me your thiughys too
I am sending you support Aerin... trying to figure "them" out is a never-ending struggle with futility! I know for my AH, his guilt kept him drinking (In periods of lucidity he mentioned this over and over). Hard to understand since I was willing and ready to throw away any guilt feelings he should have, just to have my healthy husband back. Never happened. I could never understand it, so I stopped trying. I think that is why the slogan "It Is What It Is" is such a huge one.
Sending you light and love,
PNP
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"The wolf that thrives, is the one you feed." - Cherokee legend
"Hello, sun in my face. Hello you who made the morning and spread it over the fields... Watch, now, how I start the day in happiness, in kindness." Mary Oliver
Aerin, Big hugs .. it is really hard to imagine someone giving up loved ones all for the name of drugs, alcohol, pretty much fill in the blank. My limited understanding of watching so many situations play out in my own life is .. it's an obsession. There is a saying that goes first I took a drink and then the drink took me. There is no rationalizing the irrational thought process of someone else. Where my healing really began is where I fully got the drinking/drugging was not about me.
I think that's why I was so obsessed on so many levels is I thought I was broken and I thought if he stopped then I was worthy, I also had a backwards idea that I deserved the fact he drank and did what he did.
Is it worth it for them to give it all up? No. They have a disease that tells them they are not sick. Because of so many different factors of how chemicals in the mind and body work .. the mind tells the body it won't survive without additive. It is complicated and simple all at the same time.
It is the reason the focus is kept on ourselves so that the goal is to let go of our obsession the addict and I can then move to a healthy place of being .. there is a book if you want to look at the break down of what alcohol does to the brain/body and it's not alanon before anyone else chimes in .. lol .. Under the Influence and it describes in detail what happens to the body and brain. For me understanding what was going on with my X helped me cope better because I have to have that logic to go to, if it's not logical I have to reroute and try something different.
The other book I highly recommend and you can read it more than once is Getting them Sober Vol 1 - 4. I would say that 1 and 2 apply more to your situation at this point. They are very short simple reads.
His drinking is not about you and it's not that you didn't do enough. The drinker just can't because they in the fog of their own disease and it is the disease that is trying to survive at all costs. Alcoholism is a life and death struggle because even after recovery .. the alcoholic still has to be vigilant in their own recovery process or risk having a relapse. Many loved ones make the mistake of after rehab .. all will be well because the addict is cured and that is not reality .. reality is this is life long .. like it or not.
Hugs S :)
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Faith minus vulnerability and mystery equals extremism. If you've got all the answers, then don't call what you do "faith". - Brene Brown
"Whatever truth you own doesn't own you" - Gary John Bishop
It really is because it doesn't just affect one person it's everyone it touches which is beyond sad. It steals life from the addict and those who love them.
When someone asks me if they should stay or go my standard response is if nothing were to change in the next 5 years could you love the addict regardless of where they were at the in the disease with no hope of getting better this is as good as it gets. Can you live a full life? Can you love the addict drinking or not? Is that enough because if it's not, .. then not only is the person short changing themselves .. they are short changing the active A because we all deserve someone who can love us where we are at without the expectation of changing. For me that answer was and is no, it's just not healthy for me to be in that dynamic of relationship because I get lost. I don't have guilt over that because letting my XAH go was the best answer for us both .. it's a shame it took so long to get there and it's a shame it reeked more havoc on our family.
Hugs
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Faith minus vulnerability and mystery equals extremism. If you've got all the answers, then don't call what you do "faith". - Brene Brown
"Whatever truth you own doesn't own you" - Gary John Bishop
I think that is the definition of addiction. They keep on doing it despite the consequences.
In al anon.we learn tools to focus on ourselves. Living with all that stress is pretty difficult. I was really adverse to learning the skills. I thought it was not that useful. After all the alcoholuc was the problem.
Then I started beingnwilling to look at myself.
Getting them Sober is a great resource
Most of all being part of an al.anom group is really helpful. When you see and hear other people using the tools it is very.encouraging
Speaking from experience, everything and everyone is disposable and replaceable when the disease is active. An alcoholic will go to any lengths to get what they want when they want it, no matter the law, the family, the consequences, etc. It is the perpetual pull of the disease that comes from the mind, heart, body and soul. That's why we say (and believe) that no human power could relieve us of our alcoholism.
The disease lies in wait, always. Normal folks get cut off in traffic, and might curse or swear or flip the bird or consider some road raging. For an alcoholic, the disease suggests a drink will solve it. Normal folks drop a plate, it shatters....same possible responses and then they clean it up. Not an alcoholic mind - it suggests a drink is the answer and cleaning it up isn't really that important.
There is no love or logic or rational thinking that happens for active addictive people. It's all about 'scratching the itch' through any person, means, etc. possible. So - the easy answer for me then - when people put up boundaries, I just found new people to use. When the law put up obstacles, I moved to other states. Nothing was going to stop me from doing what I wanted/needed until I hit my bottom. And, for what it's worth, at the time with my diseased brain, I told myself over and over again that "I was better off without them".
I doubt this really helps anyone but this is exactly how I was when I was active. I lied, cheated, stole and manipulated my way into/out of every possible scenario daily and did not ever give one pause of concern about how it affected anyone else. The disease actually told me I wasn't hurting anyone and it was 'normal' to be like this!
It is sad and it is an unstoppable force. Alcoholics/addicts end up one of four ways - recovery, dead, jail, institution. We say it often at meetings and have seen it proven over and over again. Active Alcoholics are selfish and self-serving for one purpose - to manage the disease the only way we know how to - feed it...
Because this is how the disease works, I was so grateful when I heard/learned in Al-Anon to QTIP - Quit Taking It Personally. That made sense to me and really helped me move forward in recovery on this side...(((Hugs)))
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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
Hi all, I struggle with understanding as well. I cant wrap my brain around it and as someone who loves math equations bc they are solvable it is hard for me to just NOT understand- NOT solve. Some days I keep my focus on me and my program and then something will happen that triggers me and I spin trying to UNDERSTAND. But theres nothing to understand- how can that be? Mn I still have so much work to do. I look at my handsome boys and hurt that my A, theyre father, is missing all of this. I truly thought, before I entered Alanon, that he was choosing to drive by our house every night straight to the bar instead of coming home. So a slogan is QTIP and Im learning slowly its not about me,, but then I hear the first drink is a choice, the second is not. Which also makes sense. But with an active A, is the first drink really a choice?
I can sit for hours spinning all theses thoughts.
Thankful to this thread and the responses, it is what I needed to hear today. Especially Iamheres share. It helps me to have compassion for the alcoholic.
So instead of focusing my thoughts on my A and understanding him tonight I will pick up literature and focus on me for a bit.
Serenity - I suppose you can hear something like that and assume it true. Many alcoholics don't measure a day as normal either. Binges are not 14 hours, then sleep, then awake and start over. Each person is affected differently by the disease, I gave my experience. I would agree once exposure to recovery, the first drink is a choice. Before recovery, it wasn't a choice - I could not function without substance(s) in my body. I did not have a single day for more than 10 years where I was not self-medicated through alcohol of drugs. I also stayed up for days on end so there was limited/little/no points of clarity.
The best that I can share is I did not see any issues in how I was living. Nobody begging me, divorcing me, leaving me, etc. affected my bottom. Like most As, I assumed all who were trying to talk at me or to me were the crazy ones. It's a cunning, baffling and powerful disease which I would have died from had I not had extremely serious run-ins with the law. My only break ever was when I was jailed. I came out of jail with direct instructions not to drink/use and my first stop was the bar. It took several judges, several run-ins and the threat of long-term time in my 20(s) to change my tune.
I would not have stopped then if not for that. Each bottom is different and trying to understand one is nearly impossible. There is no one size fits all suggestion in AA just as in Al-Anon. The first thing most here when they arrive is just don't drink - no matter what - even if you backside is falling off. Yet, if that's been your coping mechanism for the majority of your life, it's very, very, very hard to think/do/be different in times of stress, turmoil, etc.
I lost a program friend to suicide over the summer. Had I know that was where her thinking was at, I would have suggested she drink. I'd rather see anyone choose a temporary fix vs. a permanent solution. I am not defending an alcoholic's drinking, I am suggesting it is impossible to understand why one does what they do when they do it....
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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
Aerin we don't give up people we love, we hold them in 2nd place hoping that 2nd place or further down the scale will be acceptable and then after a time with the compulsive drinking we learn more and some of the more we learn is that we are considered less than because we drink and our feelings get hurt also and we find ourselves in a fight we need to win because alcoholism makes us losers even to ourselves. Everyone comes against us and when they don't we come against ourselves. The last word of the 2nd step is sanity...the continuous and orderly process of thought that we come to believe we only can be restored to by a power greater than ourselves....greater than our booze and we find ourselves up against the hard choice...booze or God. Alcohol gives us notoriety. We have a wide number of drinking friends and associates an others just like us. I never learned to let go of that until I got into recovery and accepted my life was over as I wished it to be. My sponsor told me "Jerry F, you are going to have to remove yourself from all things alcohol" and I left my family, friends, wife and all things alcohol for the program. Here I am alive...who would have thought. ((((hugs)))
I can relate to how you feel because I felt that way too. After attending Al Anon for over two years as well as going to some open AA meetings to try to understand the disease I think I have finally made peace with this idea. It took me a long time to really know (I mean know deep down in my heart) that it is a disease. It was my distorted thinking that my A was "choosing" alcohol over me that was causing me so much grief. In my mind it isn't a choice for him. He can't really choose. And his drinking has nothing to do with how much he does or does not love me. It has to do with his compulsion to drink and more likely how much he doesn't love himself. Working through that really set me free in a number of ways. When I stopped telling myself every time he drank that it proved he didn't love me enough I was able to start to have more empathy for him. I came into Al Anon so resentful of my AH I could barely see straight. Now I have let so much of that go my view of it all has changed. I see how much my AH suffers from his disease. He has a lot of self hatred, low self worth, anxiety, and anger and he's doing the best he can at this moment even if it isn't good enough for me. Now that I can see the absolute pain that is underneath the drinking I feel more sorry for him than anything else. I no longer accept unacceptable behaviour, I live my own life and do my best to allow him to live his and I hope one day he finds his way to help but his HP needs to help him because I have not been able to (I've done a lot of work to let that go too).
I hope you find some peace around this for yourself as I know how painful those feelings can be. Take care ((Hugs)))
Welcome to MIP Kkwcpa - glad you found us and glad you joined right in! Keep coming back!!
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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
This topic has really hit me. I havent really looked after myself or gone to al anon meetings whilst being involved with my AH and I feel like had I gone sooner I wouldnt Have gone through the pain Ive gone through. Im very private and I didnt want to sit in a room with people I didnt know and open up. talking about it to people that are going through the same thing has helped me so much and I am grateful for that.
Ive always took things personally - from being Very young. So when I gave the ultimatum to AH and said right this is your last chance if you love me stop. Of course they said I will Ill do everything and then 3 months down the line started missing meetings and acting weird. It went on for another 3 months and I totally ignored all the warning signs and went into denial. Then the big bender came and the chaos. Thats was 2 months ago and Ive not hardly heard from him or seen him. Hes cut me off. And my response is that Ive cut him off now.
ive survived the past 2 months on anger. Anger at hiM myself and alcholism. Ive told Myself hes using yiu, doesnt love you, wont be there for you, forget about him. Every hurtful thing hes ever done I thought about it none stop. Ive been to a seriously bad place in my head and cried none stop for 2 months.
the past 2 weeks Ive introduced myself to al anon and I feel better. I am still going to say goodbye to AH that hasnt changed. Ive waited 3 years for the chaos to stop and I cant do it anymore I was so unhappy and I cant subject or introduce my children to that way of life. We never lived together I was married when I met him. I now have empathy for him and I dont hate him anymore. I found some kind of peAce. Its not me - and its not that I wasnt good enough hes just very sick and has an awful illness with no cure. Ill always love him. the Sad thing is we arent always supposed to be with the people we love.
my ah is trying to connect with me and wants to meet up and talk so I now have the gut wrenching task of telling him its over.
i Need to tell him forgive him - in case anything bad happens to him he needs to know I know hes not purposely hurt me.
I will then work through my steps as just finding al anon has made me look st myself differently and feel more positive and Id like to explore what else it can do for me.
i have to read this thread more later but want to say... yes. cunning, baffling, powerful.
my ex took a drink just a few months after moving in with me. it started a process that took us down years later. took me years to figure out what the hell was happening.
he also told me he found an old pill and put it in his mouth. felt like a different person. that was the other part of his destruction. stimulants made him insane and robbed him - and us - of normalcy.
using my imagination - i can't imagine doing either of those things, knowing i'm an addict and that i've been destroyed before.
but i'm not an addict.
it is entirely heartbreaking and has turned my life upside down. and his, of course.
but as a "civilian" i've been running circles around myself for years trying to understand. and to recognize addiction, addictive behavior, and various forms of mental illness.
now i'm working on giving up trying to understand because i don't think it's fully understandable. but cunning and baffling and powerful? damn straight.
