Expert: Joseph Lee O. - 1/6/2008

Question
I need change but don't know what to do.  I dated a man for 7 years and then married him.  We used to drink recreationally, he more than I.  I didnt understand the problem though I should have because I don't need alcohol and assumed he could stop too if he wanted.  A month before we married he lost his job.  On our honeymoon I became pregnant. I very much wanted a child. I hoped to spend some time with the baby but my husband never did get another job.  My salary is sufficient to pay the mortgage, support us.  He said he would stay at home to care for our son. I was against it but he refused to get a job. Although he stopped going to bars when our son was born and seemed initially a devoted father, he never did stop drinking.  For the first few years I didnt know how bad it was. he hid the drinking from me, was somewhat buzzed at night and waited till i had gone to bed to drink seriously. We fought alot about money and his refusal to work outside of the home.  In order to make enough money to be the sole earner i have to work alot of hours. I wanted (want) to spend more time with my son, to be less tired on the weekends.  Recently, that is within the past 2 years, things have gotten much worse.  He now binges, and passes out, falls down, pees on the carpet, and wakes up and does it again. Our son sees it and knows what his father is, he did it in front of his mother and his sisters at a 70th  birthday party I arranged for her, he did it at my parents this thanksgiving. In short he has completely lost all control. He calls me a cunt and tells me he hopes i die almost every day now, in front of our son.  Then the next minute he tells me he loves me so much.  Its totally crazy.  My son is in preschool full time but my husband picks him up and spends hours with him alone as i dont get home until 9 pm most nights.  I have tried to talk to my husband about his alcoholism for a few years now. he swears he will never stop drinking. I made a no alcohol in the house rule but he still buys cheap vodka and hides it around the house. I cut him off from money but he sells our possessions and does odd jobs to get the money to drink. During the day when our son is at school I dont know what he is doing. Some housework, very little.  I have to make the money, pay the bills, do the shopping, attend to everything the least bit complicated, all while he is drunk, passed out on the sofa, or if he is awake, he is in a rage about nothing or acting like a lunatic most of the time. There are occasional flashes of the person I used to love--early in the morning, but there are so fleeting.  He has said maybe once or twice that he should go to rehab but that was a blip and then gone.  Mainly he just tells me he isnt drunk and has not had a drop to drink while he staggers around slurring his words and passes out.  I dont know how to help him if he does not want to help himself.  I married him and fear if i leave him he will die. Actually he could not get life insurance due to some bad liver function results which he would not sign the HIPAA waiver to share with me so I don't know how bad they were, so he might die anyway. But he does have a roof over his head.  Lately I wonder about my ability to keep working this very high stress job and keep my sanity under all this pressure. The drama is clearly bad for my son, who is a very smart and sensitive boy.  I can see there is not a very clear question here.  Here it is: i don't know how to help him. I feel helpless to help him. I feel helpless to help myself also as I think New York law will not let me throw him out of the house and I dont know how to sell a house with him in it and me working 70 hours a week. I dont think i can afford a mortgage and rent also. i am already living an hour commmute from work to afford the mortgage. I just dont know what to do and dont understand why he doesnt care about me, about his son, about anything.

Answer
Greetings to you, Jade.

I have heard you, and you have my full attention.  I do not have specific advice or counsel for your related legal matters - you need to contact a lawyer, soon - but I do offer what I can for the sake of perspective and your overall endurance.

You have written:

>> I need change but don't know what to do ...
>> I don't know how to help him. I feel helpless to help him.

It will only be when your husband comes to a point of desperation concerning life and living it that he might be sufficiently open-minded to even consider what is needed in order for him to come out of alcoholism.  Along the way, you can learn more about his present condition and permanent recovery, if you like, but you are not to be held accountable for his well-being.  So then, yes, you are helpless to do much of anything for him at the moment, including any idea of trying to help him "hit bottom" as some folks might try to suggest.  He has a built-in self-destruction mechanism already running that will automatically take care of that.  So for now, just pray that he be spared from death or "alcoholic insanity" (wet brain or "organic brain syndrome") so that he might ultimately reach his own eventual moment of clarity, truth and decision concerning himself and The One who created us all.

>> I feel helpless to help myself also as I think New York law will not let me throw him out of the house and I don't know how to sell a house with him in it and me working 70 hours a week.

If both of your names are on the deed and mortgage and all of that, you might end up being able to do no more than to just walk away and let the chips fall where they may.  Here is where I suggest you talk with an understanding attorney to search out your overall-best option.

>> I don't think I can afford a mortgage and rent also.

I would suggest you not even try.  Your child needs you as his mother far more than you might ever truly need to do anything like that.

>> I am already living an hour commute from work to afford the mortgage.

Subject to the advice of an attorney (if I were a woman in your shoes), I would seek at least temporary shelter in the home of a stable friend or family member or even a decent "family shelter" and possibly cover the mortgage for another couple of months or so while the legal details get worked out, if even possible, for the place to be sold.

>> I ... don't understand why he doesn't care about me, about his son, about anything.

You already know alcohol can greatly impair good judgment even on simple things such as crossing a street, and heavy drinking can essentially render as useless the mind of any emotionally-troubled or even -disturbed individual.  Having been raised in this hedonistic, self-indulgent society believing the big "I" is "number one" and most important over all, your husband, and especially while drunk and/or pondering his ultimate fate, is presently capable of thinking about nobody other than himself:

"Selfishness - self-centeredness!  That, we think, is the root of our troubles.  Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate ... [and] we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt.
So our troubles, we think, are basically of our own making.  They arise out of ourselves, and the alcoholic is an extreme example of self-will run riot, though he usually doesn't think so."
("Alcoholics Anonymous", the book, page 62)

You are welcomed to write as often and as much as you might wish, Jade, and I pray for your and your child's well-being.

Joseph Lee O.
leejosepho@hotmail.com