The material presented
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level.
I have to ask myself this.. Is loving an alcoholic worth what you loose ? My husband the alcoholic in my life can be so mean at times.. He calls me names and makes me feel like dirt. Other days he is as nice as he can be. We started counseling as our marriage has fallin apart and we are hanging on by a thread. In these sessions i hear how I need to fix, I need to fix, I should do, He does this because.... Not once has he said I am sorry, I have a problem and I want to stop drinking. So why do I hang on to a relationship that is so unhealthy ? Why am i fighting so hard to keep a bad marriage alive ? It is weird, like i am watching someone elses life and wondering what is wrong with that woman ( except I am that woman ) I have no emotional support, no support with the kids, I dont feel safe, most days i dont feel loved yet I cant just walk away... I really dont get it.. I have tried detaching, and most days I am successful but others ... wow it is hard.. !! I want to walk away but my feet just wont move and that makes me so ANGRY at myself.. I dont think I am doing myself, my children or my husband for that matter any good holding on to a marriage that doesnt work.
I pray each day for my God to help me break away, to help me walk away from this loving him but loving me MORE...
What kept me from leaving was I think fear, more than anything. Also denial - we had worked so hard, been together so long, built up a home and a family - I just couldn't really believe that it could be over. I don't know if it was love - there were long stretches where I couldn't feel anything that you would call love for him, at all. Loyalty, maybe.
A's keep us off balance, too, don't they? They will be so horrible, and then the next day it is as if nothing had happened. It is easy to start to disbelieve our own feelings - "Oh, it couldn't have been so bad last night, I'm exaggerrating, all couples fight..." When things were at their worst, I didn't know if I was coming or going - he'd come home from work, give me a big kiss, what's for supper and I'd be thinking "Did I just imagine the last two weeks? Where's the man who left the house this morning swearing at me?" But I was always so glad that things were OK again that I never pushed it. And they always got bad again.
To me the anwer is YES! The price is way too high. But that is a decision each individual has to make on their own. Unfortunately this disease not only affects the person with it but the whole family. I got out. I could not tolerate it anymore. My child and my life are too precious for me to waste anymore of it with an active A.
Good question. Something I too have been asking myself alot lately. Think the answer would be easier for me if my A didn't have periods of sobriety. I just keep thinking maybe one of these times it will stick and I so hate to give up hope. If A was in complete denial and refused to even try, I know I would have given him the boot by now. But what to do when A keeps trying and failing. How many attempts do you allow before you give up?
Only you can really answer that question. I know for me, that I was not willing to put up with it anymore. Inside he really is the most loving, kind, considerate person you'd ever meet. He really wasn't a mean drunk. But as his disease progressed it got dangerous. Nearly setting the house on fire was the last straw. I wasn't going to take that chance again. Telling him to leave was the hardest, most heartbreaking thing I did. But that night I came here and found comfort in the loving arms of my Alanon family. I knew it was the right thing to do.
I now have my sober loving husband back. It isn't all peaches and cream. Living with a recovering addict changes the dynamic of the relationship. I cling to this program more than ever. Miracles do happen. But I always remember in the back of my head, that in an instant things can change.
So let me ask you this: Are you lonlier with him than without him? If this were not your spouse would you put up with this behavior? ie. if he was your roomate? I know this sounds like I'm simplifying things, but think about it. A very wise and wonderful person here asked me those same questions. It helped me do what I needed to do when I answered them. To that person (you know who you are) I you. Thank you.
Love and blessings to you. May you find the answers you are looking for.
Live strong,
Karilynn & Pipers Kitty
P.S. My father in law (whom I'd marry if I didn't marry his son ) once told me this: "Answers come when are trully ready to receive them." Another words: when we are ready to make a major decision we'll know when the time is right.
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It's your life. Take no prisoners. You will have it your way.
Well I think for me the price of being a codependent was very very high. I nearly died twice because I simply could not say "no". I simply was unable to take care of myself because I did not have a boundary in there. The relationship with the A like most things is complicated the price of living with him is high, the price of leaving is high, the cost benefit analysis is that I will not have to continue with the same problems. I will instead have different problems. I will always have problems but hopefully they will be more manageable problems. Some of the irony for me is that when I met the A he very much supposedly wanted to help me with my problems.
I have heard people here talk abut detaching, making a plan b and working with that. I do think leaving is a strategy rather than a rash act. For me it is about options. I have the option to stay with the A and keep on the same road, another option is to keep on at al-anon and work on my issues (which I do at the moment) and another is to make a plan and work on it.
There are options, they are not all catastrophic. They are workable. Many people here are working on different options, some are staying and trying to make it work, others are leaving, others have left. That is for me one of the joys of al-anon there is a choice. I try to make a choice each day to be in recovery no matter what.
But I always remember in the back of my head, that in an instant things can change. 
you. Thank you.
) once told me this: "Answers come when are trully ready to receive them." Another words: when we are ready to make a major decision we'll know when the time is right. 