Expert: Rebos - 11/14/2006

Question
Hi Rebos,

I have a question, how do you deal with a person you really care about and they have serious binge drinking problems. He will admit it but refuses to get help. I am very concerned with his future. I have only known him for 3 months and I already feel like I've accepted his behavior. What should I do?

Answer
Good afternoon Karla:

Thank you for your question.

I hope that you seriously consider; the decision that you make regarding your boyfriend of ONLY 3 MONTHS as being one of the most important decisions that you will make in your lifetime!

You presently have only 3 (I would guess) hectic months invested in this guy, and I would suggest that you dump him and move on with your life. It’s one thing to have a long term relationship or are married to a person, and then they become an alcoholic (or develop one of the many other terminal diseases), but to tie yourself down to someone who you have prior knowledge of having a problem is a disaster from the get go. If he does nothing about getting help, your life will only get worse, never better. You haven’t seen anything yet as to how tough your life will become if you stay with him and he doesn’t get help!

Alcoholics who are still drinking are generally self-centered to the extreme, booze is more important to them than ANYTHING ELSE. As much as he may say that he loves you his addiction will never allow you to come first, booze will always come before you, his health, his job, his family, and even his very life. By breaking up with him you may be doing him a big favor by helping to raise his “bottom”. In other words that he may recognize that he has lost another thing that was important in his life. I know of many cases where the non-drinker of a couple ends up “joining” the drinker as a matter of their own survival. Whatever you do (even if you are also having a drinking problem) don’t join him in his drinking, because to be a male alcoholic is bad enough, but to be a female alcoholic is much worse because of the “special” problems that a woman drunk faces. Plus, you will become his weak prey that he can do with you whatever he wants to.

It is very easy for those who are close to an alcoholic to become “enablers”. An enabler is a person who allows an alcoholic to continue drinking, primarily by their acceptance of the alcoholic’s actions and not holding them accountable for their unacceptable behavior. If an enabler has no special knowledge about alcoholism and they try to help, the alcoholic can sense the weakness of the enabler and they continue on drinking because they know that they will be forgiven and rescued time and time, again. In a backhanded way you will give him “permission” to drink by your continued acceptance of his unacceptable behavior. What ever you decide to do it should be based upon your head talking and not your heart. Don’t let your actions appear to be allowing him to continue drinking. Alcoholism is a progressive disease it only gets worse it never gets better on its own. I would make it very clear to him that you do not want to hear from him again until he does something positive about his drinking problem…and then only after he has been sober in a program of recovery (like AA) for at least one full year. Never make any threat to him unless you intend to follow through with it.

HOWEVER, if for some insane reason you cannot stop yourself from continuing your relationship with him, then it would be wise for you to go to Alanon meetings. It is the only way that you will survive the ordeal of having an alcoholic in your life. If you
choose to remain in your relationship with him and you don’t attend meetings you have no one to blame for your situation but yourself for your future grief. If you say that you love him so much and that you are willing to work through whatever…so get yourself to AlAnon! Alcoholics are not bad people, they are sick people who need help, but they must be held responsible for their actions! You may not be able to do anything about your boyfriend’s drinking but you can do something about the problem that has developed in your life by having alcoholic in it. Until you are armed with the right kind of information, knowledge and implications of the disease, your efforts to help him will be for nothing. Alcoholism is deadly and it destroys everything and everyone who comes into contact with it. If you do decide to stick it out please go to Alanon meetings it will be your only chance to survive the relationship.

Stopping drinking is not a matter of willpower. Alcoholism is a disease. Drinking alcoholically is but a symptom of a deeper underlying problem that must be faced up to in order for an alcoholic to recover. Without learning what that problem is, trying to stay away from a drink is known as “white knuckle sobriety”. It isn’t very long before the alcoholic has to drink again. FOR THE ALCOHOLIC THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS CUTTING DOWN, binge or periodic drinking, drinking only on weekends, changing what they drink, smoking pot or taking other mind altering drugs or even switching to “near beer” with 0.05% alcohol. For an alcoholic nothing will work short of total and complete abstinence from any thing that contains alcohol or other mind-altering substances (drugs). Of course the exception is a medical doctor’s prescription as long as the doctor understands that he/she is dealing with an addicted person.

Unfortunately, your boyfriend must hit his own bottom before he will do anything about stopping. I am sorry to say that hitting a bottom for some may mean going as low as a person can go...plus six feet! Don’t let him take you there with him. Until he “admits and accepts” that alcohol is causing him problems there is little you can do for him. No one can scare an alcoholic into stopping drinking. Threatening, and begging will not get him to stop doing what he has not made up his own mind to do. Don’t think that he does not want to stop he can’t stop when left to his own devices. Also, don’t be lulled into thinking that he will stop drinking just because he says that he will. It’s not that he will purposely lie to you… but he will lie to himself because down deep he is afraid to stop. Alcoholism is powerful, cunning, baffling and insidious.

An active alcoholic’s choices become limited to: attending a recovery program like AA, and/or entering an in-patient detoxification clinic then to the AA program. If he does nothing about stopping then he is destined to die a drunk’s death, get involved negatively with the law or end up in a mental institution. I am sorry to be blunt, but I am only stating what you probably already know. Rarely have I seen an alcoholic stop drinking on willpower alone. The disease is too powerful.

If you do talk to him you may want to say that you are leaving him because of his drinking. And… that until he is sober for at least a year or more that you do not want to hear from him or have any contact with you. You have to get on with your life. Don’t let him trap you into “that this whole thing is your problem and not his, and if you didn’t “bug him” that he would be OK.” Alcoholics are very clever at turning the problem around to protect their own right to drink!

God forbid that you have children with him and then become tied to him for the rest of your life. His drinking will always come first. I wish you the very best and I hope that I have not taken too much liberty with you in the way I have responded to your question. You seem to be intelligent women…don’t let this man destroy your life. Get out while you can, and concentrate on someone who can love you, more than booze. I know that you love him…but HE CAN”T LOVE YOU AND ALCOHOL at the same time.

If I can be of further help please do not hesitate to contact me again through Allexperts. Thank you Rebos