Expert: Rebos - 1/14/2009

Question
Ok where to start! MY husband turned 40 in July. On November 1st we got into what seemed to be a small disagreement as couples do from time to time.it's almost like he was trying to provoke it. However, it resulted in him leaving. We have been married for 15 years and other than normal marriage issues it seemed to be great. We are both hard workers and have a wonderful 12 year old daughter. When he didn't come back I talked to him parents. Everyone in his family said it is a mid life crisis and I should just leave him along for a while. He made little contact with our daughter. Took her to the movies a couple of times and text her once or twice and maybe one call. He did spend Thanksgiving with her and he called her on Christmas. He did try to spend Christmas with her but she refused to see him because she had asked him to spend Christmas with us the weekend before and he told her he had things to do. So when we get home from spending Christmas with his family we discover the things he had to do that kept him from being with her was to come to our home and take things. So she said if material things were more important than spending Christmas with us then it was his loss. She is very upset with her dad. She said she doesn't know who he is but he is not her dad. So time has pasted and he has accused me of turning his daughter against him. Which is for from the truth. He has also convinced his family of this and now they want even talk to me. He is an only child as is our daughter so as a mother I can understand them taking his side. He has told them things about me that are not true but they believe them. he said the sight of me discus him. Anyway, it has been a very emotional 9 weeks that has turned our lives up side down. My daughter has went from a very happy little girl that has always made good grades and loved school to a little girl who is very sad and bringing home bad grades and that upsets her even more. she cries because she does not want to go to school and she only says she is sick and doesn't feel good but i know exactly how she feels because i feel the same way. I can't and don't expect his family to understand because they don't live at our house but my husband has been drinking both in front of me and behind my back. it took him leaving for me to see how bad it really was. i am finding out that he was mixing crystal light and vodka and drinking that before i got home. then he was having a couple of land sharks with dinner. then he was drinking 2 or 3 pints of wine before bed. since he left the house he has came back while I was at work and took every drop of liquor we had. we had a collection of wine we had bought in different places we visited and he took all that. when his mom and i confronted him (before she stopped talking to me) he said he has them in storage and they are his collection and he isn't drinking them. she fell for it but i am not convinced. when i tired to talk to her she said her son was not an alcoholic because he didn't fit the description. She said she had a brother and and a cousin that were alcoholics and that her son didn't look like them. she is so angry with me i have decided to stop trying to convince her and have put all my energy into trying to help me and my daughter. i want to help him so bad but i don't know how. he took our camper trailer that we had just bought and i have no idea where he is staying. on top of everything he is a diabetic and i am finding out that diabetes and depression go hand in hand. i know that both alcoholism and depression runs in his family because his mom told me this. he is in a bad way and i can't just walk away from him. i love him with all my heart. if i thought he was just being mean then it would be easy but to think he has a sickness that he has lost control of makes me want to help him that much more. he has always been such a perfect husband and father and now he is shutting us out and hurting us. when he was talking to me he was saying things like he loves me but is not in love with me and i am crazy and well the list goes on. he has convinced himself that i have turned his daughter against him but he has done that himself. the last straw was this past Friday when we got home and he had broke into the house and took  my pistol that i would use to defend us if need be, a few more of his personal items, and took the family  cat. my daughter fell to pieces. this cat sat with her every morning while she dressed for school and he was waiting for her every afternoon when she got home. she tried to call her dad but he wouldn't answer his phone. then she text him but still he didn't reply. it's almost like he is trying to destroy us. he is mad at her for not spending Christmas with him and he told his mom she talked bad to him on the phone. what does he expect? he has tore her world apart and he is acting like everything is perfect. to the best of my knowledge he is still going to work and then i guess he goes to the camper and drinks until he passes out. it sickens me to think of all those nights he "fell asleep on the sofa" and i felt sorry for him because i thought he was just exhausted from work and diabetes. now it is all staring to add up. he wasn't exhausted he was drunk. it makes since now why it was so hard to wake him up to go to bed at night and why he was so ill when i did finally get him up. then the next morning he would say he was so tired he didn't even remember going to bed. all this time i blamed diabetes! i can't believe i was so dumb. i can understand his mom's point of view. i too had painted a different picture of a alcoholic and never once did that picture look like my husband. he works at a very, very stressful place where his life and the lives of other is in his hands everyday so i can understand he is stressed all the time but what i don't understand is when and how did it get out of control and me not even picking up on it until it is OUT OF CONTROL. The love of my life, the guy i have loved since i was 13 years old want even talk to me or his daughter that he adores. what am i to do now? how can i help us? everyone around me (except my 2 best friends) says i should file for a divorce and move on but i can't just walk away from him. i married him for better or for worst. one of my best friends went through this same thing with her husband and she keeps telling me he has to want help before he can get it. but, the problem is i think he is shutting us out so he doesn't have to hide it any more and he is free to drink when he wants and how much he wants. HELP ME UNDERSTAND THIS AND DEAL WITH IT. i don't want to walk away from him i want to help him. should i keep calling and leaving messages on his phone are sit back and wait and hope he calls me. i don't want him to think i don't care. my daughter refuses to call him or text him. she is so angry at him and even though i tell her he loves her she refuses to believe me. she said if he really loves her then he will come home. everyday seems worse then the last one. i never know what to expect next.

Answer
Good afternoon "what to do" and thank you for your question.

I can’t to tell you to leave him or not, nor can I tell you what to do legally. However, if you intend to stay with this man I strongly suggest that you start going to Al-Anon. ! I assume that you know what Al-Anon is. Alcoholism is a disease that affects everyone (negatively) that come into contact with an alcoholic. If your child is mature enough she can go to Alateen. You can either start YOUR FAMILY'S recovery process now – or keep the illness going and destroy your family unit. Your best defense against the emotional impact of your  husband’s drinking is to gain knowledge and the emotional maturity to put that knowledge into effect. Al-Anon can be reached by calling 1-800-344-2666 (United States) or 1-800-443-4525 (Canada). If you decide to not go to Al-Anon the least that you can do is to stop trying to control something that you can’t control. Thank you Rebos