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Addiction to Alcohol/Support for my boyfriend in recovery

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Expert: Joseph Lee O. - 9/29/2008


Question
Hello.  Please forgive me, if I sound ignorant.  I have never done this before.  My boyfriend of 5 months is in AA.  He has been sober for 4 years.  It has changed his life from what I can see.  He attends three meetings a week and stays very involved with the program.  I think he is incredible for being able to accomplish that.  He is also a single father raising two teenage boys.  In addition, with the support of his parents, he has gone back to school full time.  Nursing school.  He wants to be an LPN or RN down the road and work at the detox center.  I am so amazed by the person he is.  He has shown me so much love and life in such a short time.  I love him with all of my being.

We haven't not been able to see each other much at all lately.  He is exhausted.  The last two Saturday afternoons, I thought we were going to be able to see each other, but he fell asleep.  Needless to say, I was very disappointed.  With a slight tone in my voice this time, I said, "At this point, I don't even know what to say."  He blew up, hung up on me and hasn't spoken to me since.  I sent him a text message and he responded that he needed time to think...that he was tired of making excuses for being exhausted.  He also commented that he had to call his AA supports because he was not going to get drunk over me.

What do I do?  It has been two days and I haven't heard a word from him.  I love him and want to share our lives together.  But I feel so shut out.  I don't understand after what he said I meant to him and what we were working towards how he can completely disregard me.  We have been able to talk through everything so far.  

I don't want to lose him.  Please help me do the right thing.

Answer
Greetings to you, Susan.

I believe your dilemma is one that is rather simple to understand, but one that is not at all easy to resolve.  As you have written:

>> He attends three meetings a week and stays very involved with the program.
>> He is also a single father raising two teenage boys.
>> In addition ... he has gone back to school full time.
>> He is exhausted.

And of course, he likely also has a regular job of some kind.

It is not that you are not worthy of his time, but that he simply has no time for much of a relationship.  Three meetings a week amounts to three evenings a week, and staying very involved amounts to at least one more morning, afternoon or evening each week ... and if you or I also had two boys to raise, I wonder whether we would even attempt going to school along with working a regular job.  So then, the very best you can do at the moment might be to patiently wait until he his boys are grown and he has finished school before expecting him to meet any additional demands upon his time.

You have written:

>> ... he fell asleep ...
>> I said, "At this point, I don't even know what to say."
>> ... What do I do?

Next time, just quietly let him know you understand completely.

>> I feel so shut out.

With feelings aside, I believe the facts reveal something much different.

>> I don't understand after what he said I meant to him and what we were working towards how he can completely disregard me.

It sounds like he perceives any additional demand upon his time as some kind of threat to his sobriety.

>> I don't want to lose him.  Please help me do the right thing.

Just keep things in perspective while placing his overall needs and responsibilities above your own desires.

Joseph Lee O.

Addiction to Alcohol

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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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