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Addiction to Alcohol/Is my husband near rock bottom
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My AH Drinks all day every day has been doing so for 9-10 yrs. he is currently living between 2 diff women he says hes using them for a place to stay as he is not allowed to live here due to social services. he is not a bad man and would not cheat on me or shout at me if he was sober. He says he loves me and kids but is pushing us away and cant bear to look at us he is starting to say that he hates drinking and what it has done to him he hates himself 4 how hes treat me he says he wants drink out of his life but hes scared of life without it hes very confused. but i cant accept what he has done with these women it hurts he stil lives btween them but pushes me away im hurt and cant understand why hes doing this if he means what he says hed detox. what do you think, i feel like walkin away but if hes near bottom id b throwing alot away i just started goin to al-anon in uk. please help any advice welcome
Greetings to you, Heidi.
You have asked and reported:
>> Is my husband near rock bottom?
>> He says he loves me and [children] ...
>> he is starting to say he hates drinking ...
>> he hates himself 4 how he’s treated me ...
>> he says he wants drink out of his life ...
That sounds like a man getting near the end. He knows alcohol and drinking are destroying both himself and the lives of others, and he wants to stop drinking.
You have written:
>> he’s scared of life without it ...
>> he’s very confused.
He probably does not understand why he cannot drink normally or safely, and neither does he have any idea about how to face the realities of life without drinking. He sees others around him who seem to be doing okay whether or not they are drinking, and that leaves him feeling like he is somehow different than anyone else and all alone in a very big and overwhelming world.
>> but i cant accept what he has done with these women
You do not ever have to accept those actions as moral and right, yet you will have to forgive him in about the same way you would look past his nasty messes while experiencing diarrhea. And of course, that is dependent upon his getting help and eventually seeking your forgiveness while amending his manner of life.
>> it hurts he stil lives btween them but pushes me away
Sure, but consider the snare he is in. He must have some place to stay, and he is unable to face the pain of his shame and remorse every time seeing you and his children remind him of what he has become and does not know how to overcome.
>> he is not a bad man and would not cheat on me or shout at me if he was sober.
>> im hurt and cant understand why hes doing this
>> if he means what he says hed detox.
>> what do you think
Maybe he seems fine on the outside when he is sober, but there is still something that troubles him on the inside when he is sober or he would not be drinking at all. In other words, my guess is that he is not going to detox because he has no idea about how to live sober when it is time for him to leave that place.
>> i feel like walkin away, but if hes near bottom id b throwing alot away
He will probably not be able to continue as he is for very long, so it might be best for you to just wait a bit and see what happens ... and please keep me posted.
Joseph Lee O.
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Answers by Expert:
Joseph Lee O.
Expertise
Greetings to you! Amidst the insufficiency of all the philosophical, religious and “self-help” approaches to relief from chronic alcoholism, I have personally experienced the content of “Alcoholics Anonymous”, the book. Thus, I can now explain at least the essence of the physical, mental and emotional aspects of an alcoholic's inherent condition and plight, and I can show why a spiritual solution is required and how it works and how to attain one.
Experience
The oldest of four boys, I grew up in a religious, Midwestern-USA family. Unable to decline a friendly offer in a social setting, I had "no effective mental defense against the first drink" ("Alcoholics Anonymous", the book, page 43), and took my very first drink ever at age 24 ... and within minutes I had become obsessed with getting more of the effect that glass of homemade wine had given me. Alcohol had just done something *for* me that nothing else had ever done; it had seemingly "fixed" something inside me I had not even known was broken.
Over the next seven years of my life, I "drank up" just about everything and everyone ever meaning much to me at all, and I eventually abandoned my young family so I could drink and smoke pot at will. For, you see, alcohol was giving me a good-to-go feeling about life and a sense of control I had never before had, and at least in the early days of my drinking it could kill just about any pain that came along.
At age 31, however, circumstances and consequences had piled up all around me in ways that were making it obvious I could not continue on much longer. Life had become too tough, my pains had grown too great and the dangers of continuing to drink had become too undeniable for me to be able to continue believing I might ultimately survive an inescapable drop to the bottom of the pit. I still wanted to be able to drink safely as in days past, but something had seemingly "taken over" my drinking and was dragging me completely out-of-control after just one drink. So, and even while completely overwhelmed by the thought of facing life alcohol-free, I decided to stop drinking altogether ... and I quickly discovered I could not. No matter what I said, thought or did even just "one day at a time", I always ended up drinking once again. Where I wanted to drink safely, I could not, and neither could I remain abstinent for very long at all ... and such is the physical "allergy" (where one drink takes another) coupled with alcoholism’s mental-emotional obsession for the effect of alcohol ...
... but then I met a small group of people who personally understood my deadly dilemma - my complete personal powerlessness - and those same folks were quite able to propose a permanent solution. I accepted, of course, and today it is as if I "could not drink even if [I] would" ("Alcoholics Anonymous", the book, page 57), and for that I now remain unendingly grateful.
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