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Addiction to Alcohol/I need to leave my alcoholic boyfriend!
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Question
I have been in a relationship with my boyfriend for almost 3 years. We have been living together for 2 years. When we first started dating I just thought that he liked to have a good time a lot. Then things changed and once he lost his business (to gambling) his drinking got worse. He was drunk everyday. And he's a mean drunk. He swears and yells at me. I finally pushed him to get a job. He has worked construction ever since and all he does is complain how much he hates it But he won't do anything about it. He won't look for anything else.
Over the past 3 years, he goes up and down. He'll be okay for a few weeks, where he only drinks on weekends, but then other times where he's always drinking. He's always got an excuse, whether it's his job, or "Hey it's Saturday night". There's always something. For the past 3 years, I've been different, I don't enjoy myself at outings because I'm always watching him, making sure he's not doing anything stupid or embarrassing. We always leave everything early because he's drunk.
I have tried to leave him before, but I always go back to him. I love him. I can't help it. But earlier this week was the last straw.
I recently started a new job that i absolutely love, planning corporate events for a big company. I had been planning a Gala Dinner for weeks. There were over 300 people in attendance at this dinner and our keynote speakers were high-living politicians. Well he got drunk at it, yelled profuse things, was swearing, making a scene and then passed out at the table. I then carried him into a room where no one could see him. But it was too late, everyone had seen him, including my boss.
It is now 2 days later and I have decided to leave him for good. I spent the night away last night, but today I have to confront him. I know he's going to try and get me to stay.
I do love him, I wouldn't want anything bad to happen to him, but I just can't live my life like this anymore. It's taking a toll on my health and now my job.
what do I do if he threatens to commit suicide? He has threatened it before. I don't know what I would do if I got a call saying he had done so. i would never forgive myself.
Help!!
Greetings to you, Stephanie.
You have asked:
>> What do I do if he threatens to commit suicide?
Tell him you will not be attending his funeral if he ever commits suicide without calling you first, and if he ever actually does call to let you know “This is it”, just say “Okay, thank you. Goodbye”, and *immediately* hang up and call the police to let them know what he has just said and to give them his location.
>> I have tried to leave him before, but I always go back to him.
You need to get in touch with a counselor at a women’s shelter and begin doing something about that kind of insane, self-destructive behaviour. My younger daughter (now 33) used to have the same dilemma, and she never would have broken free from “loving her abuser” without some professional help.
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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