Comments on: Should I Leave my Alcoholic Wife (or Husband, Partner, Boyfriend, Girlfriend, Addict)?

By: W

Sat, 04 Sep 2010 08:54:23 +0000

This site is fantastic, I have searched and searched over the years but never found something with so many husbands of alcoholic wives.

My story is so similar, been together 17 years, the first 10 untouched by alcohol and those days seem like I must have been living in heaven comapred to now. Her mother was an alcoholic so my wife knew the pain of alcoholism. We had the usual glass of wine with dinner like most folks do I guess and drank while socialising but about 7 years ago I began to notice she had already had a glass of wine when I got home from work. I didnt understand alcolism at all at that ime and thought to myself she knows what she is doing, it’s no problem, maybe denial on my part too. It steadily got worse over a few years until she asked me to help her with all this as she knew she had a big problem by that time. She was probably drinking 2 bottles of wine a day or a bottle of vodka sometimes a mix of both.

I have been at breaking point so many times over the past 5 years. She can get sober and remain so for 2, 3, 4, 5,6 best 7 months. during these sober periods she is just like her old self, I love has as much as ever but it always comes back to her lifting a drink again and getting herself into such a mess I feel as if i’m going to have a heart attack, begging on streets, looking and smelling like a tramp, trouble with police, neighbours talking, you know how it goes.

She has been in rehab 4 times, hospital stays, her GP and her addiction councellor who have been fantastic, I’m sure are sick of her too. Everyone, ever her recovered mother, tells me to leave. We have no kids, she doesnt work, maybe that was the problem and I crucify myself with those thoughts for not making things different 10-12 years ago. But I lover her so so much. I can’t bear thinking about how she would cope, homeless, it scares me.

Another problem outside of all this has arisen now. I need to find a new job as my current position has been made redundant. I have had a lot of support from my work with my wife, they now the situation and have been very very supportive with time off to help her back to sobriety etc. But I cant take this to a new job, I wouldnt be able to hold it together. So my life is currently in such misery. I know I should leave her but keep thinking this time she will be better and stay better. Am I a fool for thinking that?

Thanks
W

By: Tom Linde

Tom Linde — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 23:40:03 +0000

Ryan, you say it’s hard to let go. Naturally enough. But it seems you’ve described several different ways in which she has communicated the wish to leave.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 18:05:52 +0000

My wife of 13 years is an alcoholic our whole marriage and at one point got addicted prescripton meds. This was the forst time she went to rehab. She came out and made it two weeks clean. So another few years went by and she was still drinking. This past January I had an affair and admitted to it in February and ask her to leave. She moved six hours away with friends and called me everyday and told me how much she missed me. Finanally after 2 months of this I told her I wanted her to come home and her whole mind set changed to I was pressuring her. She attempted suicide and her frinds demanded she get help for the alcohol or she was no longer allowed at their home. So she did go into treatment and stayed and came out after six weeks. She informed me four days after coming out she wanted a divorce because she met a man in rehab. Is letting her go what I need to do for her to stay sober and be happy? I am finding it hard to let her go. I have told I would but this is not what I want. Is this something that happens to recovering alcoholics? Is she affraid she could not be with me and stay sober?

By: Jason

Jason — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 17:02:34 +0000

I cannot believe all the postings and how similar they are. My situation is different in the fact my wife and I both drink all the time. We are both professionals in very high stressed positions. We drink wine together every night. We are both divorced and have suffered through many stresses and crisis together. I love my wife and I have become so concerned about her. Our kids, and friends are taking notice of her behaviour changes when she drinks. Sometimes she is OK other times she is very mean, confrontational, and engages me or the kids in conversations that do not make any sense. She turns on me frequently, it gets really bad verbally, a few times I have been locked out of the house, many times I have slept elsewhere for the night. Admittingly I at times have become so angry and frustrated I have yelled, I have punched her in the butt once, dragged her out of bed once, yes I have to admit I have become so frustrated and hurt with the verbal abuse she lays on me that I have retaliated and yelled my head off sometimes. I have so much guilt over this. I drink too so its hard for me to point out when she’s had too much when I’m drinking too. I handle myself better, the kids never really see me drunk or slurring my speech or talking jibberish like they do with my wife. But, I am part of the problem too. I have found liquor hidden amongst the house, I found her on the patio drinking at 5:00 am the other day, after a night out with her girlfriends she was sooo drunk she could barely form words or speak. I took the glass and dispensed it off the patio and raised my voice to her again. She says I scare her but really she scares all of us and I worry so much about her that something bad is going to happen to her. I want us to both stop drinking and I am trying to encourage this, but she seems so resentful towards me and when I bring it up she becomes very angry towards me. She is a wonderful person when she is sober, and a total Demon when she is drunk. She makes excuses the next day, or does not remember, or does not believe me when I tell her what she was like. She got drunk with her girlfriend again last night, came home full of empowerment, and told me “this relationship is the shits” and “you have anger issues” and “we’re through get out!” etc. I guess I argued with her which was a mistake, so she simply got in her car and went back to her girlfriends again for more drinks most likely. I left the house in fear they may invent some kind of abuse thing and call the cops on me or something. I sit here at my office devastated wodering how this got so bad, when I love this woman and I just lost my best friend, and she just lost whatever support I had left for her. My kids are at home alone, she won’t take any calls or emails, she just disregards everything and everyone else when she gets like this. Alcohol is so destructive to so many families, so painful to watch it take hold of the one you love, and so hard to realize I have been part of this problem. I helped her become an alcoholic, because I am an alcoholic too. I always felt I was in control and she was not. The truth of the matter is . . . we both need help.

By: Jim

Jim — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:58:52 +0000

Tom, can you please send Ken my email address? My situation is EXACTLY the same as his and I need someone to talk to if he is interested.

I’ve been married to my wife for 12 years and we have two sons together, 8 and 11 years old. My wife has always been an achoholic but the last 6 months have been the worst. She now drinks 5 or 6 days a week…wine, vodka or both. She’s not a mean or abusive drunk but I can’t let my boys grow up watching and “learning” her behaviors. My oldest son get depressed and my youngest is a prime candidate for following in her foot steps into alchoholism. I almost snapped when he walked by me with a beer on his way to deliver it to my wife at her request. How dare she!

I’ve read all of the above stories many times and they are very comforting to me. It’s amazing how I can be surounded by great friends, neighbors and family and still feel soooooo alone. I can’t sleep anymore. I can’t concentrate at work. I can’t keep doing this anymore… I still love my wife. When she is sober we have such a great time together, but when she goes for that 1st drink my stomach knots up and I can feel the depression & anger well up inside of me instantly. I have not been to therapy or to Alanon yet for fear that I will escalate what would be the inevitable end to my marage and family. I don’t want to make things worse for my boys.

After last nights drunkin fall in the middle of our street, while playing basket ball as a family, I have once again reached the end of my rope. I’m sitting at my home office right now wondering how to tell my wife, when she gets home from work, that I’m leaving her. What do I say? Will I actually go through with it this time? Do I show her videos of her sitting at the dining room table with me and the boys while she is completely wasted?? Do I wait to tell her until I have spoken to a lawyer? Do I cancel all of the credit cards and stop direct depositing my paycheck to our bank account and take over the responsibility of paying our bills? (I make 98% of our families income) Do I try and get her to find a full time job first so she can afford to move out?

I am so confused…

By: Nena

Nena — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:30:04 +0000

Hello, I am 37 and have been with my husband for eleven years. When we first met he was the nicest guy ever (and told me he didn’t drink because he had gotten into a bad accident and was trying to stay away from it). I didn’t think anything of it. We dated for a few months and I got pregnant, I know not the best choice I made but what’s done is done. Anyway we got an apartment together (with my two year old daughter from my previous marriage). During the pregnancy everything was fine. When the baby was born I came home from the hospital and he went out to celebrate with his friends. The baby was barely a month old. He came home and was soooo drunk. He became abusive both mentally and physically. What had I done?? I stayed because I thought things would change. He continued to drink and be nasty but never physical again. He straightened himself up and we were good for a few years. We bought a house and moved in. I got pregnant agian with my third child, everything went downhill from there. He would drink all the time and his excuse was that he was depressed because he had gained a lot of weight. I was so depressed I reached out for help and starting seeing a therapist. He stopped drinking again and decided to have a gastric bypass. If anyone knows about this surgery your stomach shrinks and you can’t eat as much or drink. The doctors told him that if he drank he would be very ill and could die. By then I had asked for a divorce already. One weekend I decided to go see my parents in PR. My inlaws lived next door and I told them I would be going and to please care for my two elder children; I would take the baby. They agreed. I left on Friday night, but on Satuday late afternoon,my phone vibrated aleting me that someone had left me a message. I checked the message only to hear my daughter hysterical crying that something was wrong with daddy. I called back several times and no one answered his cell phone. I called my inlaws and they said he had taken the kids to the movies. I told them to run out and check on them because of my daughter’s call. They could not find them anywhere. I got the baby ready and headed back to the airport in hysterics. Two hours later my sister receives a call telling her that my kids were at the police station and that my husband was in jail. He had driven to a theme park almost an hour away and was drunk. He had pulled in to get the kids something to eat and the workers called 911 after he was knocked out on the table of the fast food joint.

Moving ahead, he did not have to do any time because he hadn’t been physically driving when he was found. It was his first offense and they allowed him to do an intervention program, together with having to take parenting courses. I had to sign the paper in order to allow him to see the kids again. My son had to undergo a long bout of therapy to get over what happened. He was devastated to the point that he blamed me for what happened to his dad. (It was just easier then believing his dad would do something like that) This all happened three years ago and it wasn’t until recently that he apologized and said he knew it wasn’t my fault. We did get divorced but a year later we re-married because he was “a changed man”. He stopped drinking altogether…until… his mother’s birthday. he said he was running out to get something at the market. An hour later his brother and I found him passed out with the car engine running in the parking lot of the market. Again he started meetings but stopped shortly after. Just this weekend my little one runs upstairs complaining that daddy was slurring. I told him that daddy was tired from working so hard. I made the kids stay upstairs while I went to check. Sure enough he was knocked out and would wake up momentarily all confused. I addressed him about it and he said he had taken some valiums and some energy drink.

Things aren’t getting better if anything they are getting worse. He said he wasn’t an addict and that it was the first time he had done that. Sure!!!!
I am being cold to him and even told him we were done, I told him to get his act together for the sake of the kids. That is the main reason why I have stayed. When he is not drinking or taking valium, he is the best father and husband. The kids adore him, he is funny and smart. I love him but I am afraid. I dont want my daughter to grow up thinking its ok to be with someone like this. I don’t want her to think that if my mom did it then why cant I. It’s not what I had planned for her. Her biological father left us when she was only a year old. He enlisted in the military and never looked back. We got divorced through the military. She has never seen him or heard from him. This man she calls daddy is her heart. She loves him very much. I feel sooo guilty for her father abandoning her and now her “daddy” being a drunk. I know I haven’t made the best decisions in life but I just hope she understands that it’s not ok. That I have tried my best to give her a good life as well as her brothers. I just don’t know what to do anymore. The kids are 5,10, and 15. They are my life. But will they hate me for leaving their father? His parents just look the other direction but from what I’ve learned, my husband is the one who has to want to change. It would not matter what any of us ask him to do. I have even tried going to meetings with him but nothing changes. I find myslef constantly sick and I know its because I am always worried and thinking. I just want my kids and I to be happy, but I guess its a little selfish considering he is hurting and in need of help. But I tried and even married him a second time, what more do I have to live with. Ohhh I am a mess!!!! Would not wish this on anyone.

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 20:49:43 +0000

Hi Reno

I thought I would post a reply to you because in many ways what you said resonated with me.

To you I want to say: WELL DONE!!!

Wow, do I feel for you and what you are going through (and for all the other posters here).

It was very very difficult to leave her. From reading many sites and a few books I realise now that I was essentially a hostage. Being a hostage leads to living the hostage taker’s reality. Leaving that reality is very hard indeed.

Like you, I wished for a different situation and believed I could make it happen. Like you I questioned myself in so many ways. Questioned, doubted, castigated myself. At that time, leaving her felt like I had failed (and still does). Of course, that was her reality. I had become a caretaker, parenting the alcoholic, and co-dependent (although I most likely was already co-dependent).

Failed?? Failed what I now wonder. Her health was not my responsibility. More importantly, I did not cause the alcoholism, I cannot cure it and it was never my responsibility to fix it. Instead, I will repeat what I read on another site (written by ivehadit31): We should not view leaving the alcoholic as failure. Rather, view it as WINNING BACK YOUR LIFE. This piece of constructive advice holds much for me. Breaking free is all about winning back my life.

Other sites also mention how people left their alcoholic partner and after a few months returned to the relationship. 20 years later (at the time of their writing) they were saying that they had wished they had never done it. They left, started over (as I have), left again and started over (me again!) and given up leaving (not me: Like you, I will never go back no matter how hard it may be).

The overriding sentiment is: The signs are all there, given by God or whatever higher power one might believe in. Don’t ignore them. If you have made a break to leave your alcoholic partner and choose your own destiny, RUN, don’t walk.

I don’t apologise for the anger in my posts. I am angry. At her, for wilfully destroying our marriage (as I saw it then); for not trying to save it, like I was; Now, mostly, at myself, for believing that her actions had anything to do with me. They didn’t. I was incidental. She loves alcohol.

Thanks again to all the posters sharing their stories. It was such a relief to find you all.

Here’s wishing a bright future to all of you.

By: Tom Linde

Tom Linde — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 05:36:51 +0000

Tara, I don’t have a solution to the need for an on-call nanny. I do know that many people living with an addict are highly reluctant to expose to others what is going on in the house. I’d be very private about it myself. But if the reason for your need was different, something you wouldn’t mind sharing with the public (say, both parents are doctors who get called to the hospital at night), then you might cast a wide net. For example, putting a note on the bulletin board of the nearest community college, or in the highschool parent newsletter, church announcements or whatever. Perhaps something like this in your situation would serve a bit of a dual purpose along the lines of “if what you’re doing isn’t working, do something different.”
Just a thought.

By: Tara

Tara — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 05:57:08 +0000

Tom, thank you so much for this website. I, like so many others have endured the pain of an alcoholic spouse. My husband is not a “daily drunk” and can go for a week, or occasionally a month, without drinking. But when he does, watch out! Suddenly every problem he has ever had in life is somehow my fault and every little thing that he feels I have done to slight him even in the smallest of ways is relived in a drunken rage and made a thousand times worse than it really was.
He is an angry person whom the slightest things will set him off while sober. But, when he is drunk I actually have to hide from him or take our 7 year old daughter and spend the night at a hotel to keep him from continually screaming, calling my every foul name in the book, and spewing his ugly venom in my face. He doesn’t feel like he is an alcoholic because his drink of choice is beer and he doesn’t do it “all the time.” He says the problem is mine and that I am just against him having fun and being a “real man.”
He has never really hit me while drunk but he will push me or throw things at me because I refuse to participate in his drunken tirades and he gets angry when I try to get away from him. He has raised his fist and threatened to punch me in the face many times though.
The next day, he always acts like nothing has happened and if I mention it he becomes irrate and says he doesn’t want to hear it and that I am attacking him and treating him disrespectfully (ironic isn’t it?)
I admit that I cannot stand him when he is drunk. However, he is a good father to our daughter when he is sober and she loves him very much. She cries when I have talked about divorce before and begs me not to make daddy move out. We’ve tried counseling years ago but now he totally refuses to participate in any type of therapy.
At this point, I want out of the marriage. However, I am in a very specialized medical profession (not a doctor) and my job requires me to be available 24/7 (I am on call and have to be at work within 30 minutes of being paged). Unfortunately, I have no family nearby and daycares aren’t open in the middle of the night. I don’t know the neighbors well enough to ask them for help and have no close friends because the fear of him getting drunk and acting like a jerk in front of them has kept me from reaching out to anyone else.
But, one thing you said before really struck a nerve with me. You said, “if you imagine coming to the end of your life and looking back, you will probably want to be able to say, “that was the best choice I could make under those circumstances, with the information I had”. Rather than, “I stayed because I couldn’t decide what else to do.”
I know what I want now but I don’t know how to do it. Any suggestions on how to get child care in the middle of the night without hiring a nanny (too expensive) and without knowing when I might need the help? There is no way I can afford to pay someone to spend every night at my house just in case I get called in.

By: Raymond Boyd

Raymond Boyd — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 03:22:07 +0000

I have found a website with men with the same issue that I have in my life. My wife is presently in rehab for Alcoholism and has been there for 20 days and has 8 left. Sunday is the day for visitation and we were there to support her. The bad part is even though she decided to go and get the help she still wants to drink and live the party life style at the age of 47, this has torn out my heart and scared my children. I am glad for the breif time she has been there I can start to see my wife again and mother to our 3 children. Just 5 weeks ago she woke me up and told me that I would miss her, well that night I knew she had a real problem she admitted she tried to kill herself, so I ask where do you go from there.