Husband struggling with alcohol abuse

[GreenMtnGringa]

My husband and I have been married almost 3 years now, and things are usually very good. However he has an alcohol abuse problem that always feels like 1 step forward and 2 steps backwards.

I’m scared to talk about this with my family and friends because I feel so ashamed of trying to mask this pain and I don’t feel like I can join an al-anon group without breaking down.

Issues from his drinking do not happen every day, nor do they happen every week, but when they do they are unbearable. My therapist has concerns that I’ve become codependent and so do I. I find myself making adjustments all day long to accommodate his drinking to avoid getting hurt…but one those days when I know his drinking is happening, I almost always end up hurt. Not physically abused, but verbally abused and mentally abused (i.e. I’m second-guessing myself, and wondering if I’m really the one who’s the problem in the relationship). We’ve been going to a marriage counselor for the past year and although things are getting better, they are still not great.

I would appreciate the prayers more than anything. I am the Catholic in the relationship; he doesn’t attend mass, but I’m always hopeful.

I don’t know if there’s anyone else out there with advice. I know it is wrong to give up on the marriage but I just don’t know what to do. Any help would be super.

God bless!

 

[Trishie]

Please don’t fail to seek help in an al-anon group imply because you might cry.
Honest emotion would be particularly understood in such a group.
You have ample cause for tears, facing what you do in your marriage, and trying to deal alone with the distressing consequences of addiction in your marriage.

Verbal and mental abuse, which you are even beginning to blame on yourself, is hugely destructive.
Alcoholic addiction is not likely to lessen without your husband’s own freely chosen decision and persistence, in fact it is more likely to increase. In his addiction, resulting in emotional and mental abuse, he is clearly failing to honor the vow to love and cherish you.

I do feel very much for you. Of my four brothers, one became alcoholic and died in a one-car accident a few years ago, with a broken family. His wife was so traumatized that she kept her new married name from our family and her three sons have become lost to our family under threat of disinheritance.

Please seek help for yourself. You can try to persuade him, but he simply won’t until or unless he chooses. My brother managed a few years sobriety, and sought help several times, but ultimately the only good thing that occurred is that he returned to the Church a month before his sudden death. It’s really serious stuff, this addiction thing.

Please seek help in the appropriate Al-anon group and learn how to cope as healthily as possible.
If you cry, so-be-it. Doubtless all the other spouses have cried over their spouses’ addictions in private and in the group

God bless you. I’ll keep you and your husband in my prayers.
I still have a little piece of paper an unknown child left in a Church in Arizona when I visited the U.S. in 1999.“Please ask God to help my Daddy stop being alcohlic.” I hope God heard that sweet innocent’s prayers, and that the poor kid had a happy childhood after all … which is a very important part of the equation.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Before I married my husband, I was in love for many years with an alcoholic guy who was also probably cross-addicted to pills. This situation you’re in is not good and you need help and support. Stop making adjustments for your husband’s drinking and go to Al-Anon. Please.

 

[His_helpmeet]

Thirding the Al-Anon. If your therapist is concerned about your being codependent, I think there is a group called Codependents Anonymous (CoDA). I believe it is a 12-step group modeled on AA.

 

[TheLittleLady]

Go to Al Anon.

Go to a Calix Society meeting.

He will never stop drinking until he hits rock bottom.