How do you deal with unacceptable behavior?

My husband is a binge drinker and in the military. After over a year of begging for him to self identify to get help and watching him vomit and urinate on himself and worse, I finally went to his command out of fear for his life. He was sent to a mandated alcohol awareness course and then “cleared” as not having a problem with alcohol. I was hopeful that this course did truly help him, but a year later I know for sure what I felt I knew then, my husband is an alcoholic and there is nothing I can do. To complicate things, we are stationed overseas, I don’t have a support network here, and I feel like I have lost a whole section of my memory…..l have deja vu frequently…like several times a day frequently. I desperately want to separate from him since he refuses counseling of any type to include individual counseling and/or marriage counseling. My husband says he wants to separate too since my not going forward with him to his next assignment means no one will know what I reported here. Although he says he wants to separate, he has not yet taken the steps we discussed to set up a separation agreement. Also, when he gets angry with me for discussing his drinking or my asking him to use available resources to assist us in our separation, he threatens to leave me penniless and/or fight me every step of the way with a lawyer so I am left penniless. I don’t have a place to go to in the states and it has been overwhelming trying to stay up late to call apartments stateside and set up some type of plan. Additionally, I have fears I won’t be approved for an apartment because I do not have a job or car stateside and I have 3 cats. I sold my house to come overseas to be with him. I am heartbroken that the military so easily cleared him as “clean” especially considering the fact that he openly binge drinks around co-workers. We have been married for 4 years and although we dated over a year before getting married, it was long distance with an ocean separating us. We continued to have an ocean separating us our first 1 year and 2 months of marriage . I am trying to control my anger at the fact that the “military” didn’t intervene with his heavy drinking over the past 20 years until I came into the picture and forced the subject out of fear for his own safety. I am also angry at myself for listening to his initial excuses when I first addressed my concerns about his drinking – he said it was because he missed me….things would be different when we were living together. Long story short, has anyone else dealt with anything similar to this? If so, what did you do in order to find shelter and get your mental health back in check? #GoingInCircles

Hi
I am a 49 yr old woman married for the 3rd time. My husband is younger by 4 years. I have only been married for 4 years and feels like a lifetime. Should have left the first month of my marriage, but stuck around (the optimist in me). Verbal abuse and physical abuse was a monthly occurrence, in the privacy of my room but not out of earshot of his parents and kids. I consider myself a tough chick, that heals and forgives quickly, however I don’t forget every word you sent to me and every action etc.
I have made plans to leave many times and then “things” become quiet and smooth, then boom another incident.
I am now so tired and mentally drained and frustrated more because of my behaviour and my allowance, that I am angry all the time.
The only place that I am my funny, cool, energetic, loving and caring self is at work and elsewhere. I don’t want that. I want to be with a man that does not make me an option but a priority. Is this not what its all about…..
Call me Wishful even Silly, but I need that……….My husband has his good points, but the bad ones override, overshadow and block the good ones.
“IS IT TIME TO HIT THE ROAD JACK” or is Jack just a beanstalk climber.

i am 26 years old, i have 2 beautiful children, and i am married to an alcoholic. i have been with my husband for 5 years now and i have been on a roller coaster from hell ( literally ) for all of those years. i have had a gun shoved down my throat, i have had him belittle me and tell me how horrible i am, he tells me he hates me and he wants a divorce, i am nothing, ….. and the list can go on and on and on. I hear all this when he is drunk and its been more then i should have tolerated but i did and i stuck around and i am still here, but i don’t know what to do or how to do it. i feel so lost and hurt and betrayed. he is a loving father and husband when he is not drunk but i cant take it anymore, i cant take the drinking. he seems to not be able to stop!!! he tries to hide it from me which only makes me mad cause i am not stupid nor was i born yesterday i know when he has been drinking and when he is drunk. He lies to me every time he goes on a rampage and tells me he wont ever drink again and he will get into church and so this and that, but it only lasts for maybe a month. I do love him but i don’t love that he chooses to drink over his family. The worst part is we live with his mom, step dad, and his sister and they do not help at all. if anything they enable him cause they drink and im pretty sure they hide his alcohol for him so that i dont see it. im so tired of the lies and back stabbing i just want him to get help and be the man i know he really is but i cant help him if he isnt willing to help himself and thats hurtful even more. i dont want to sit by and watch him drink himself to death and i definitly dont want my kids to grow up around it neither. right now i am staying at my moms house as of last night, i havent talked to my husband all day today but i really want to call him and figure what is going on and if he really wants a divorce and if he meant all the things he said to me last night (which was very hurtful and i am broken into many pieces from the things he said to me). I am not a perfect person but i really am striving to do my best that i can. He is mad that i didnt come home last night cause he was drunk and so now he is done and wants nothing to do with me. Idk what to do other then pray but even still idk what to do.

I am amazed at how much we women tolerate from abusive men. I never thought I would put up with a millionth of the abuse and lack of respect (and filth as he rarely washes himself or clothes unless I remind him to and even then…). But I have done for 14 months – he has a charming side and I was lonely so it began and I do care very much about his nicer side. However, real love has died off due to his horrific behaviour when drunk e.g. walking around having urinated in his trousers, urinating in neighbours gardens, spending every penny on alcohol and a lot worse. I do have a lot of sympathy because he suffers from anxiety which (he says) is why he drinks but men use this weakness that many women have for a ‘helpless’ man and it can wreck the lives of those who are kindhearted enough to help. I am very very tired due to living on edge not knowing if he will get drunk or even be sober and nasty (I feel alcohol might change the drinker’s personality for the worse, permanently perhaps….some sort of brain damage almost from soaking that organ in alcohol for so many years…) Anyway, I meant to get rid of him so many times but did not and realise that I have to look after myself because he cannot help what he does it seems – i wish he could.

I have been married for 33 years. 4 wonderful beautiful children. My husband has a drinking problem. I saw it before we got married but chose to go ahead with the wedding anyway. His drinking has consisted of just one too many sometimes…but always I was able to shield the kids from any real knowledge of it when they were little…he was a functioning alcoholic…few beers every night…on occasion he would bring home harder alcohol…we both drank wine….but he never was able to push the “stop” button…never had a wine bottle that wasn’t finished…by him…had a few drunk episodes over the years that I confronted him about…always denied…called me a “prude” or “teetotaler”…sigh. He has been a great dad. We have attended church and Bible studies all of our lives…home schooled the kids…he has provided well and his kids love him. But the not being able to press the “stop” button has always been a problem…if there’s alcohol around, I find myself walking on eggshells…trying to make sure there are no scenes…no stumbling or slurry words…I guess I have been an enabler trying to hide it from friends and family…although some have seen and know including our kids who are in their 20s now…last 5 years have been hard…he has been through several layoffs….and so his “go to” to salve the stress is the alcohol…trouble is at 57 he cannot seem to handle even a few beers without slurring or acting stupid or repeating himself…I am so tired of walking on eggshells…it is not everyday and he has admitted to having a problem and says he’ll stop or to trust him…yes, sound familiar? I have even threatened to leave before when I could not take it…now he is unemployed having recently resigned an exec job (instead of getting fired) and I believe it may have had something to do with drinking at a social work gathering…too long to get into why I suspect that…he is smart…involved in IT Management…loves the Lord, but just not willing I think to really break free from the alcohol “go to” that has been his life since college (we’ve known each other since college). It is hard. And he likes it…he also is a closet smoker which has never gone over well…definitely has struggled with an addictive personality… But I think I need to branch out and include some more family members with our issue…his mother knows and has confronted him…his response? “I can stop anytime I want to.” I feel for all the women here…I understand. I don’t have any answers…just sharing.

I am a first generation child (age 49) of alcoholics and at age 12 my alcoholic stepfather assaulted me, in addition.I am no ingenue to abuse survival and I’m someone who has also, overcome great opposition, abuse and turmoil. My so-called significant other is, unfortunately, a progressive alcoholic and passive-aggressive abuser. I do plan on getting out, and reclaiming my own life early this forthcoming year. I’m surprised I’ve hung in this long. And although I’m no angel, I’ve told myself so many rueful, sickening times he is going to come home one day to an empty house. He has not only sabotaged himself but almost sabotaged mine- he is not who I ever want to be. I have never been so shut out, ignored, shifted blame to or objectified. There were times he used my weaknesses to get me back. He is an alcoholic but I wonder where he learned his blame and shame, sticking me in a corner and never apologizing. We’ve been living together since 2014 and no, he has not wanted to get married, also having a bleak and negative view of such idea. My mom says he has some problems and is an abuser. We have almost zero real, human communication and he is emotionally disconnected. I would think at age 64 he would be a bit more self loving and aware, but I think that’s who I hold my own self up to be. I have been really affected by many alcoholics, many who got help and changed. I can’t logically nor intuitively define he is the right partner for me (or I for him) and this is not a relationship…sorry, but I know it’s true. I’m still staying on due to emotional attachment, guilt, lack of faith in myself and fear of more retaliation; post fact guilt, and his “It’s not not the same without you; come back; I miss you” or attacks on my character/other emotional blackmail. Like I said, I’m not blameless but he’s really hurt me and I deserve a healthy, free, satisfied future…

I am leaving a comment only to say thank you for sharing your stories. I thought I was going crazy. My husband and I have been married seven years. He is a completely different person, and learning from what I am reading here, a functioning alcoholic. He drinks every day, gets drunk and becomes extremely mean. Every other day, I am getting told to “get the *&^ out” or being called inappropriate and horrible names. He too always wants sex and can’t even remember the next day the horrible things that he says. I left and he promised that he would change, he has not, in fact it has gotten worse. I feel like some of the others, I just turned 50 and don’t want to leave with nothing, but it looks like….I will have to in order to save myself.

My late father was a functioning alcoholic and chainsmoker since he was fourteen years old; he died at 72 from a very painful death, lung cancer. (My brother is a nondrinking, narcissistic rageaholic who hates me, but that’s for another blog).

Dad was an executive for a major automotive corporation, and a good provider in that we were never homeless or hungry. But he was a beer alcoholic, drank at least a six pack every night until bedtime, drank all day on the weekends and when the beer was gone would drink any alcohol he could get his hands on. He never gave up drinking until he became too sick to drive himself to the store, and afterwards nobody would buy him any more booze. But he and my brother still smoked cigarettes (Dad smoked while on oxygen, no matter that this could’ve caused a major explosion which could’ve killed everyone in the house).

Dad would get drunk, and basically need a watcher or ‘babysitter’ to keep an eye on things when he was too loaded to do so; since Mom worked, too, these duties would fall on my shoulders. I was just a young teenager, I barely knew how to take care of myself, much less an alcoholic parent with issues.

I also remember many family outings where Dad would end up falling down drunk, he just wouldn’t, or couldn’t, and didn’t, stop drinking. It’s embarrassing when your parent is so drunk that the security guards have to pick him or her off the casino floor and escort them to the exit because they can’t stand up and walk by themselves.

Yes, Dad and Mom took us on nice vacations twice a year, and tried to do the best they could in what they knew how to raise us kids, they attended our school functions and ballgames and all that, thankfully, but, until he was dying and no longer able to procure alcohol for himself, Dad never gave up the bottle. He was a lifelong alcoholic.

Glad that I’ve never liked the taste and effects of alcohol (makes me puke, I think I’m allergic, probably a good thing) and after college and working as a cocktail waitress(! it was familiar) for a few years, and one failed marriage to an alcoholic who died of cancer when he was only 51 years old, I now understand the living hell of alcohol but at the time I thought it was normal.

From my experience, the two alcoholics in my life never stopped drinking. Your experience may differ, I really hope so! But if not, please understand that sometimes the only thing you can do to save your own life, is to escape and leave them to their own devices, or their own undoing. All the love in the world, sometimes just isn’t enough. Sometimes you have to love enough to let go.

We’ve been married 3 years, but together for 10 years. My husband always had a bit of a problem with alcohol, but we were in our twenties, he was always happy, and I hoped that the partying would subside as we got older. It has not. He lies constantly about his drinking and how he gets money to drink. He drinks as soon as he gets out of bed in the mornings and refuses to eat for most of the day because he doesn’t want to diminish his drunkenness. He pawns things for money for alcohol and lies to me about it. He drives while drinking. He can’t hold down a job. He refuses to admit that anything is wrong with being drunk all the time. He now says its just ‘who he is’ and that I need to accept it. He is an emotional roller coaster. He can never remember a conversation the next day. I can’t have meaningful conversation with him. I am so lonely. We have a 6 month old daughter now and I have to do everything myself but pretend to others that we are some happy family. I can’t depend on him to ever watch our daughter since he can’t be sober. I am so lonely. I miss who he use to be, but that person is gone now. I am using all of my energy to take care of him and our house and our daughter and the bills… I’m just so exhausted. I want to get back a piece of myself. I want to be happy. I want to have a conversation with my partner. I can’t do this anymore but I don’t know how to leave him.

I am married for two years and got a beautiful son, 21 months running, without knowing him completely, fell in love with this gentle behavior, kind, loving person. I got pregnant soon as I met him so being an Indian, society discriminatori, creed soon tied a knot with the man I loved so much thinking I had finally my charming Prince but when I reached his home with pregnancy, in the hospital, he started his true colour. He hit me with his cellphone soon after delivery, he couldn’t control his anger. Not only so aggressive in nature but he during weekend drank heavily so if I asked him, ” why so much drunk?” He used to break everything that he bought whether cheaper or costly phones, break lampshade, doors, hit himself hard against the wall and get bruised..sometimes take a knife and put himself on his throat..I was scared and nervous..didn’t feel shy to go out nude and show his private parts, extremely vulgarity exposed. He used to throw whatever I cook lovingly, if I only ask him to switch off the light in the room. He will start removing my family members names and literally shout on me. I have got baby boy, I don’t want to get separated or divorced because I see the consequences of broken family. I don’t like to sleep with him now in the same bed. He shouts outside in public but during the week, he acts everything was okand shows me nothing was wrong, just he shows me that he drank only one or two glasses..I am tired, he doesn’t listen to me. He’s got few friends. I talked to him about counseling but he doesn’t agree, he has huge debt to pay. I am worried about the future of my son. Please help me!

I am married to my husband and we have a 5 year old boy. We went to high school together but only met again about 7 years ago. When we met he was ‘in between’ jobs and his truck was broken. Come to find out he had a DUI and was couldn’t drive. I forgave that lie and thought he lied because the truth was probably embarrassing. However 7 years, a marriage and 1 child later I catch him doing things like drinking and hiding the beer cans around the house so I don’t find it. I now have money ‘birthday present from my parents’ missing from my wallet. He goes through hundreds of dollars a month. He tells me I am making things up until I finally catch him. It makes me so mad that he thinks I am that stupid. Until this year I was the only one who worked in the family and my husband watched our child. Now that our son is older he has gone back to work. The idea of leaving him and breaking my sons heart is killing me but I am just at my whit’s end. My son right now is going through an aggressive stage at school. I don’t know if he feels my pain or if he is feeling stress of changing schools. I don’t want to upset my son but I really do not want my son to grow up seeing my husbands behavior. I try to keep it together. some of the people on here are a lot stronger than I am spending this many years with a person with issues.

Me and my partner have been together two years and we have a 10 month old boy. My partner doesn’t drink every day but when he does drink he will binge and come home in a state where he can’t even speak or know what he is doing. A lot of the times he will not come home at all. I feel like I don’t know what to do because it happens A lot but not all the time if that makes sense- once every couple of weeks. I just don’t want my child to grow up and see any of this and understand what is happening.

My husband and I have. Even together 8 years, got married last year. He has always been a social drinker- once he gets going he cannot stop. He is 41 now, I thought as he got older it would stop somewhat, but he has come home at 2am once again tonight. He goes out drinking and doesn’t answer his phone or texts. He drives drunk tonhet home and I end up so mad I tell him to leave. He will sleep in his truck unless I make him come home because I feel guilty and I don’t want him to get in trouble with the law. He is my best friend and I love him so much. He is a great husband and we run a successful business together. He is faithful and caring, but he just HAS to go out drinking so often, and he will drink from 6pm to 2 am. He comes home at 3am and later sometimes. We fight- he tries to turn it around on me, and then passes out drunk while I am left to cry and feel sorry for myself. I feel so alone, his family is watching his father slowly kill himself with alcoholism. He doesn’t believe he has a problem. He can’t see that the only time we fight is when he is drunk. He used to call me names but I have learned how to walk away before things escalate to that. He is ruining us and I am so heartbroken. To read all these stories makes my heart ache for everyone. I often ask myself what I have done to deserve this. It’s making me hate MYSELF. The stress of wondering where he is at night, if he’s safe, when will he come home, has he been in a car accident, etc eats away at me. I am a good wife. I am a good person. Why this man continues to do this to me is tearing at my soul.

I am recently divorced. I left my husband because he is an alcoholic who was ruining me and my daughters lives. I know he has driven drunk with our daughter before. He recently started trying to make arrangements for someone to watch our daughter during his time so he could pursue other activities. I found out about this and called him out on his unacceptable behavior and how it violated our parenting agreement. I think this is the lowest thing a person can do- dump your own child to pursue your own selfish agenda. He’s angry that his drinking is coming to light. He’s angry that his family and friends know about his drinking. He has lashed out at friends and it makes me feel horrible that he has put them in the middle. He has showed this rage to me multiple times. I have tried reasoning with him telling him I love him and he needs to get help for our daughter. This only makes him angrier and he accuses me of harrassment. I don’t know how to deal with an alcoholic because I have no experience with it. I am very concerned for the safety of my daughter and cannot trust him. I feel that this co parenting relationship is going to be an uphill battle for many years to come.

It breaks my heart to hear these stories and I know that I am not alone. I married last year and recently realized that I married a functional alcoholic. I love my husband very much however I am gradually losing myself trying to stay in this marriage. He is a daily drinker (4 to 6 beers) and most weekends ( Saturday & Sunday) he drinks 18-25 beers. He drinks an average of 36 to 48 beers a week. He works every day and I don’t know of it effecting his job. I have done everything I know to do from threatening to leave to exposing him to others. Nothing works. He is almost 60 years old and wants to be intimate like a 25 year old. He works and stays busy around the house in which he uses projects, football, cookouts, etc to support his reason for drinking. He is loving and attentive when he has not been drinking or has had under 3 beers or when others are present but he turns sarcastic and hateful the more he drinks and when we are alone. I have always been an outgoing bubbly kind of person however I have become so depressed and now somewhat of an introvert. I don’t feel or look happy and people are starting to notice. I feel so ashamed that I am living like this and I pray daily that God changes him. I recently lost my job and have filed for disability due to a medical condition he now tells me that if I don’t give him the intimacy he requires there will be a price a to be paid, meaning he will no longer financially support me. He hurts me so much with his words and makes me feel so little. Losing ones self should not be an option to stay with an alcoholic however I have no choice at the moment. God bless you all and you are in my prayers.

My heart hurts. I have a wonderful husband who works very hard for his family. He is attentive, thoughtful, loving, helpful, kind….etc. He doesn’t normally drink during the week but once Friday comes the drinking starts. I used to look forward to the weekends because he got to be home with his family. Now, I dread them because although the day starts off good he ends up drunk and passed out by the evening. I tend to sleep on the couch because I hate the smell of beer and being in the same bed with him just makes me angry. We have 3 beautiful children together that absolutely adore their Dad. They don’t always see the worst part of him. He is horrible at night once they have gone to bed. But, if we go camping, out to the river for the day…etc he always gets drunk. I hate it because he acts like a jerk and it is unsafe for all of us. He stumbles all around and if there was a serious situation he wouldn’t be able to help. That puts us in danger. He feels because he works hard all week that he deserves to be this way on the weekend. But I work too! I may be a stay at home Mom but I take care of our kids, cook, clean, do laundry, grocery shopping, make sure bills are paid, all of that…everyday. My job doesn’t end at a certain time. I am on duty 24/7 and I deserve to have a sober husband on the weekend when our time is the most precious. I had always used the excuse ” well at least he only drinks on the weekends ” but those weekends are all we have to spend quality time together. I’m tired, worn down, hurt. I even told him to just drink less, not quit altogether but as an alcoholic he can’t do that. I feel lost. I don’t want to give up on him but no amount of tears, threatening to leave, trying to get him and us to get help has worked so far ( 12 years ) I just can’t do it anymore.

I’m 30 and me and my boyfriend have been dating for 2 years. After yet another attempt to stop drinking I came home last night to bottles and cans all over the floor and a drunk passed out slug at 7pm in the evening. I’ve been down this road before, it’s lonely and exhausting. I’ve made the decision to leave, thank you for sharing your stories, it has helped me see the life path I would go down if I decided to stay in this and get married and have kids with this man. I just can’t do that….no woman, man or child should have to go through this. God Bless to you all you struggling and living with this.

Hi all

It’s so sad but also comforting to see my life reflected in so many others. I have been living with an alcoholic my whole life, parents, now my spouse. What I find interesting about this topic is that the unacceptable slowly becomes acceptable as the alcoholism progresses. It is hard to define what is normal , because alcoholism attributes are normalized. I am no longer able to even cope with all the unacceptable behavior because as far as alcoholism is concerned, none of it is acceptable. I feel like I have wasted so much precious time. I am worried about my kids, stay or go, complicated either way. I however even though I have my tool box full of tools am getting tired of dealing with the unacceptable because even when I set boundaries, they aren’t respected. I have come to believe that alcoholism is an assault , on the sober members of the family, on our boundaries, emotionally, verbally, physically, financially, and mentally. Therefore the ultimate boundary is to stay no more. Through this trial my saving grace has been 2 strategies in dealing with the unacceptable, practice gratitude and focus on my own behaviour. Love to you all.

I have been with my fiance on and off for 19 years . He is a functioning alcoholic. He can keep a job down while he drinks but can’t keep his actions down while drinking . We have 4 kids together ages 17,13, and 6 year old twins. He started out only drinking a few beers a night he worked 2nd shift so he got off at 11 pm and only had time to drink 2 beers before he has to go to bed but now he is training on 1st shift. He drinks from the time he gets off work till the time he go to bed and passes out . He always says mean hurtful things to me and accasionally is abusive . He is always picking on our kids saying they are yelling or being to roudy when to me they are being typical 6 year olds . When I tell him to leave because of his actions he either gets violent or spits in my face literally literally spitting in my damn face. The slightest thing with make him mad if anything happens it’s just a reason to drink more . We call the way he acts while he drinks ( acting a donkey) that’s his violent episodes name . Or if i won’t let him in the house he will cuss and scream at the top of his lungs and I’m scared to death that he is going to hit me to I don’t let him in and im scared I’m going to get evicted for him causing a neighborhood disturbance so I have to call the cops. Our oldest can’t stand her own father she is 17 because he is always making unnecessary mean comment to her while he is slurring and dosent make since he calls me a bad mother in front of our children and least week he hit me three time in front of them in my mouth I have a really big bruise on my arm from it and my jaw hurts to eat . He went to jail for public intoxication and when he got out he blamed me for him going to jail and locking his keys in his car . He is a really good man when he is sober and I love him so much when he is sober but when is he ever sober now in days that’s very few he has went without a beer like 4 days in 6 months . He won’t admit he is a alcoholic and indint known what else to do I gave him a altumatume that he can come around us when he is sober or don’t come around at all . I want the man I fell in love with back because I don’t know this guy . My daughter who is 6 said i love daddy in the morning but not daddy at night your know why she says that because he is drunk mean weird and makes everyone uncomfortable at night. I can’t handle the beer any More I can’t stand the thought of him with a beer in his hand. I’m tired of our kids feeling scared and intimidated and me too . Sorry to unload so much on you but I have No one to talk to . Please pray for my family god bless and I’m sorry for anyone else out there going through the same situation . Your in my prayers

My husband is an alcoholic, I am being mentally abused by him, He lost a good paying job for stealing, He refuses to get help, I have Lupus, And I am not supposed to be stressed, My health is going down really fast, The reason why I have not left is because I have no where to go, We have been married for 33 years, At first for many years I did not know that he drank, He was hiding bottles around the house, I know that I am rambling, But that is what I do a lot, Because I am so hurt that the bottle is more important than me, I hope I can make it, But it looks very bleek

Husband used to just have a couple of drinks almost every night after work.
Now it’s daily, and not just a few beers, now its like a 6 pack and then he moves on to ounces of whiskey (usually at least half a bottle of Bushmills a night, $$$$ habit).

I’m getting sick and tired of a husband who’s insensible by the time I get home from work a half hour after him, who passes out on the couch by 7 pm most weeknights, earlier on weekends, who uses ANY excuse to drink (football season is especially bad).

He’s not violent, and doesn’t blame me for his drinking.

I have long suspected that he hides bottles around the house (like his little trips to the garage for nothing….but he gets more and more drunk as the night goes on)…found empty vodka bottles in our son’s bathroom. Also that he’s been taking off work or drinking during the day when he goes home for lunch, how else can he already be drunk if I get home so soon after him?

He was on a bender one day really bad like almost black-out drunk by noon. His parents called and he was insensible on the phone, very slurred speech, and then he passed out while talking to them. They kept trying to call him back but he didn’t answer, couldn’t he was passed out sawing logs.

Found out it was worse when I came across a notebook I thought was our son’s in the living room the other week (same composition books I had bought at start of year for school). Looks like he decided to start journaling his thoughts and feelings about drinking. He drinks in the morning when he wakes up before he goes to work, keeps it in the car, has been drunk or drinking at work/lunch at home, bottles hidden all over the house, skipping out on work/too many sick days.

He blames family genetics for his myriad health issues, fatty liver, gout, nausea, high BP/cholesterol, diarrhea, I know all those can be attributed to alcohol consumption, but his Dr doesn’t know the extent of his drinking.

Worst part is our son. I don’t want him to think it’s normal for someone to be passing out on the couch still sitting up, or to be smelly, red eyed, slurred speech. I’m afraid when I travel for work that my husband is going to either be so hungover in the morning or already drunk in the afternoon that there might be a car accident when he drops off/picks up our son. Or that he’s passed out so early that he has no clue where our son is.

So far he’s still functional, hasn’t screwed up anything at work too badly, or gotten called to the carpet yet for his absences, but it’s only a matter of time. Today was the ultimatum, get professional help or your out of the house until you get treatment.

My husband and I are 27, we have been together 4 years, have a 2 1/2 year old son, he was not drinking for a while and now pressure at work has sent him off the edge again, he used today (fathers day) as an excuse to drink and smoke and pass out. I am so tired of this, I am a nurse so it is my nature to not give up on people and help them, however I am tired of being lied to and blamed for all negative actions my husband does. This is a sad time for me, I feel I am a 24/7 care taker who never gets a day off. My husband is going to end up alone like his real dad, drinking his problems away, he never sees problems in his actions and says I am being hyper-sensitive, this is a sad time for my family.

Hi
My husband prefers to stay out at night always. He thinks going out at night and drinking with friends is enjoyment.We are married for 4 years now.What do i do to get him and myself out of this situation ?

Can’t leave. Four kids–even though he’s “functional”, they can’t deal
With his fight picking and bs. There’s no hope. He thinks I’m going to keep working when he retires early so he can drink, travel without me, etc

I cannot thank you all enough for your painful stories. I am in everyone of them.
I am severing my Relationship at this moment. I know I am doing the right thing that is: I AM SAVING MY OWN LIFE.
Every single story is my story too.
Thank you for giving me the courage to do this. God bless all of you. Stay strong and know you are not alone.

Wow these stories really are pretty sad I hope most woman can get the help they need. Compared to reading these stories I feel like I may still be in the “early” stages so to speak. My fiance has a wonderful job is the breakmaker of our family, which besides his health scares me the most about his drinking. He’s supporting me and our child and if he lost his job due to drinking we could be in much deeper problems my job would not be able to cover our family bills. I use to drink with my fiance when we went out or made fun drinks at home. I did notics when we drank together he didnt really ever have a “limit”. But I never really thought anything of it. Slowly he started drinking after work a glass of vodka and cranberry almost every night. Then that glass turned into half a bottle, to now he drinks a whole bottle of vodka easily without any chasers atleast3-4 times a week. He doesn’t think he has a problem. He thinks since he still has a job and not walking around as a day drinker then he cant be considered am alcoholic. Although drinking a big party size vodka bottle to himself is not concerning to him. He can be freshly ahowered but the smell of vodka smells through his clothes. His urine when i spotted from a forgetting to flush is the darkest i have ever seen someone’s urine. Im very worried for his help and me pushing him getting help isnt doing anything but pushing him to drink even more. I know he feels guilt because he tries to hide his drinking and bottles. I just dont know what else to do. Only thing i have not done was reach out to his family. Im afraid they will not take me seriously since he is not a heavy day drinker walking and driving drunk but more of a night binge drinker when he is alone. Leaving him may be my only option. After reading these stories ot sounds thats the road im headed and I’m just not willing to live such a uhappy life that you can bot redo.

I wish there were more hopeful stores here. My husband of 6 months and I had a kismet story. We dated years ago, fell out of touch and then fate brought us back together and things moved quickly. 3 years later we’re married. He would warn me early on, joke about the fact that he was an alcoholic. I grew up a child of abuse but never knew a drinker so I didnt know what to expect, what to look for, or JUST how hard it would really be. I was so cocky to take it on. I also didn’t know he was drinking a giant party size bottle of vodka every two days. He would stop drinking hard liquor for a month, maybe even 3 months at a time– always drinking wine and beer. But he’d have slips. And lie. And hide little bottles. Now the little bottles are less frequent but the beer and wine are at a peak. He started a fight wth me tonight telling me that I don’t really love him or care about him and I’m no help, that I’m the opposite of help (along with a lot worse things). It’s enough to make a sane person crazy. I didn’t do anything to upset him — I tried to listen to him and support him and he just lost it. I don’t know how to help him, I’m sure I can’t. He went to AA a few times but it didn’t stick. After our fight tonight he swears things will be different tomorrow and he’s going back to AA. I want to believe him, he’s just broken my heart so many times. I want him to turn his life around like Robert Downey Jr or something. Ha! But seriously, we are so in love most of the time and he would be the perfect man if he wasn’t an alcoholic. He knows he has a problem and he says he wants to change, knows he has to change. I just worry that the disease is stronger. We want to start a family within the year– but reading these stories I’m even more resolved to refuse to stop my pill as long as he’s drinking. Are we all nuts for thinking our men are different?

After through reading through all of these stories, I see that so many are similar to my own. I have been with my fiance for a year and a half now… It took me a while to realize that he had a problem. I used to drink with him when he wanted to drink, but stopped when I realized he was an alcoholic. He can barely hold down a job, so I’m having to pay all of the bills. I’ve seen him neglect doing things with his family or his kids (whom his parents have custody of), because he is drunk or too hungover to leave the house. He’s made promises to stop drinking, even went as far as to ask me to take him to AA meetings… but has never wanted to truly go when they take place. I thought maybe we were starting to do okay, but today found him out drinking from a bottle of Vodka he had hidden in my car. When he’s sober, he can be this great, loving, caring person….. when he drinks, he turns into this obnoxious a-hole, and why he’s not physically abusive, the way he acts and what he says takes an emotional toll. I’ve thought about leaving, but found out that I have a baby on the way, and do not want my child to grow up without a father…and I was working on helping him get his two kids so he would be there for them as well. I know we all love him. But at this point, starting to wonder if it’s really worth the fight anymore.

So I suppose we come here when we make the realisation that things are never going to change and it will never be easier.
My husband is a functioning alcoholic.
He says he doesn’t drink throughout the day but I’m not sure about that anymore. He says he doesn’t drink/drive but again, I don’t believe that.
He goes out every night to “walk the dogs” and then comes home with beers. He passes out every night, he’s downstairs now asleep on the couch at almost 1am because I refuse to wake him anymore. He has work tomorrow. But he will still get up and go to work…
He has admitted in the past that he’s got a problem, and can stop for a week or 2 but I know deep down on these stopped weeks he’s drinking secretly.
I can’t trust him anymore. I keep thinking of following him when he goes out but deep down I know I will believe his lies, even if I catch him he will have the perfect excuse. He makes me doubt myself all the time and my sanity is affected by this! I don’t know if I’m coming or going. I’m going through a period of depression ATM and all I keep getting from him is “what’s up?” When he knows what’s up but doesn’t care enough to change and free me from this pain and suffering.
I’m ill because of him and his addiction. I’m becoming someone I never wanted to be again. Sad, lonely and wishing I could be anywhere else than here. I hate my life.
We don’t have sex, which he moans about all the time. Yet how can you have wax when you’re passed out?? Or how can you be attracted to someone who is drunk or passed out every night???

A couple of years ago I met someone online in a chat room, since then we have established an online relationship. My Problem? During the week when he is sober he is the most wonderful man however come the weekend and he begins to indulge I don’t know who he is, he abuses me verbally, mentally, emotionally. Why do I walk away? I love him but I don’t like him. I feel guilty if I was to walk away because we’ve been through so much, when is to much already? When is enough is enough? Why am I not able to walk away? Please if anyone can help I need peace again in my life………I’m so Broken Down

I have been married for 30 years. My husband is the one who drinks and has done so for a long time but not as bad as now. We have 2 kids who are grown, one of which has basically estranged the whole family. I have been telling him he needs to stop because it is affecting his health. He refuses to go to the doctor and will not work now. He has gotten weak. I feel he doesn’t care anymore about himself. I have been out of work for 6 years and within the last 4 years he has started to drink first thing in the morning. I have been through situations where he has stolen with me right there and I can’t have that as I am trying to get back to work. My being here with him is not working. There is no affection anymore, no conversations, etc. Luckily, the one time he got caught stealing in which I was with him, they did not prosecute. I thank god for that at least. I am in a crisis right now trying to get my life back together. I have grown up with alcoholic parents and I know what I am facing. I have talked to him about his excessive drinking but it only leads to arguments. I have called the police on him once already and he went to jail. He has tried to retaliate back at me. I have no family here and I’m not sure what I should do. Need someone to talk to and maybe get some help.

It’s amazing how each one of us could have written these stories ourselves. I’ve been with the love of my life for going on 7 years, married for almost 4. I knew she was a recovering addict when we got together, I thought, I can handle this and signed up. She’s always had an amazing work ethic, he’d a good job etc. Because of that, I thought, surly this can’t be that big of an issue. For years we drank together, sometimes a little, sometimes too much.
It wasn’t until she started using again, behind my back, that things got really bad. We were trying to conceive and there would be sleepless nights of anxiety waiting for her to come home, hoping she was alive. Hoping she didn’t hurt anyone else while driving. I was trying to be healthy and stress free, while struggling to get pregnant and every week, would come the night. I would wake up to an empty room.
Over time I became sick and unreasonable myself, trying to force a solution, force communication, force everything. Becoming frigid in my ways, and affection, in my understanding. I was unpleasant to be around and more like a parent than a wife.
In one of my (failed) attempts to force a solution, I talked her into moving across the country, we had talked about moving many times, but this time it stuck. We moved clear across the country. We took a break from trying to get pregnant. We gave up the dog we had just adopted (2 other attempted solutions of mine) and we left. 2 weeks after we arrived to our new “home”, she decided that we needed a “fresh start” and some time to breath and rediscover ourselves so we could be become better versions of ourselves. This would help our relationship, she insisted! I disagreed profusely, but my opinions on this were dismissed as she signed a lease for her own studio apt. She left. I was gutted. I am gutted.

I found myself in pieces, sitting in my first Alanon meeting a month after she left me. In one weekend I think I made it to about 5 meetings. I cried through every single one. I lost about 10 lbs (bring me down to a measly 107) I thought about quitting my job, moving back home, killing myself.
I’ve been in Alanon now for 5 months. I no longer cry through every meeting and I have good days. I’m able to enjoy my mornings making coffee for just me, because I want coffee. I’m able to enjoy music while getting ready, but can handle the silence as well, most days, without crying.
I’ve lived on my own for 7 months, and I’m now working my way through the steps. I have a sponsor that will listen to me with out judgment when I call her one day swearing I’m headed to the lawyers office then 24 hours later telling her, we’re going to get though this. Good days and bad, I can whole heartedly say, I am a better version of myself today than I was 7 months ago. I have more love to offer myself and more to offer the world.

I’ve been trying to salvage my marriage every day of these last 7 months. There have been days of hope and others of pure white, blinding rage. I’ve discovered there has been affairs with people I had at one time called my friend, there have been more lies and some truths as well. There have been relapses, drug use, hospital visits, fights and desperate pleads for forgiveness.
In all of this I’ve learned that my wife has a disease and I didn’t cause it, I can’t control it and I certainly can’t cure it. I can choose to stay and hold on if I accept what the reality of it is or I can choose to let go.

Today, through tears, I have chosen to let go, and let God. I have chosen myself as it’s the only thing I have any control over. I’m choosing to live and let my higher power help me down this road of life. I do all of this with love, not just with love for myself but love for my wife and her recovery as well. I hope she finds her path. I still have spiteful thoughts of resentment and revenge, but I try to just let them go as they come. I know I feel better about myself when I don’t have hate in my hart.

My life is such a fake. I look like I have it all together. The reality is my husband is an alcoholic, i’ve lost my house, I grew up with an alcoholic, and I’ve suffered abuse. I’ve been homeless for a short time, I’m heartbroken, and lost. But…you will see me in church each Sunday..finding ways to help others. You will see me shining at my career. My children are known as polite and talented. Its a front I’ve kept up since I was a child. I use to take my father’s shoes off for him when he’d pass out on the couch. I’d jump between he and my mother to protect her from him. I would sneak away when staying at friends so i could call my mom and ask her if everything is okay. Now I’m reliving the cycle with my husband. He’s wonderful in everyone’s eyes. Yet he is horrible to me most of the time. He spends our hard earned money on 12 pack after 12 pack, yet blames me for our financial stress. I’ve kept this secret from my family…even my kids don’t truly know the pain i’m gonig through…or maybe they do. They’ve sufferred terribly as well, seeing the worry in my eyes..hearing us argue. I’ll soon be an empty nester. I’m happy for my children to begin lives free of pain. So…now the strange part. Why do I stay? Why can’t I leave? Why do I keep hoping things will change. They won’t. My dreams are dwindling. I so badly want it to work out…and we live that happy life. Alcohol has changed him more than I could. For now, the fake front continues. Just happy I could finally say it to someone.

My story is so similar to the others I have read only difference being its my wife that is the alcoholic. She is the type that loves a drink and could probably drink most guys under the table. Only problem is that she is an emotional nasty drunk behind closed doors and unfortuantely I am the one who cops it. (its never been physical abuse) She simply cannot function. Starts doing weird things out of the ordinary around the house repeats conversations five minutes later that she doesn’t recall having already said. I am 46 and have been in the Police for 29 years, I don’t drink anymore as her behaviour has turned me right off it.
You would think I should have known better and realised i shouldn’t continue on particularly for my 8 yr old son that I have brought into this situation, 10 months ago and quite miraculously my wife gave birth (IVF) to the most beautiful baby girl. unfortunately the stress has confounded ten fold. When she is not drinking she is a great mum and loves our daughter to bits. However she is being sneaky and conniving and deceitful in getting access to alcohol within the house and having it at strange times, usually when I’m at work. I get home and I get the usual lies that seem common to everyone’s stories however she cannot function at all. It appears the alcohol mixed with a lack of sleep is an even bigger problem. She puts the baby to bed 5 minutes after getting up but forgetting she has already had the morning sleep, feeds her unusual food at strange times and even put her into an ice cold bath when it was supposed to be warm….On this particular day she gave her 5 straight bottles of formula and there is nothing I can do. If I’m holding her she takes her off me, I had her to sleep this afternoon for about two minutes however she came in and picked up a sleeping baby for no reason and gave her another bottle of formula. I am at my wits end. I love my wife or at least i love the person that she can be when she is sober. She is beautiful dresses fabulously and is a fun caring person. But when the alcohol kicks in everything is completely different. Its like the right side of her face doesn’t even work and her eyes look so big. Whilst she thinks she is hiding the drinking from me she so many obvious tells. Basically she turns into a completely different person. To say Im stressed would be an understatement. I have had to rush home early from work on a few occasions as I could tell that the alcoholic different person was with our baby. I am at my absolute wits end and do know what to do for my baby and myself.

I am supposed to get married in seven days to the love of my life. He admitted he had a drinking problem seven months ago and went to AA and supposedly quit drinking. I was the happiest I had ever been in my life. Six days ago, I found a receipt with a bottle of vodka on it. He was drinking it in his tea right there in front of me. He lied and said it was a mistake on the receipt and that he did not buy any vodka. Then he admitted it. Then he admitted two other times he had bought alcohol secretly but that was it. Suddenly all of the lies became clear. I asked repeatedly if there was anything else I should know. He said, no that was it. Well I asked again and again and he finally admitted that he has been drinking regularly for months and had several months ago as well. He blamed me for being unapproachable to discuss his thoughts about being able to drink again. He now admits he is an addict and has gone to AA twice this week and we saw our counselor together. He says that he wants me to marry a week from today like we planned or that we are going to break up. I told him I want to postpone the wedding as this is a lot of stress and new information just days before our marriage. He refuses to postpone the wedding. I love him so much this is insane. PLEASE HELP! I can’t marry him and don’t want to lose him.

I have been married to my husband for 21 years. His drinking at night has gotten worse. He drinks beer nightly. We have a 12 year old son who is in bed most of the time when my husband gets home. Our son has seen him stumble to the couch once. I have noticed him shaking during the day more than usual. I’m thinking it is because he hasn’t started drinking for the day yet. He isn’t abusive and has never said a negative word towards me. His mother is hard on him. He is a functioning alcoholic. We love each other very much. I don’t want to nor do I have sex with him if he is drunk. He just goes to sleep. He’s had a DUI years ago and I’m afraid he will get another one. We are starting marriage counseling May 1 because I get mad and build up walls and he avoids discussions and drinks too much. I am hopeful he wants to decrease the drinking and talk when we have things to solve together. Thank you for allowing me to vent. Life is so complicated and I’m not one for controlling another person. I know he needs to want to do this for himself and for us. I know I can’t do it for him. I want to know the best way to help and be loving.

I have read many of these stories and myself have a story of love and loneliness and a rollercoaster of emotions.
My husband is a functioning alcoholic or rather “a problem drinker”. I don’t know what the correct label is but I do know that a 41 year old man should not be passing out on his couch. I don’t find it to be attractive that he chooses to drink alone at home, daily (when he is home from work). I have a list of incidents that are embarrassing and ugly but mostly in between I just feel lonely and empty. It doesn’t matter how much I love him— love just isn’t enough. My teen daughter moves away from our home to her Dad’s home and I have a wonderful son at home.
I feel the stories I read are much like mine and I would like to say that there is hope. The hope you have should be IN YOURSELF… you (and I) can do this, and the only way is to devise your own personal plan to become financially and emotionally independent. There is no cost too high. Accepting some temporary help from friends and family is nothing to be ashamed of.
For me, I am in no danger other than letting more years slip by while I feel like an empty paper bag floating around in a wind storm. I wanted a deeper emotional connection to my friend and husband… but I cannot control him or force him to see things the way I do. He will always be who he is, until he isn’t. I don’t want to waste my time waiting like an idiot for that to happen. I have begun taking college classes and will be on my way to becoming a nurse. That is a plan that works for me. I will have HOPE and faith in myself. I will love myself and seek happiness in something other than a relationship for now.
I am sad to see that so many people suffer in such horrible ways!
I know it’s cliche, but you only live once and there is no time to be miserable or spend your time dragging someone out of their misery when they can’t even see clearly what they may be doing.
Bless you all. I hope you find courage and peace.

Married 26 years last year, we decided to separate trialling a year the date 2/6/17
is when we agreed to say Yes or No to continuing.He is an alcoholic he is very materialistic, he thinks and believes he doesnt need help. During our marriage I became bored with all of his promising to slow down so I started gambling. My way of escape I thought but I too got addicted to that. Started lieing, not paying our bills I thought if he can put money down the toilet WHY cant I.I soon became a regular on the pokie scene what a huge mistake I made.Always making excuses to be out of the house especially if he drank for 3 to 4 days of a week on our fortmightly centrelink payment,his second favourite pass time besides drink was sleeping recouperating thats when Id gamble more. At least I didnt have to listen to his very boring repeated conversatiom about the same topics , the pokie machines never talked back I was hooked. So two to tango as they say. He started hating me as much as I hated myself,eventually leading to his cutting words of how useless I was. Separation inevitable. The year is nearly over in this time weve had sex.probably 3 times. Im happier now then I ever was Im sleeping with another man not the conditions.arranged husband asked me to wait a year then discuss our mariage then JOKE, I am frightened he will physically hurt me, he may commit suicide had had thoughts like this through the marriage, or just shoot me. Today I want to ask for a divorce but terrified for my own life. I am a prisoner to Alcoholism and I am the one who seriously needs counselling,help,advice. I feel so much hate toward him I feel like he WON the Jackpot. Im so mentally drained from Addiction.

My husband and I haven together for 18 years.we got married when I was 18 and he was 20. We had the greatest relationship. He was funny and attractive and the kind of guy everybody loved to be friends with. That all changed… The year that changed was our eleventh year of being married. He decided to have a girlfriend. I found out about her through people at my church. I also found that throughout their relationship he started drinking. I didn’t know or didn’t pay close enough attention to know he was drinking. I think the guilt drove him here but, that’s not why he drinks anymore. He has called me a cunt for the last seven years, says he hates me, he has punched me in the head to many times to count. I stay because when he’s sober he is my best and only friend. I stay because I love him, I stay because I have no where else to go. He tells me ” you don’t have the balls to leave”. He’s right I don’t but I am getting to the point where I need more than this. I want to be treated good everyday, I want to trust again, I want to feel loved. I want him to be not married to a bottle but to his best friend. I truly miss him!

My 26 year old daughter is a drunk. She has a 4 year old son. I am so tired of her behavior. She refuses to admit that she has a problem.

I am scared of my husband…he refuses to get help! He becomes violent when drunk. I have spoken to his mother about it but when he finds out he threaten to divorce me. I am all alone here, i am stucked, have no where to go or talk …. ????

Im stuck in a hard place my husband when he drinks hard alcohol we have conversations that when he sobers up he doesnt remeber at all. He says im lying to him. We argue over everything i remeber. He holds my step son over my head saying hes going to leave with him. I could leave but it would break my sons up. Ive tried just telling him he has a problem but he doesnt listen. Im tired of not being trusted anymore.

All this makes me so sad. I’ve been with my alcoholic husband for 26 years. I went into the marriage with 2 little children from a previous marriage. From the beginning I knew this was a troubled relationship. My husband would call on his way home from work asking, “Do you need anything?” Bread, milk, ect. He would then stop at the bar. Not coming home until the bar closed. Occasionally he’d bring drunk friends home, to drink more after they were thrown out of the bar. He would pawn things to pay bills after he had spent his paycheck. I tried everything to get him to see what he was doing to me and the kids. He’d miss programs at school because he was drunk. He’d listen to loud music in the house as we tried to sleep. We fought constantly. I filed for divorce and didn’t follow through. He was arrested for fighting with my son, when my son was older and had moved back home for awhile. I’d throw my husband out and then let him back in. I sold our house of 25 years, on my own, and move to another town. His brother become I’ll and passed away. In my sorrow for him and the tremendous loss I allowed him to stay with me. Before long he was back in my new home permanently. He continued to drink, but he began trying to hide it. It seemed ridiculous to me. I knew he was drinking. This summer he had an online “love affair”. I discovered this by accident when he left the message on his phone opened. I threw him out again, only to allow him back. I convinced myself that I was too poor to not have him here. The drinking became worse. He hide bottles all over, locked his phone. He would get drunk and be hateful, hurtful. He would break things in the house, windows, doors, he would throw things, and stumble around crashing into walls. Recently he has been drinking night and day on the weekend. I just can not live this way any longer. My children are grown. They have given up on me in many ways. They are disgusted with years of my enabling their stepfather. They see me as crazy as him, because I’ve allowed this for so so long. I have a Granddaughter now. She lives states away. I visit when I can. Her mother is always reluctant to come here because of the drinking. Who could blame her? After another horrible weekend and an awful fight my husband has left. I hope with all my soul to be strong and end this roller coaster ride.

The journey that I have taken with my husband who is an alcoholic seems unreal at times. It was not always this way. Like many of you in the beginning it was great. He was actually deeply involved with the church. There was a light that had drawn me in. I loved him so much to the depths of my soul. He at 1st didn’t want to be with me because I wasn’t on the same level of his religiousness. I have never been a follower someone that just does something because everyone else does. I had became pregnant with his son when I was 18 years old. He had asked me to marry him and of course I did! He was my soulmate so I thought. Our son was born premature at 29 weeks gestation. Talk about a rough time. During this time the drinking began. The drinking has not stopped in 8 years, We have 2 beautiful children together 6 and 7. I just found out I am pregnant. I am so scared for hope has run out. In so many ways it has gotten worse, He never has a job because either he cant hold one or he has no care to have one. All the responsibility is carried on my shoulders. I have never met someone so arrogant and delusional in my entire life. You think someone would be great full that stands by your side through the worst part of your life. He puts me down calls me names makes me feel so small. He blames me for who and what he has become. Everyday I feel more and more hopeless and that one string I have held onto is broke. He runs away all the time 2 to 4 days at a time getting drunk at his brothers. Can you imagine how I feel. Not knowing anything because his family cuts communication and he will not call. He comes home after the fun is over. I dont trust him. He doesn’t have sex with me anymore. He tells me how unattractive I am, as if he looks any better. I feel dead inside and lost. How can the man I loved with every part of my being do this to me and his kids. Put the name calling, lying everything aside. If his drinking doesn’t stop he will be dead or end up with serious health issues. I have no friends and my family does not like him, Can I blame them? He treats me like shit as if im worthless the one person that has stood by his side. His loyalty lies with his family the ones that dont give a shit. Why am I doing this to myself and my kids. Is this love or just complete insanity. Why should I allow myself to be put down and called names. Im comming to a place of hate. I want to understand, I want to say its because hes an alcoholic. Everyone has a choice. He chooses to be this way and get no help, he allows the word to come out of his mouth. He bites the own hand that bares his children and feeds him daily. It makes me sick. My grandmother has been with drunks her whole life and told me about Al-anon. I am thankful to have found this, As many of you probably feel alone. Our situations are nothing to be proud of and we are unable to live regular happy lifes due to the choice of someone else. So I am happy that I can open up to complete strangers who actually are not strangers at all. For as you read our stories we are one in the same.

My partner and i have been together 2 years now. At the start we went out together every week drinking until i realised he liked to continue drinking the next day. A few months in and he disappeared for 3 days. He promised he ewould never do that again but 2 months later it did, and every month after that for 4 months until i had enough.i rarely drink anymore for i constantly worry he will leave me for days on end. We split for 3 months but i then took him back as everytime he was genuienly sorry and he would never do it again. He does recognise there is a tendancy there for his drinking and has made massive progress with gettin himself together sincd we met. His finacial status has got better… he can go without a drink for months and it would not annoy him.He is the most genuienly loving most decent man i have ever met when sober. He would do anything for me and has the kindest heart…. except when hes had a drink. I took him back and agreed he can stick to a few beer now and again as he said it was just the spirit’s or shots that make him want to drink the next day. All went well for 6 months… we got engaged and a month later he went on another rampage… as we speak its tuesday…. hes been gone since saturday morning. Im a girl in my 20s and he is in his 30s. I constantly get promises that it wont happen again. I love this man with all my heart… he is well liked and the most generous friendly person you would ever meet and someday I know he will be a great father.my family adore him. I adore him.. how can i help him see what he will be losing.

Most of these women sound younger than I am but the story is the same. We love our dysfunctional mates to the point of losing our own identities n sometimes our possessions. My husband and I have been married 37 years. The last two have been legal separation. He turned into a ‘functional alcoholic’ n has been let go from several high-paying jobs for being ‘crazy’. I spent a year and one half with a relative to ‘heal’ but it was really hiding. We lost our house during divorce arguments. I can’t stand to look at certain homes because they remind me of ours. Our back yard was beautiful, like a park. I miss that too. I miss any feeling of being normal. I am next in line for a senior apartment n have moved to stay with my son for a couple of weeks. I resent living out of boxes and in someone’s extra room where available. I would like to be able to have my sewing machine set up n work on quilts. I have stuff that’s stored at three different places n feel like I may leave this world an inflict my kids n friends with disposal of my junk. I visited my ex recently n he has not given up drinking or smoking. He still tries to hide those habits from me. He’s just pathetic. At least now I can leave n not have to put up with the meanness or lies. All I ever wanted was a man who loved me. Somewhere he learned to love the bottle more. I don’t want anyone else to pick up
After n lie to cover their dysfunction. I just want peace. Please pray for me.

I fell in love with my husband’s smile, his kindness, his joy and confindence. We met in college and shared dreams of a great future both with high hopes and very driven. The problem began when he became stuck in a job that seemed to provide him with success in the form of open bar drinking parties and ‘title promotions’ that seemed like more like pay cutbacks for more work. It all didn’t seem right, but he was fooled and after 7 years of dedication, it was all over and they no longer needed him and several 100 other dedicated employees. He rarely drank when we met and when he did it was for fun. After this happened the reason he drank changed and the way he acted when he was drunk changed. He became a different person, he didn’t care about me, he would be blackout drunk and be verbally and mentally abusive. Now he is unemployed and has been for several months with an alcohol problem and a nicotine problem that I’m not sure how he is able to financially support. We have a young child and I have hope that one day he will wake up and be the man I fell in love with. My hope is fading and I don’t know how much longer I’m willing to wait.

My husband and I have been together for 11 years in may, married for 9 in April. We have a no children together but 3 each from previous marriages (a total of 6)two are grown and the other four live with us full time. We work for the same company and have had a pretty great relationship for the most part in my eyes…he is kind, caring and we have great conversations. Everything on that end is fine….but there is the drinking. My husband is a functioning alcoholic. He drinks almost daily and drinks from the time he gets home to the time he goes to bed during the week and starts early on Saturday afternoons and continues drinking through Sunday night on most occasions. This isn’t anything new. Normally we have a cycle. About once every three-four months he will do something really really stupid ending us up in a huge fight and then he will apologize and cut back for a while and then three-four months later, another incident will occur. I have been trying to convince him for years that alcohol is the reason for his troubles. He will never admit it and never quit. I have only asked him to quit completely once, and he did for a bout a year and then, he went back. I have always just asked him to cut back becuase i dont think there is anything wrong with a person have a drink or two every so often.

One of my issues is that I like to drink also. Not often, but I like to have a drink on a Friday night while out to dinner. One or two is my highest limit. Not him. He starts drinking before we even go to the restaurant and continues long after. Then bad things happen. Like i said he is not mean, just…stupid. Lets start with the big bad things:

-IN the first year we met, he had 3 DUIs resulting in thousands of dollars paid for him to go through ASAP and to get his license back which took four years. I had to drive him around for years. One of them was a hit and run where he ran into a house and i was in the passenger seat and went through the windshield. I was lucky to survive.
-He got really really drunk along time ago (before he knew me) when he was in his early twenties and slept with his sister. (Mind you they didn’t know each other, they had just met but really, still.)
-He shot someone in the hand by accident (again, long before he ever met me but still)
-He lost custody of his boys to their grama because he overslept on the court date and it took 10 years for him to get custody back. He just got it back BTW
-He is so far in debt, owes back taxes, overdrafts his bank account (no, we don’t share one) and has maxed out all of his credit cards…but he ALWAYS has money for a bottle. (He doesn’t drink the cheap stuff either. I’m talking Captain Morgan, folks.)

Those are the things that scream out to me as “big”. Now lets talk about the small things.
-He constantly sleepwalks. Naked, sometimes. I sleep with one eye open every night because I want to be sure he doesn’t walk naked into one of the kid’s rooms. While he has never done that, he has ended up in the backyard once, and one of the kids saw him naked.
-The kids have no respect for him because he constantly tried to have serious conversations with them when he is drunk. He gets angry that they dont respect him and doesn’t know why. Heres your sign??
-He is addicted to porn, meaning, sex is almost irrelevant in our relationship. I never realized that this was an attribute of alcoholism until i started reading up on it. He gets drunk and watches porn. I wrote him a long letter about this just a couple of weeks ago and how it hurt me so bad that we never slept together and he literally read it, cracked a bottle, and then i walked in on him doing his thing to some porn. Needless to say, I threw his computer. It didn’t break unfortunately. He admiited once that he got so much lube on the bed while he was drunk and passed out with it in his hand while i was out of town that he had to wash the sheets. I took him back. He once admitted to me that he was engaging in live porn. I took him back. Stupid.
-Recently I went out of town and when i came back, i felt like someone had been in my house. He told me he had “a get together” We NEVER have people over. So come to find out his brother and people (INCLUDING WOMEN) that I don’t know came over and drank with him and he doesn’t even remember what happened after that. He was too drunk. Apparently they all spent the night? Oh ya, one of our kids was there that night too…
-He calls his sister on facetime while he is naked in the bath. Because it is funny. Yes, that sister. ????
-Last week he got so drunk and his son had the flu and was throwing up profusely for about 6 hours. He was adamant that he wanted to help him so i gave him some guidance and he instead, brought him into the living room instead of quarantining him from the others, made him gulp down a protein drink until he got even more sick, and when i called him out on it, told me to F off.
-He always friends random women on facebook when he is drunk. I have caught him often having conversations with them.
-He slurs his words and says things that make absolutely no sense. He spills things, pisses himself, stumbles all over the place, it is so unattractive i wanna puke.

These are just some that i came up with off the top of my head. I confront him about these things and he finds a way to blame me for everything that happens. Here’s the straw that broke the camels back. Saturday night i told him i needed him to make a decision, me or the drinking. He said THE DRINKING. Can you believe that? Can you believe that this man is confidently ending his marriage with me without even trying to do anything about it because he would rather drink?! My biggest concern here is that he will take his children that he fought so hard for and he will loose them within weeks. He is talking about moving to his mothers house (who is ALSO an alcoholic, mind you) but he cant because she smokes in the house and his son has asthma. I have advised him to get an apartment. He ignores me. Sleeps on the couch, stays on his computer and does God knows what. This has been going on since Saturday. The issue before this where the people came to my house was a month ago. So much for the three-four month breaks.
I think he has finally given up on everything and i don’t know what to do. I want him to leave on one hand, but on the other i don’t. I don’t want the kids to suffer and i do love him when he goes through his “good periods” We have built a life together. Many years! I am so torn and so upset and so sick of this. My oldest son is 20 and he is a heroin addict who has been through rehab and has a good job and is doing well. My first husband was a drug addict who eventually sucomed to his addictions two years ago. I honestly feel like i am in this cycle with these people and i have know way how to get out. I want to run away, take my kids and go…but i dont know how….

I never thought this would happen to me. I met my husband at church when I was 18 and we got married when I was almost 20. It’s hard to pin down when exactly the excessive drinking started, but sometime last year he started wetting the bed and passing out in the couch (and wetting that) 4 or more times per week. He always tries to hide how many times he gets refill drinks from me… I don’t know why because it’s obvious he’s drinking. He mixes juice with different liquors in a 32oz bottle and usually has at least 2 of them. He also makes excuses for wetting the bed like “I sweater through the sheets” which is just obviously not true. We lost some friends because the husband made a comment to me once about “he was really drunk last night huh?” And I passed it along in a fight. Sometimes he blames me and my parents for his drinking, when he does acknowledge that he drinks too much. I’m not sure where to go from here. Most nights he holds it together until our daughter is in bed, but I dread coming back after laying he down. Constant yelling, paranoia, and making a big deal of little things. He always thinks the worst of me. Nad in the morning, he remembers about 10% of it. I don’t know how much longer I can hold it together.

I am so lost, I’m angry, then I burst into tears and now I go cold… married for 10 years been with him since I was 17 now 38! I actually feel comfort in writing, people I don’t know reading my story, understanding my pain. Why do I stay, love this man dearly, but I am so tied, so sad every evening …. I hurry to tuck the kids in bed, trying to shelter them from their dad. He hates me when he’s drunk and I hate to be around him. The kids are not babies anymore and I try my best to protect them from seeing him plastered.
My head is so heavy, so disappointed in myself and confused as a mother. I go through it all, ezxavtkt what everyone describes, heartache, abuse et

So alone

My husband of 20+ years woke up this morning at 4am and drank 1/2 bottle of vodka. Came to bed at 7am pissed. Woke me up and couldn’t understand why i was not happy. We were due to meet friends at 9.30 for a walk – there was no way he coukd make it. I don’t love him any more but we have a 11 year old child who still loves her dad. I dont know what to do.

This has been an amazing read. Such great helpful information. I’ve been in recovery for nearly eight years. It takes a lot of work. Getting sober, working a 12-step program, doing service for others and maintaining a continuous healthy spiritual condition is the only thing that really works for me. So I was excited to meet a man two years ago with roughly the same amount of sobriety. We have a lot of mutual friends and everyone was so happy for us and from the beginning we seemed to be on the same page in life. Unlike most new relationships, we have always maintained quite a bit of time apart. I have a stressful job with a lot of responsibility and he works long hours. In additions, my service work, church activities and AA meetings, I had a very busy life before he came along. But I made him a priority in order to spend at two evenings a week with him. I was a little surprised and somewhat hurt, when started asking for alone time after about two months of dating. I’m very open with my schedule and planning “alone” time on the only day I am available didn’t really reconcile. But understanding that everything isn’t about me and there are two people in this relationship, I’d swallow the pain and deal with it. But it was happening about every other week and usually Saturday night. He’d say things like, “You have lots of friends, go hang out with one of them” and accuse me of being needy and co-dependent. About a year ago, though I didn’t think he was drinking, I told him that he has alcoholic behavior and I was concerned that he’s on the road to relapse. I felt as though I was in a relationship with an active alcoholic. I wasn’t able to make any plans with him because 50 percent of the time, he’d cancel. This was leaving me confused and alone. In August of last year, he was clearly drinking and called me. I said, “oh my God, you’re drunk!! And I hung up” He didn’t call or text me for two days. When he did, he said that his blood sugar was high (he’s diabetic) and he thought I was someone else. He was not about to admit he was drinking. As an alcoholic myself, I knew that he’s either he’d realize he made a mistake and stop or it would accelerate. So here I am seven months later with a boyfriend who calls me drunk almost every day and everyday, tells me that he’s gonna get back on track. But now he says that he doesn’t need meetings and that he can do it on his own. So today, after reading all of these heart breaking stories, I’m going tell him tonight that our romance is over. The job of every AA member is to help those who still suffer, but I can’t be more than a member of his support team. No more intimacy, no more late night TV, no more drunk phone calls. Meetings and AA functions are the best that I can do. I don’t want to look back and say hindsight was 20/20. In fact, looking back over the past eight years that I’ve know of him through the walls of AA. I don’t know that he’s ever really been able to string together more than a few months. His resentments and blaming others is still at the fore front of this brain. In true alcoholic form, he’s blamed me for his drinking now. He says that even if he thinks about if, he can’t find one bad thing to say about me, so he can’t understand why I’m twice divorced. The answer that I’m a different person now isn’t enough. He thinks I must be a manipulator and a fake. It’s pure insanity. I’m getting off the plane before it crashes.

I echo most all of these comments, yes, even Seans.
You are not alone. Dont be afraid. Take courage, and be diligent to take care of yourself, wherever or whayeber that leads to.
You are important.

My husband drinks when he gets home from work, 12 to 18 a night. sometimes he will drink intil he can’t he sit in a chair he well fall a sleep there that happens alot, but if I say something to him he will say do you have a job, your stupid, that l am worthless, my son grow up as a with a addition to drugs and it’s my fault, I should leave I know. But I never worked because he told me that I am a housewife, and when he is drunk I a shity one at that . I smoke cigarette but not in my house so if he has friends over I can’t smoke in the garage l have to smoke outside. I have more to say but he watches everything I do.

I have married for 21 years now. My husband always consumed alcohol socially and would get easily out of control. He also is an insecure person and have anxiety issues too. As we were away from our country I found it difficult to speak to anybody and tried to deal with it by myself. So over the years I have been abused, had a miscarriage, my daughter is now suffering from anxiety issues (she has been witness to a lot of drama at home)
Now he see a psychiatrist to help him with anxiety. However, I doubt whether it is anxiety that is the problem. I think he uses anxiety as an excuse to drink.
Once he starts drinking, he cannot control himself. He misses work. Stays at home and keeps drinking, lying about his drinking. Makes the home environment unbearable.
This used to be a daily occurrence. After getting help from the doc it has become less but there are relapses and nasty scenes.
I have come to the end of my patience. The last time I spoke to the doc, I asked him – if my husband hates me so much (once drunk he only has problems with me) I should leave. To this the doc said he might get worse if I leave. So I held on. But, its getting increasingly difficult to bear the pain and humiliation.
Today, i was hit, banged, my hair was pulled so hard numerous times that I feel I have lost half of the hair on my head.
Please let me know what I should do. I know he is not in his senses when he acts like this but I cannot take the disrespect and humiliation anymore. Time is a bitch, when he sobers, I too forget this.

I’ve been married to my alcoholic husband for twelve years. This is the umpteenth billionth time he has promised to “behave” – which means cut back. He just behaves as though this is a true thing when it’s not a true thing. We live in a constant Hell of stupor and bitching. My hisband’s whole life revolves around drinking. Nothing in our life is untouched by it. We have not had sex for ten years. He has embarrassed me countless times at social and family gatherings because he always gets drunk to the point of stumbling around and and being completely out of it. Nothing can be discussed when he’s drinking because he doesn’t remember anything. When he’s not working he has two sober (hangover) hours a day when he’s waking up with his coffee. Those are the hours of the day that he makes empty promises about helping out, or doing something about his health. He doesn’t see that he is ruining both our lives and putting our future a risk. My husband has an amazing ability to adapt to whatever Hell between us is created by his drinking. One year early on in our marriage I spent the entire year sleeping on a yoga mat on the hardwood floor of our living room because I couldn’t stand to sleep with him – his obnoxious snoring and stinking. I was also obviously trying to make some point about how unhappy I was. My husband simply adapted and acted like it was normal and we were happy. Now I’ve all but moved full time to our cabin in the woods. He visits weekends and drinks all day until he’s asleep on the couch periodically waking up to get another beer. I act hostile all day long and scream at him at night. Everyday I try to come up with a new strategy for coping. Nothing works. I’m either being nicer than I feel because I just can’t be angry all the time, or I’m bitching or yelling. My husband has ruined his health and is interested in nothing but the news, the weather and drinking. He has nothing interesting to say and can’t even join me on a walk around the block. He does manage to go to work, but that’s it. He helps with nothing, does nothing, and can engage with nothing. I want to divorce him – in the back of my thoughts is always the idea that maybe that’s the only thing that might wake him up to reality, but honestly I don’t think it would. Of course we are financially intertwined, and I am extremely vulnerable financially I I divorce my husband. Not that his drinking doesn’t make us financially at risk also.

My wife is an alcoholic. We’ve been together for 11 years. At first she hardly drank, never thought anything of it.Then it got to more and more. She’s had many injuries because of it. Fell down in the bathroom, racked her skull open. Shecalls 911 all the time, because she needs help, she says – goes too the behavioral ward- never seems to help – I enable her uy buying the beer. She screems until I go. I don’t know what to do anymore. Can’t take it. I love her but maybe I should leave

My alcoholic husband is blacked out next to me on the couch right now.
Another Friday where he chugs liquor in his car before coming inside thinking I won’t notice that he’s wobbly on his feet and glassy eyed. When asked about it, he just says he’s tired. Like I can’t tell the difference. I don’t even know why I ask anymore. I can see it a mile away. Something I never wanted to be an expert on. My other skills include being able to quickly identify liquor hiding spots, quietly disposing of his contraband and being quiet as a cat burglar so as not to rouse the sleeping drunk in hopes of having a little quiet time.
Tonight was a mess. He started to black out while he was eating dinner. Food spilled all over his lap and down his shirt. I tried helping him get up and get to bed so he could sleep it off and that’s when he woke up just long enough to hurl belligerent insults at me. I have had an exceptionally hard week and am stressed beyond words about a crisis my family is dealing with right now. He knows this. He consoled me while I was sobbing last night and opening up about my fears. It just devastates me that he continues to heap more pain my way when I’m already struggling.
He hides liquor everywhere in our apartment. I figured out that he smuggles it home in his work bag and takes it into the walk-in closet attached to our master bathroom while I’m asleep so he can drink during the weekends. Last weekend I found a brand new pint of peppermint schnapps in his work bag (he blacked out last Friday night too) and tonight, I found a 14 pack of those mini bottles in his bag. Maybe he thought those would be easier to hide? I poured them out and buried it all in the trash. He either won’t remember buying them or won’t ask where they are since he shouldn’t have them in the first place.
The drinking he does in the closet is so distressing. It’s the drinking that has resulted in him being blacked out on the bathroom floor. It’s the drinking that causes him to sleep until 3pm on a Saturday. It’s the drinking he does when he’s getting ready to go somewhere with me and is clearly drunk in public and acting like a sloppy mess.
This has been going on for seven years now and is only getting worse. I thought rock bottom would be the DUI he got in 2014. It wasn’t. Maybe rock bottom would come in the form of waking up in tall grass at 3am next to train tracks after a day of binge drinking followed by a trip to a bar where he stayed until closing? It wasn’t. Was it when he recalled the events of threatening to kill himself because I would tell him where a bottle of whiskey was that he accused me of hiding? Nope. His behavior gets more unacceptable each weekend and no reminder of his actions makes him think that it’s time to change. At this point I’m convinced that the alcohol is either going to kill him or he’s going to end up in prison for a second DUI. I know that the addict has to want to get sober and I just don’t see him ever admitting he has a problem. You would think a DUI and the myriad fines, penalties and consequences would be enough to snap someone back into reality but it hasn’t. He obeys the rules only when they’re being imposed upon him and there are direct consequences for not following them. When no one is looking, he acts on whatever impulse he’s feeling.
When he’s drunk, he tells me how much he hates me. Hates our life together. Tells me he’s miserable in our marriage and will go into crippling detail about the faults he sees in me. When he’s sober, he’ll surprise me cards telling me how I mean everything to him and he never knew he could love someone as much as he loves me. I wish I only received the latter. I could do without knowing that my husband thinks my fingers are “disgusting and boney” and what a “nasty, barren” woman I am because I had two miscarriages and no children since we’ve been married.
I’ve kept so much of this to myself for so long, but I’ve decided to go to an al-anon meeting this Sunday morning. It’ll be my first in a long time and I don’t know if I’ll be up for talking, but I think it’ll help to, at the very least, be around people who know what it’s like to love a problem drinker.

I have been with my husband for 14 years. We have been married for 6 months. He has always been a heavy drinker but last year he lost his son. He turned to alcohol,for comfort and this has not stopped since. To compound this he has had endocarditis, a blood clot and ulcers so his health is not good. I come home from work not really knowing what I will find. Usually he is sitting in the lounge having done nothing all day (he is still on sick leave). I find gin bottles, beer cans and wine bottles everywhere and I have stopped looking anymore because it is too upsetting.

Usually he will not communicate unless I force the issue – i find myself having to be overly happy or talkative and it all centres around him. He looks terrible. He will not shave and often he drinks so much he wets himself. If we go out he makes no effort to look presentable and, shallow though this may seem, it does matter to me. We have just bought a beautiful home but I am just not sure what to do. I love him very much but this is making me desperately unhappy.

My family warned me about his drinking but, after the death of his son, the wedding was the only thing positive to focus on. It is really difficult to talk to anyone because I feel embarrassed. I know how much he is suffering from the loss of his son and also his health issues but I am beginning to wonder if I can continue to live like this.

Is there any advice on how to deal with him?

Michelle, please tell me it gets better… Something has caused him to change… I’m where you were at then and I’m hopeless feeling it’s my fault.

First of all I want to say thank you, feels good reading your stories knowing I am not alone. I sympathize with every one of you and can relate on certain levels. So I guess I’ll start explaining what kind of mess I am in.

So I met this guy while I was a sophomore in college and fell hard. Didn’t know he was an alcoholic till about a month later. I ignored it initially because I was in love. So on and off it happened. He hacked on to my facebook and publicly announced I was a webcam model and proceeded to give people links to my videos. I thought this was it and I was officially over, but I fell into the rabbit hole and forgave him.

Now I am living with him and he is a monster. He is verbally and emotionally abusive. He makes me cry and brings down my self-esteem by judging me and my life to make himself feel better. Physically he holds me down and I try to get out of his grip, but he doesn’t release until he wants to. Recently he broke my laptop for school… Now I have to figure out how to get him to repair it.

Overall I need to break ties with him before I get more involved. I am about to graduate with social work and make something out of my life. I plan on moving far away from him
and his demonic soul of a person.

I have been with my alcoholic husband for almost 40 years now. At first, I thought he just wanted a party buddy, and I thought it was me. I was so wrong and didn’t realize it for many years. It was anyone who would drink with him, I was the last on the list, after op, (other people). It has ALWAYS been other people before me, or the kids. I have no friends, he has destroyed that with his mouth. He tells everyone what he thinks, why he thinks it and what and why they should fix whatever it is that pisses him off, for whatever reason. People don’t like that and when he loses friends, he blames me. I rarely talk, because I get my ass reamed if I say something he doesn’t like or agree with, but he finds something, always, to bitch at me for. He will make it up if he feels the need to do so, so he can bitch about something, anything, cuz he seems to like doing it. He likes to degrade me, bitch at me for no reason other than he likes doing it. I have no friends, I vent through my own email, from me to me, so nobody else will see it. I have fibromyalgia, degenerative disc disease, IBS, herniated discs, and other afflictions. He has NO empathy or feeling for me and what I go through. All he cares about is getting drunk…he is a functioning drunk, but he’s never sober when he’s home with me. For my birthday, I asked him to not drink until at least 4 pm, not his usual noon or earlier for a weekend day. He told me to pick something else, I said I don’t want anything else. How can a person not even delay drinking time for at least 4 fucking hours!!! Is that so hard to do for your wife??? I guess it was, and I said I didn’t want anything else for my birthday from him. He didn’t care. I have no respect for him, cuz he clearly has had none for me for many years. He couldn’t even give me something for my birthday that didn’t cost any money!! Money is another thing with him, he likes to spend it when we have none. He had 2 inheritances and he chose to spend it, it’s gone! I got an inheritance and he is still bugging the shit out of me to spend it as he sees fit and I won’t let him, guess how mad he is about that???!!! I have animals, they make me happy. He bitches about how much they cost to feed. I figured out how much they do cost to feed. They cost less than the beer I buy him monthly. He drinks more than the animals (all of them) cost to feed, so shut the fuck up, is what I say, but he doesn’t listen…to anything I have to say. I have no voice, I hate that, but I can’t speak, cuz he just yells over me, doesn’t let me talk, and does whatever he thinks is necessary so that I don’t get a voice or opinion, that he can hear cuz he’s talking over me. I just don’t know what to do, he has smashed me like a worm, and he just keeps doing it over and over again. I let him cuz he makes the money at this time in our lives. He has forgotten that for many years, it was me who was the primary bread winner, but he conveniently doesn’t remember things that way. That’s probably cuz he was drunk, had the monday morning blues, didn’t show up to work cuz he was too hung over. Doesn’t happen like that now, he is functioning. He goes to work sober, and after he is home, he’s not. Actually, he’s only partially sober, how can someone drink a case of beer in a matter of 5 hours, go to sleep and them wake up sober? They can’t. That’s why sometimes he feels the need to drink a few beers for medicinal purposes when he first gets out of bed???????????? There is no intimacy, unless it’s his version and I get a new one reamed cuz I don’t comply. Who wants to when you are drunk and disorderly????????? I just don’t know what to do.

My wife is a mean drunk. She usually drinks wine, 2-3 bottles a night, but sometimes drinks rum, a bottle or so. She often stays up all night, alone, drinking then lays in bed until noon. She doesn’t work and I do and often starts drinking shortly before I go to bed. When she’s drunk, or hungover — which is all the time lately — she is awful. She will call me names, disparage me, scream at me, and blame me for everything wrong in her life and the world. She’s beaten the crap out of me in the past but hasn’t done that in awhile. Lately she’s been telling me, when she’s drunk, that she hears voices in her head telling her I’m out to get her.

She does not work and seldom leaves the house. We have a child who I bring to and from school so she’s not a stay at home mom. She usually cooks dinner (we’re on our own for breakfast and lunch), cleans up around the house, and does laundry and the housework. I appreciate that but, for three people, it doesn’t seem like a full-time job. Plus I’ll often help cook or bring home take-in. I do almost all the grocery shopping, deal with bills, deal with anything that involves people outside the family, and I work a full-time job.

Besides drinking she likes to play phone games and seems to play them all the time. This isn’t jumping on to solve a puzzle game for 15 minutes: it’s countless hours of online gaming. I don’t know how much she games – because she’s up all night while I sleep – but wouldn’t be surprised if it’s 6-10 hours a day or even more.

Our sex life is pretty much nonexistent. She’s always angry about something or other and, like everything else, there’s always an excuse why she never wants to have sex. Actually, there’s an excuse for everything; always somebody to blame for whatever real or imaginary (usually imaginary) problem she has. The person to blame is never her; it’s usually, but not always, me.

She lashes out and banishes anybody I get close to so I can’t have friends; she keeps me isolated then tells me I’m a loser who has no friends. She’ll literally attack people I get close to, sending them awful emails or texts or facebook posts, sometimes using my computer and under my name. Or she’ll start writing to them and disparage me, taking my friends over. Besides attacking friends and family she once attacked a co-worker, sending them an awful email, which got me called into HR. When I asked them how I’m supposed to control my drunken wife in the middle of the night while I’m asleep the HR person, who is normally tough, started crying and suggested I see a psychologist: she said she’d never seen a spouse do this in her 30+ years.

I’m tired of going to bed alone every night. I’m tired of being yelled at. I’m tired of working hard and never receiving any form of gratitude. I’m tired of being woken up to a person reeking of alcohol spewing hate and abuse. I’m tired of being blamed. I’m tired of being the only person working while she makes no effort at all to curb, or even watch, the spending. I’m tired of having intimacy replaced with booze and phone games. I am physically and emotionally exhausted from this shit.

One thing I’ve learned after doing this awhile, and occasionally taping the outbursts, is to ignore the accusations and I’d encourage the other spouses of alcoholics to do the same. Err on the side of brushing them off rather than trying to internalize or ponder them. I did that for awhile but they’ll just ramp up the effort to put you down and the vast majority of the put-down’s are 99% nonsense. Maybe there’s a shred of truth to some, which is why we think about them (ex: I could do more housework even though she doesn’t work) but they’re so harsh, so mean spirited, that analyzing them just enables the abusive alcoholic. Like others here I think about leaving but I don’t know how she’d function without me. Then again, she isn’t functioning especially well with me so maybe it doesn’t matter.

I’ve been married to my husband for four years now. Both my parents were alcoholics too. My mom and step dad. I had normal boyfriends before this. Somehow I chose to settle down with an alcoholic. He is so annoying when he drinks. Before I was pregnant with my son (3 1/2 years ago) I didn’t care about his drinking. After I became pregnant he always said he would stop. When I came home from the hospital he got drunk with a few friends then brought them back to our house to celebrate. When we went on a cruise a couple years ago he came in later and later every night until the day we were coming home he didn’t come in until 8am. I toommy son yo get breakfast. When I got back to our room he was gone but all five of our large bags were there. I had to find a way to get all our bags, my one year old son to the bus. Thankfully some ladies noticed and helped me.
Like another comment on here said, the smell of stale liquor on a person repulsed me. I find bottles hidden everywhere. He makes messes around the house that I either have to clean or live with. He doesn’t ever seem to get to the point that he will pick something up, nor does it bother him if I don’t. it only bothers me. When he listens to music it’s so loud that you can’t go anywhere in the house to get away from it. I will scream at him to turn it down, or ask kindly.
Two years ago we moved out of state for his job. We’re away from all my family and friends and I left my job when we came here. I’m stuck at the moment and I can’t stand him.
He’s also gotten two DUIs since I’ve been with him. Doesn’t seem to learn his lesson. There have been many times I’ve found emails or texts that are imnaprorite with women . I hate him.

Very helpful

I met my common-law partner over 6 years ago and we moved quickly. We had so much in common. I was widowed, he was divorced.we are the same age within 6 months (old baby boomers). We had both been looking for a new partner for a few years. We met on-line. Within 6 months I sold my condo, shut down my failing business, and moved into his larger condo. It was great for a while.

He was overweight, but swore he could lose it all in 6 months. That never happened. He drank a lot of beer in the beginning (up to 6), but just fell asleep and snored. I tried to get him to cut back, but that never happened. He was never abusive in any way. He just said, and still says, “I,m a drinker, that’s who I am”. He thinks it’s fine because he is not abusive.

As we continued to live together I realized that his problem was a lot more complicated than mere alcoholism. He has a pretty healthy dose of OCD which is an anxiety disorder of genetic origin (there are other family members, living and dead, affected with various manifestations of OCD. Alcoholism is present in about 25% of these people because they use alcohol to alleviate anxiety and depression. Of course it only makes things worse because alcohol is a depressant.

My partner has progressed to whiskey, spends his day in his recliner drinking from early afternoon until he can just get himself to bed before falling over. He’s sleeping 12-14 hours per night. He will not listen to logic because he is mentally ill.

I have moved to the guest room, and the den has become my TV/Living room. I cook and leave his food in the kitchen. I am terribly sad because I feel that I cannot help him, nor will he seek outside help. He are getting old and are financially intertwined so I will likely stay, but not happily.

Your stories are all similar to mine.I Love my husband except when he drinks. I’ve been married to him for 14 years and 3 beautiful children. He is both emotionally and verbally abusive. His favorite thing is to turn the table and call me crazy, needy etc.I live with so much emptiness and frustration. I’ve only recently realized that he’s an alcoholic or should I say binge drinker.He’s a good man except to me when he drinks. I’ve had enough, i want a better life.My praying knees are worn out.

I too am married to an alcoholic wife. Everyday I come home to her drunk. When I would have a beer it was I would have 1 she would have 7. Then pass out drunk while my 9 yr old daughter watches her mother slowly kill herself. When we are with friends she gets so intoxicated will come home late sometimes with a fresh blackeye or giant bruise. I just don’t know what to do. I’m tired of her verbal abuse. Telling me what a terrible husband I am. We have talked and she says this is it never again that lasts for about 2 days. And she was miserable the whole time. She begs me to forgive and I’m usually so emotionally drained that I say forget it
. She is selfish with her drinking g and only cares about the next drink. She does nothing with our daughter. Please help

I have the same problem with you guys. I met my husband 9 years ago with a little drinking gathering with friend.. I saw the problem from the start but I also saw the kindness in him that leads to a relationship afterwards. I was a student then and he is 11 years ahead of my age. I thought the problem I saw in him will eventually vanished after we got married. He is such a quiet guy without the influence of alcohol and easy to deal with. But worst came when he had drunk alcohol.
By this time.. we been married for almost 3 years now and still no child to raise. My problem with him gone worst than ever. I could’nt even understand his grudes anymore. He will just bust out in anger whenever he does’nt want anything I had said or do. Or even if I didn’t do anything wtong at all. I’ am a teacher and my credibility as teacher and as a woman as well is being compromised because of his behaviour. I wanted to escape with my present life but I’m still worried about him. I felt so lost and useless whenever he maltreated me with his choice of words. I FELT degraded. Many times I tried to leave him and go on with my life but I couldn’t stand the fact that there will be no one there to take care of him. It’s a difficult decision to leave somebody yiu love although you clearly knew that there will be a brighter tomorrow ahead of you without him. I tried to talk yo him and even encourage him to consult a doctor but it ended up talking to the air. Hiw can we help them beat alcoholism when they doesn’t want any help. Its just sad that somebody who has great potetial will end up living with the life that does not offer light.????????????

I’ve been with my fiancé for 7 years, yesterday it snowed where we live, I’m not comfortable driving in the snow so I asked my fiancé to drive me. I had a ten hour shift and I guess after dropping me off he hit the liquor store. He’s always been an extreme binge drinker, doesn’t drink everyday but when he does he can’t stop. I called him on my lunch break (4.5 hours before I was off) to make sure he would be on time to pick me up later and he sounded extremely drunk. I guess after talking to me he got it in his head that he had to come get me immediately, he crashed his car head on into another vehicle. I had to leave work early because he was rushed to the hospital. He recieved a DWI but was not taken to jail because he was too injured, broken nose, fractured cheek, concussion, dislocated hip, and bruising everywhere. The driver of the other vehicle was okay but the passenger was injured the police would not tell me how badly. We’re supposed to be leaving for a vacation with my family tomorrow for nine days, and also to meet with our wedding planner. My heart has never felt so heavy. The only thing we ever fight about is his drinking, and I feel like this might be the last straw. He has a family history of alcoholism, and his mother is still battling it herself. I worry for our future children, I don’t want this kind of life for my family. I love him, but at some point it’s my responsibility to love me more, because no one else will. I deserve to be more important than a bottle of liquor. I’m just not sure I have the strength to leave.

My husband is an alcoholic. We have been Married for 39 years. He has drank heavily for the last 25. I stayed because of our two children but they are grown and I want to leave now. He promises to stop but doesn’t. He lies about how many he drank, he has to have his friends bring him home because he can’t drive. He doesn’t think he has a problem but he does. He doesn’t cal me names like he used to but still has anger problems when drunk his friends tell me they know he has a problem. Our girls know he is a drunk and don’t want anything to do with him. I finally can afford to leave if we sell out and I think it is the only solution I just hate to give up but I know he will never change. He blames me for everything. Says what am I going to give up if he gives up drinking. I just can’t live like this anymore.

I’m sitting here on the couch again, crying because he is drunk and was horribly mean to me tonight. I saw it coming on tonight, when the monster comes out. I kept hoping he’d pass out but he didn’t. He was only physical with me once, In which he grabbed me during a heated fight. I left for a week. He knows I will not play that game and it has never gotten physical since, but I know he has in past relationships. Tonight, He started in on the same conversation… my dog. He hates my dog. Wants me to move in but the dog “needs discipline”. I avoid these discussions when he is drunk but tonight he wouldn’t stop. He called me a “fat bitch” and when I politely reminded him that he wears a 3xl and I wear a med to large that maybe he should rethink his name calling. We are engaged. When “jeff” (his drunk who) comes out, I want to run. But when he’s himself, I never want to leave. Is it possible to loveand hate the same man? I’m about to give up everything of “my own” to move in. And it scares the shit out of me to have nothing if I want to leave. Tomorrow, he will find me on the couch as he leaves for work wondering if we fought or if I just couldn’t sleep. I may get a text saying he’s sorry and I may not, depending on the pieces he remembers. I could go home to my bed and my house but that would just be me running and soon I can’t do that.

Due to my husband’s career and the poor choices made with alcohol, I live very socially isolated. My husband’s drinking is not something he is willing to admit or face. He drinks every night and becomes loud and offensive. His biggest complaint is often the financial burden of our family. We live very frugally- aside from his drinking and his on again/off again hobbies. Our marriage has been damaged in irreparable ways and if he even remembers the things he says and does to me, he simply says that it was just too much alcohol “that” time (but won’t cut back or stop). Our family is going through some especially painful and life-changing things and we need to come together to heal but the alcoholism is in the way of that growth. Our children see that daddy’s thing is beer. Even our one year old associates alcohol with daddy. He refuses to acknowledge his problem. He has asked me to help him when I confront him in one of his sober moments, but gets aggressive and defensive when I ask him not to drink or open a conversation about his hidden alcohol in the garage or his drinking alone. I grew up in a home that where drugs and alcohol were valued over family. I had really worked hard at getting away from that desolate and toxic environment. Now my children are facing the same ‘normalcy’. I have put myself through so much hell trying to help my husband find what he is searching for in that bottle. In the end I am only further exhausted, alone, and devastated. He needs help and doesn’t want it. I cannot do it for him.

I met my husband online. We got married a year later. This month on the 28th it was our 18th yr anniversary. The first year before I married him he drank a lot but bc my first husband was an alcoholic, womanizer, used drugs and a wife beater I didn’t think my husband an alcoholic.

As the years went by I started noticing things. When he drank he was mentally abusive and very jealous. I felt that eventually once he knew me btr he would let go of his jealousy and lack of confidence and trust towards me. When he took me to the mall I wld have to walk with my head down bc at many other occasions he accused me of looking at “men” including looking at the private part of a male picture located inside the store. So, to avoid an argument I walked with my head down. His jealousy especially when drinking was so bad that I couldn’t speak to my children without my husband getting angry. So, I wld mute my phone so he wldn’t hear it ring and or ignore the call. He had horrible road rage so many times I had my heart on the palm of my hand. As the years went by I learned to not allow him to dictate my time with my children although I still limited my conversations with them.

I left my husband a few times but always returned feeling sorry for him and afraid of what he cld do to himself as his drinking was 24/7. To make matters worse his mother lived with us and she was an enabler of the worst kind. Anything he wanted she wld give him.

Six years into our marriage I decided I couldn’t take anymore. I turned in my resignation of 9 yrs working and began the process of packing my belongings. He was already drinking and began begging me to give him another chance. I told him I had made up my mind. He got the keys to his truck and left the house. At 1:20 am I got a call from the police department that he was encarcerated bc while drinking and driving he hit a walker causing his death. This was the most horrible thing that cld happen and more so to a human being. My husband thought he had hit a deer so he was also devastated. A year later he was convicted and sentenced to 13 yrs in prison of which 4 he served. I felt so guilty of what happened blaming myself bc I was the one who told him I was leaving causing him to leave the house drunk and the death of a human being. I decided that I cldn’t leave him and remained at my house taking care of his mother who by now had mental issues. Thank God the job I had for 9 yrs took me back.

After he came out of prison he was not the same. He went back to drinking soon after, depression and hating himself. He has not stopped drinking and now it’s worse. There’s times he won’t go to work bc he is so drunk from the night before. I don’t know how much longer I can live This lifestyle. I’m starting to get depressed and stressed wondering if I’m going to die far from my children and family. His jealousy has diminished but his drinking has gotten worse. I was too afraid to start all over then and now I’m 60 and afraid of having no place to go. Afraid to leave him and be the blame of his demise. Right now all I can do is pray for God to give me strength.

It gives me some comfort to know I’m not the only one dealing with this My husband is 10 years older than I am and that didn’t matter to me. I loved him very much when we first met, more than any other man I ever loved. He has done everything possible to wring any love I have for him right out of me.

We married and his drinking became an issue and I was drinking too, just to kind of keep the connection with him. I woke up one day and saw what I was doing to my kids and stopped. Then He jacked up his drinking; driving drunk all the time (yet only got caught once) and he is such a nasty, cruel and almost demonic man when he is drunk and feeling mean. My eldest son left because he couldn’t stand it anymore (among other issues) and my youngest son seems to get most of his venom – but I catch almost all of it. He lies about his drinking constantly and has absolutely no interest in getting sober. He will die of this disease as he has been drinking alcoholically since his college years (he is 60 now). I hate to say this but it would be a relief if he did die. He has emotionally damaged me, my sons, his sons…..he thinks his drinking is a big secret but it’s not. He is a full blown drunk; his family knows it and his friends know it. But he comes across as such a nice, unassuming, quiet shy man to the world. It’s only those he “loves” that we get the joy of seeing him for what he really is.

I’m the reason he drinks, I’m a cruddy parent, my son is the reason why he drinks….all BS. His ex-wife died of an overdose not to long ago and he painted her as an horrible woman, but I understand her a bit better now. He is a soul sucker and a weak willed loser. After she died in her van; I asked him how he must be feeling about it – he looked me dead in the eye and said “I could care less.” and he meant it – this is a woman who had three of his children. I think, honestly, that he is just a very sick man and he may have killed her (metaphorically) he will not do the same to me.

I’ve gone to my pastors for help, friends for help….but they can’t help – it’s up to him and he will NOT stop. I have been let down by churches so badly that I don’t even want to go to one anymore.

Anyway, I’m leaving him – I have to, it’s a matter of survival…my son has a little dog that he LOVES and cannot be without – this makes apartment renting difficult, so far I can’t seem to find one that I can afford. But I’m leaving; no matter how hard it will be on me; I’ll eat PB&J’s and have some peace in my life again. I’m 50 now so I’m not interested in finding another man ever again…frankly, I don’t trust myself.

My boyfriend and I have been together for 22 months. I actually fell in love with him 28 years ago, moved on with my life, got married, had children, went through a terrible divorce because I found him again. The one true love. I feel so ridiculous, I didn’t know that in 20 years he had a serious problem with alcohol. Actually compulsive behavior, in general. I saw this man I fell in love with so long ago as the same person and had “big-time” blinders on. We only spent a little time together in the beginning of our relationship so I didn’t see him during his binges and blackouts. However; he would send me text messages about our future and they were all so promising. He made me feel safe, secure and completely loved and adored. Fast forward 22 months and he’s not that same person. He’s angry, emotional, controlling, sneaky and confrontational. He drinks because he needs to, every single day. I destroyed my family because of his lies and deceit. My children love him and have no idea what he’s like. But I can’t do it anymore. He can’t perform sexually so I am not satisfied, he gets angry if I’m honest about my feelings and doesn’t consider them and he manipulates every conversation into making me feel like I’ve done something wrong. My issue is, I want to leave him but I’m afraid of failing, once again, he does help me financially and right now I need that and I’m so lonely. I know I need a lot of therapy now, I am a wreck. He sees nothing wrong with his behavior, to him, I’m the emotional one, the nag, the relationship destroyer. I see now why he never married or moved on with his life, he’s a complete alcoholic that won’t get help. I can’t even say that he is better sober because lately, his sober is so few and far between, I can’t tell the difference. This is not the life I want to live.

My husband and I have been together for 30 years, married for 26. He has always been a drinker and I’ve always tolerated it. However, I am at my waterline. He is drinking every night, 6-8 beers. He’s never been abusive, physically or otherwise, but recently he’s gotten very obnoxious, saying completely inappropriate things in front of our teenage daughter, just generally being mean. For him, I know it’s a coping mechanism. The problem is that after all of these years I’m over it. I no longer know how to deal with him, because he doesn’t see the problem. I’m miserable!

I’ve been married to my husband for 12 years, the first 3 were wonderful, he was such a kind man. I knew he liked to drink, he was a funny, loving drunk, unlike my last boyfriend, so I thought I made a wise choice.

Now he drinks everyday, he gets off work at 3:30 and gets home at 6:30, he stops at a private club everyday, and comes home trashed, some times he can walk, sometimes he can’t and I wait till the next day to tell him not to do that again, it works for a little while.

He comes home so mad at me, I’ve never done anything to him, I’ve learned to stay quiet, when he comes home because he wants to fight, I see fire in his eyes, he pushes me a lot, I don’t know if this will get worse, so I just go into myself and stay there until I go to bed.

I can’t leave him, I have nothing, I work 2 days a week and I don’t have a car anymore, he smashed it.

He breaks things, he does things just to make me mad. I don’t know why he wants me to be mad.

I think I still love him. We haven’t slept in the same bed for 3 years. Sex doesn’t happen anymore. He can’t, I guess that’s the alcohol too. He doesn’t brush his teeth anymore, so I can’t stand to kiss him.

I am so afraid he’s going to break my spirit, I pray a lot. I just want to know how to deal with it.

Hi I m 52 years old married for 25 years to an alcoholic. Cannot stand anymore his alcoholic behaviour as effecting my health. Got big responsibility if three grown up children and two elderly parents in the house. Want to end this peaceful and sensibly .please help .

My husband I were both partying a lot when we met. I didn’t think anything about his drinking. We were just having fun. But we made a baby, got married, and 10 years later we have a family, 2 full time jobs between us, and no time for each other. About ten months ago he said he was starting AA. I didn’t even know he was still drinking to excess. Over the past year, I’ve come to believe that our entire relationship is a sham. He’s always been more committed to his drinking than he has been to me. All those times I made a request for something and he told me we didn’t have the money, because he was spending it on booze and peep shows. he just lied. I’m at a loss. I knew he liked to drink, but what I didn’t know was that I was being lied to for years. I feel so hurt by the violation of my trust and good faith. I feel so naïve. Now that he’s sober I feel a pressure to let the past go, but the reality of the past is just hitting me. He’s been lying all this time. I made decisions that were built on putting my faith in someone who is a lying, manipulative person. We have two children. Our kids are well bonded to him and he is dedicated to them. I don’t want to hurt my family. I don’t want to be a victim. I don’t know what to do. I just take it day by day.

In the middle of getting a divorce from my husband. We have been together for 19yrs, have an 18yr old, 13yrs, and 12yr old. This past year has been rough – no regard for me, the marriage, or the family. He has been “sneaking drinking. He will hide in his shop till 10+pm “working”, or have overnight jobs (he works construction – BS), he goes out with his 20+yr old employees (he’s in his mid 40’s), then claims he’s going to AA meetings (which means going to the casino or strip club). He will not come home for 1-7+days at least a couple times a month.

I have been alone in this marriage for years. My husband’s routine is come home, eat, lay in bed. He has no real interaction with me or the kids. Our running joke was, “here comes Mr. Angry”. He would come home and the stress level in the house would rise. My husband has been sneaking drinking for most of our marriage. I am the crazy one for questioning if he has been drinking, smelling his breath. Well, confirmation from friends when I have talked recently to them – hell yea, he’s drinking when he goes out of town to fish. He drinks drinks with his employees (those beers are supposed to be for his employees in that shop fridge – they are not his?!?!)

Our kids are active in sports, we have played for years in the same clubs. People have thought I was a single mom because he never comes around. Of course, when somebody comments in the stands, who is that man? He was offended. Boy I heard how nobody knows him at the club, and its my fault. Well, I am sorry, I was the one taking these kids to practices and and games for 10yrs – where have you been? Oh let me guess, WORKING!

Working is his excuse. Working is the excuse his recovering alcoholic brother used, working is what his mother did, while those two boys ran loose in their teens. But that’s okay because you are “working”. He owns his own business, he did that when we got married and I provided the benefits. When I would complain about the expense to his mother about his fishing habit (which the family was NEVER a part of), her response was “Well at least he isn’t drinking”. She is so dumb. I replied, “$80k can pay for a lot of therapy.” But thinking back, that is how is brother would work her over to buy/subsidize his stuff (computer, tv, race car, horses), he would say, “I can do this instead of drink”. She would then foot the bill.

He has solitary habits. He fishes, owns an $80k fishing boat, but the family never goes on it. He can clear 8wks and year, and pay $6k+ in entry fees to fish, but boy did I hear about how much our family cruise cost this past spring. Mind you on a 7 day cruise, he only spent time with the me and the kids at dinner, on the excursions, and playing 3 games of bingo. Oh, did I mention that he had disappeared for 8 days right before that cruise? He showed up the morning we left.

Now we are separated, and getting a divorce. He calls me to lament how expensive groceries are, how expensive household stuff is. Wow – Yeah, I know – I have bought those items for the last 19yrs. Oh, he only cries over money. How much he will have to pay in child support, how much he is going to lose on the house when we sell it. He said I put so much into that house, now I won’t have anything to show for it. I replied, “Yeah, I know what it is like to invest so much into something and not have anything to show for it.” Needless to say, that went over his head.

His mother is back to enabling. His brother died in spring, and that become another excuse to drink. The brother lived in the upper unit of the mom’s duplex with his wife and kid. She enabled that brother, daughter in law and grandson. Cooking, cleaning, laundry, chaufering. Now she has her baby boy back and is enabling him. I find out that my husband’s brother’s widow is now texting creepy stuff -to my husband, hitting on him. Good God – to be out of that dysfunctional family.

He loves the kids. He has a 50% commitment level to his 1/wk visits with two of the kids. When he cancels at the last minute, they aren’t even phased. To quote the 13yr old, “Mom, its not like he’s been around for the last several years.” “What is normal Dad even like?” They have only know their father to be a removed figure in their lives. Somebody who shows up at night and lays in bed an watches TV.

So, years later you are reviewing your life. How many DUI’s during our marriage? Looking back, he was drinking more than he was sober. Yeah, we did have stints of sobriety, but you could tell when that ended; he was too busy working to go to meetings, he felt his M,W,F meetings were cliquey, he would start not talking to hot about friends in the program. Then he claimed to be going to different AA Meetings. He now has a recovering drug addict working for him (this guy’s Dad is the neighborhood alcoholic my husband is friends with). This employee is 20yrs younger than my husband and drinks (great move for an addict).

So, here I am – in love with an alcoholic who is incapable of loving me/doesn’t love me. Yeah, he says he loves me, but is “not in love with me”. I supposed our marriage got in the way of his drinking. Well it is what it is. As painful as it is….

My husband is an alcoholic. This is my second marriage, my first after 21 years decided to “fall in love” with another woman. I met my new husband shortly after my divorce. Finally found true love (never had it all my life that includes the love of my father who was also a drunk). Maybe because I grew up with it I have little to no tolerance for it with my husband. My kids are young adults but I still try to hide his drinking, though they are well aware of it. My husband has admitted he has a problem, has told me he wants to quit, has told me he wants help. We tried a 6 day outpatient detox, all that did was he stopped buying beer for a little bit, but kept up with his Jim Bean and Loco’s (which by the way have a large alcohol content. I’ve changed my life to “live” around him being drunk, meaning I stay home in the evenings (see he is a functional alcoholic) as he goes to work each day and works hard. In the evening 7 days a week ( the weekends he starts by 11:00 drinking) he is drinking everyday. I prayed on this before I got married I was engaged for 2 years before I decided to walk down the aisle. I love him very much, deep down inside he is a good man. My anxiety and depression is a way of life now. He can be verbally mean though this happens when I “discuss” his drinking or when its one of those nights that I’m just tired of him coming to bed drunk. I even asked him if he needs to be drunk to be with me. My son 21 has anger issues he has put a lot of stress on my marriage as well, but no excuse for the hubby to get drunk daily. I’ve had his parents come over to help deal with him. I’ve “threatened” to have him go back and live with mom and dad. As I’ve read in other posts when we have a “good” fight he might let up for a bit but never for long. The detox didn’t work and I’m physically and mentally tired. We are now in counseling to try and help him. So far we have agreed that he is not “ready” to stop drinking thus detox and possibly this counseling may not work. I can’t afford for him to go into a rehab (like the stars do) and have him possibly lose his job. I’m thinking of going to Al-Anon now, but angry that I would have to because he has the drinking problem. I’m now close to the “I don’t care anymore” and that’s not good for either of us. He’s told me to stick by him he can’t do this without me, but I’m sure we’ve all heard that before. I’ve posted in “prayer” groups asking for prayer, I go to Church and pray, yet nothing changes. My biggest fear is having to end this marriage, won’t lie don’t want to go through another divorce, yes I know that is no reason to stay. I stay or have him “stay” the home is mine, because I truly love him and I know he loves me. I read articles on the internet where most say there is no hope for a relationship to last if there is a drunk in it. That little voice in my head is worried about what others will think, if they knew what my life was really like, they’d probably say “Why do you stay”? I ask him daily if he drank (especially on weekends if I have gone out to do an errand), or I’ll check in with him on his day off if I’m at work. I can tell by his text messages if he has been drinking or not (I know you probably think it is ridiculous) but I can tell. I’m constantly asking him to be “good” when I do leave for something. If I got out with my daughter my stress level is so high because I know when I get home he’ll be drunk or on his way to being drunk. He lost his license many years ago (before me) so when we met I had to drive him everywhere. I was committed to him thinking I could “change” that part of him. I helped him finally get his license back, see he is a auto mechanic and that is his “livelihood” as he will tell you. But I know he’s gotten behind that wheel after drinking. He’s mad because I won’t put our home in his name I’m the only one on it. I was honest with him and told him I didn’t want to lose everything if he screws up and does damage or worse yet hurt someone because of his drinking. I’m just so tired I don’t know what is the right thing to do, other than try and continue to help him. But I guess I have to wait until he is “really ready”. Thank you for listening.

My partner of 7 years has always been a drinker. When we first met (15 years ago) he was a happy, outgoing, fun loving person – with or without alcohol.
Now he’s a horrible person to be around when he’s had a drink. I resent him and it kills something in our relationship every time he starts an argument just because he’s had a drink.
When he’s sober I wouldn’t want to be with anyone else in the world.

He managed 5 months sober earlier this year but sadly relapsed and now seems worse than he was before. It breaks my heart to see him so lost and scared.

I’m not sure how we can live the rest of our lives like this though.

My husband is an alcoholic. I even hate saying that. I love him with my soul. We have been together 21 years and married for 14. We have a 13 year old daughter. My story is a lot like the others.
About 8 years ago he was drinking heavy. I mean a half pint from our house to the sitters to get out daughter. The sitter lived 5 mins from our house. He really liked the hard stuff then. I will never forget one Christmas eve he was drunk and mad and took off in our jeep. He ended up driving our car off of the end of the runway at the municipal airport and sank it in the mud. We find this out after he walked 5 or more miles in the snow an below freezing temps to get home. Needless to say he was given a ultimatum. Me and your daughter or the alcohol. HE CHOSE US for four years. No drinking! Then it’s our anniversary and we go to dinner and I made a mistake by asking him if he would like one small margarita with me. I’m not a drinker at all. Any way that was the end of his sobriety. He says it wasn’t but he has blamed me for it and I take the blame. I thought he could socially drink. WRONG. he tries to hide it But our 13 year old now is calling him out on it. He lies and said he had only had 2 beers when we know it’s way more. My daughter and I just don’t say anything anymore. Our daughter got sick and we found out at 13 years old she has an ulcer. I really thought after he heard that things would change. As usual. Wishful thinking. I’m more worried about our little girl than myself even tho I have a life threatning heart problem. And ulcers and I’m 40. Now he is trying to change. Because I gave him the ultimatum again. He won’t get help he says he can do it on his own. He drinks to make the pain and thoughts of a bad childhood go away. That is what he tells me. I love him with my soul and I will never leave him. As bad as I want to sometimes. His family could care less but my family is behind him one million percent. I need help to help him and our daughter.

I just got married in August and my husband is a alcoholic. He doesn’t drink everyday but when he does he goes all out. His friends drink, his family drinks except his one sister who is a recovering alcoholic. What’s so frustrating is his family knows and tells me he needs to get help but they have a problem too. We go over to his parents house to only have liquor and beer during the visits. I’m 8 weeks pregnant, my husband lost his job due to his attendance issue because he would stay up all night drinking pass out and wouldn’t wake up in time to get to work. I am stressed all the time. I can’t trust him to go to plaid without buying beer, I work evenings and have a 8 year old Daughter from a previous relationship. I’ve come home from work to find him drinking liquor with friends when my daughters asleep even when I told him I don’t like him drinking when I am at work and my kids is there at the house. He doesn’t see a problem with it. He’s already been warned by his doctor he is at risk for psoriasis of the liver. He is only 28. He chain smokes when he drinks too so that’s not helping. My fairytale of a life I thought I was getting is turning into a nightmare.

My wife and I have been together for about 7 1/2 years now and have two young children ages 4 and 6. We both come from families where drinking a lot is generally accepted and normal. I grew up with an alcoholic father and for the longest time refused to drink. Over time I let my guard down and found drink I enjoyed and having a few beverages together at night became a normal thing. We had probably more than what is probably recommended, but it wasn’t to an extreme that caused problems.

There’s a much longer story that I started to write up, but the jist of it is that she got fired. She was under a microscope that was unfair and became a target. The only gratification is that after she was fired, a massive amount of people left that place and those that came in to replace those that left, also immediately left.

Anyways, this was the trigger that pushed the already probably too much drinking to a real problem.

Over the past month or so it has been picking up. She’d go or with a friend or her sister which whatever, that’s fine. But she began to break promises and not reply to texts or calls. She’d say she’d be home soon early in the night, only to not hear from her several hours later. When she did come home she was extremely drunk and would berate me, or it would be well past bar close and I was either sleeping or trying to sleep as I had to get up early to take our oldest to school.

This was hard enough, but the worst was yet to come. She started to purposely say or do things to hurt me. She tells me to trust her but repeatedly does things to chip away at that trust. Several times she just hasn’t come home and says she slept in the truck or blacked out at some random place. She sees no problem with it, but I find it very wrong on several levels. She says, when she’s sober, it hurts her too as she does these things, but they keep happening.

Yesterday we had a good talk, I thought, about her getting back on track and she went to a meeting on her own accord, so she said. Well, last night she said she was just going to get out and clear her head and stay occupied, so I trust her and say fine. She never came home. I haven’t seen her yet today because she didn’t come home until I was out taking our child to school and she’s in bed yet.

I could probably go on. I used to enjoy having a beverage with her. But living through this destruction has led me to quite altogether. Last Saturday night was the last night I had even a drop. I can only hope to be a positive influence as I don’t know what else to do anymore. When she’s gone I can’t sleep because I worry so much. I’m trying really hard to be healthier and exercise and the like, but my insides feel like they’re being repeatedly stabbed. I fear anytime she walks out the door she’s going to get a drink somewhere and keep on until she passes out, which is why I was hesitant to say fine to her going out last night.

I’ve been in a relationship for 10 years. I met him and I felt like my heart was pulled to him instantly. We would sit up at random hours and talk on AIM and he had a daughter with his ex girlfriend. I am a little over a year older than he is, and although I had a lot of people telling me to be careful I loved him and his daughter, so I took that leap and it has been filled with so many highs and lows my brain and heart are never able to catch up. About a year into our relationship I saw how much his drinking damaged our relationship and the way I felt about him. He would rage and scream at me about being unfaithful which was so silly to me at the time seeing as how I never talked to any males and was always home. He got physical a few times and like an idiot I would attempt to leave and only found myself staying with him and letting his sober side apologize. We both had a really hard life with plenty of abuse and addict parents, but I kept myself as far away as I could from being anything like my mother. I’m happy to say I am succeeding when it comes to that. Fast forward to having a child of our own. We nearly died due to complications and he had to be delivered a month early which was so scary. I had so many reasons to just leave after seeing his behavior and how he would choose drinking with his old band instead of going with me to find out the sex of our son. Instead I stayed and on occasion I’d stand up for myself just to have him knock me down with harsh words and really mean/bullie like behavior. Like many others I see posting, I am in love with a side of him… the sober side. That loving and sincere man I’ve tried to keep strong for. At some point he just kept putting others before our son and I. His daughter lived with her mom who refused court ordered visitation and moved without letting him know where. Blocked phone numbers and it’s still an on going battle which I’m sure is a big reason for how his drinking is now, but then again I’m done trying to make excuses for him.

Skip to several years ago, christmas morning. He was on a 3 day streak at that point. My birthday is December 23rd and on that day he refused to buy me a gift after telling me we were going to get one after picking up his friends to come party. I bought my own alcohol just to have a couple drinks and relax on my own. That is what he drank from that night until Christmas morning. A big bottle of my favorite rum that I had planned on having for a long while… that morning he was a sloppy mess of a drunk. Came to say sorry to me because my cousin was trying to help him see what he was doing to my heart and mind. I wasn’t happy to see him so wasted and that’s when he starts calling me names and being so horrible to me. Even spit in my face twice. I lost it and became physical with him and kicked him out. He slept in my cousins house and when he woke up and was more sober he was devastated by what he had done to me. Crying, sobbing, sorry, anger at himself, the works… I broke up with him for about a year after that. Maybe longer actually. Things at my house wasn’t working out (roommate started using my rent to pay off fines and stuff of that nature.) So I swallowed my pride and let my mom come bring my son and I home to her place. My sister and sons dad lived there at the time so we all just got along and then he was sober. We got along and I fell in love all over again.

As I’m typing this I feel so stupid and can’t stop the tears from falling. Let’s fast forward yet again to when I had lost my patience again and had my dad kick him out after a hefty fight and many warnings from my dad about no alcohol in the house, but it always found its way into his heart and stomach. He moved with a friend and got a good job. Stopped drinking and seemed really serious about staying sober. Said it was for him and seeing how it damaged me made it even easier to stop because he loved me so much and hated what he had done. We did great at Co parenting and then it was like the world made sense again. Our son was happy and healthy, we were both so happy together and said we were going to start over. No lies, no drinking, no toxic stuff. He proposed and we had our wedding date set for October 29th of this year and a couple months before our big day he started drinking again… which turned into hiding it once I found about 15 empty vodka bottles hidden in my car under the seat… he lies to me so much… he promises over and over…

I couldn’t handle it so I postponed the wedding. I don’t see how I could take that step even after all this time, knowing he is hiding alcohol… if he’s hiding that what else could he be hiding when worried it might hurt me? I’ve always had self esteem issues. I get told I’m pretty and stuff, but my issues are much greater… which makes me so much more upset when I often find myself telling myself “you deserve better. You really are worth so much more.” The addiction is so selfish and I’m so lost and alone in this… actually I’m not alone because my son is here with me dealing with the nonsense. I hope to find the strength to walk away if he can’t find the strength to let alcohol go.

I have been with my hubby for 23 years. In the past two year I started to feel real unloved by him. I started thinking what am I doing wrong or he just not attracted to me. When I realized he was drinking a six pack day I began to believe he isn’t capable of showing me love and effection. Don’t know if this is a livable arrangement He also did some very unforgivable hateful thing. Help any ideas

My husband and I have been together for 20 years, married for 15 years. We have two wonderful kids together. I used to think that I was the luckiest person to have such an amazing marriage. We were best friends, soul mates. We shared the same interests in life and always had great respect and trust with one another. He came from two parents who were functioning alcoholics. I never thought it could happen to him as he always seemed in control at parties or when drinking at home. He never went to the bars. Five years ago, I could see small things happening to him, especially after a long weekend of drinking or a holiday. He began to take frequent days off of work because he did not feel well. Shortly after that, he began working on a high stress job and later I found out he began drinking after work everyday. I was clueless as I work around 60 hours a week. He lost his job two years ago. He began drinking heavily. I would come home with him passed out. I began to feel like I did not have a partner anymore. It was up to me to keep the house going, work, clean, and to provide for our kids. He was in the house physically but never here emotionally. I had to learn to hide my feelings as small conversations would spin into huge fights. He was a master at making me feel like it was my fault. He would belittle me, put me down. It never got physical but very close when I would find numerous bottles of vodka hidden around the house. At this time I sent him to a rehab program. I had hopes that this would be a new starting point for us. He came home after three weeks and relapsed. He went back to rehab. He never stopped after rehab. Soon after his first rehab experience, he came home and had a seizure from trying to detox on his own. Back to the hospital and another rehab program. His doctor explained to him that if he continued, he would die. This did not stop him for too long. He relapsed again after three weeks of being out of a rehab program. All together, in two years, he has gone to 6 rehab centers. In September, I had enough. I could not take the constant fights and roller coaster. I asked for him to move out as I felt I was drowning. He moved out in September and we agreed this was so that he could pull his life together and we could again be happy. His moving out only escalated the problem. I’m more at peace because there is not constant fighting, however, he continues to go on binges…hides out in his apartment, continues to drink. I’m always worried, scared, wondering if he is sober. I track him with my phone….I often feel I’m insane. Why do I keep taking him back? Why do I allow him to do this to me? I have gone to a lawyer to file for a divorce but keep putting it on hold..as I always have hope that he will change and that I can have my old life back. I know I need to realize that in our marriage he has changed and I need to move forward. I believe divorce is hard enough, but when divorcing a person who is an alcoholic and that you still love, it seems sometimes impossible. I pray every day that I have the courage to move forward. In either situation, it seems bleak. I cannot live with an alcoholic that won’t stop, but I will also live out the rest of my life without the person who I believed was my sole mate.

My husband is…possibly a functioning alcoholic. He hasn’t always been. Before we got married, I discovered his addiction to pornography. He pleaded with me and promised he would change. Several more times it came up again, and finally when I feel like he has kicked it, he started with alcohol. He drinks the hard stuff. A few times now he has promised to stop. He does for a week or two, then starts up again. He is not mean or abusive or anything, in fact is a very happy, sappy drunk.

Today though, a huge red flag came up when he was already getting to the point of drunk by 6 pm, while caring for our children!!! Then he wanted to take them in the car with him to pick up pizza. I insisted they stay home. This is dangerous!!

He is depressed (and on meds), won’t shower or brush his teeth (gross), won’t do chores, won’t exercise, is morbidly obese, won’t do things with our children, yells at them when sober, sex is getting less and less because he drinks every night, and honestly my attraction to him has severely decreased, and to be honest, I don’t even want to be with him anymore. But we’re Christians and made a promise to God and each other. But still I keep wondering if I can/should leave with the kids. We’ve been in counseling, and things were better for a little while, but then just get worse again. I am just SO TIRED and want to be happy again!!!!! 🙁

Help. Three years I have been dealing with this same problem. He use to drink daily but has cut back a bit. Although I don’t even know if that is true because he hides his beer. He has told me that he has done that often. On the weeks he works to midnight he goes to the bar with his buddies. I dont know if it’s every night because I am in bed. He admits that he goes because I am not up anyway so what does it matter. I have printed stuff. Bought books. Everything I can think of to help him. Once he starts drinking he won’t stop. Then he is mean. Yells. Throws things. Verbally abusive. He has never hurt me but I am beginning to think it is just a matter of time before that happens. He is on his second dui. He spent time in jail and I thought that would be his bottom. I stood by him. Drove him to court and jail on weekends. Helped him find a new job and continue to drive him wherever he needs to go. But the beer store. I won’t take him to get alcohol and that makes him angry.
I am so angry at myself. I keep thinking what would I tell my daughter if she was facing a relationship like this? I would tell her to run!! But something keeps me here.

Last night I told him that this was it. He had two weeks to move out. Of course he won’t remember in the morning any of the stuff that happened.

He will be nice and we will keep going and then it will happen again. Why can’t I get off this roller coaster ride?

I met my husband when I was 14 years old and he was 19. Its 25 years later and were still together. However he has a problem which he does not think is a problem. He is a Friday and Saturday alcoholic which to him does not seem like a problem. He works away from home and comes home on weekends and leaves again the Sunday. When he gets home on a Friday he starts drinking, usually a whole bottle of Klipdrift Brandy, he then becomes very aggressive and swears at me saying I don’t love him anymore and I treat him like crap. He will then pass out only to find another reason for him start over on Saturday. I try and calm him down but it proves a difficult task when I’m sober and he is drunk. I myself will enjoy a glass of wine now and again but I am not a big drinker and prefer to be sober. I find myself not wanting him home anymore and would prefer he stay where he works just so I don’t have to deal with the drinking. I tried to talk to him about it and he said you married me when I was drinking why do you want to change me now. I am sure he is right, but when we got married I was young and stupid and though he was cool. Now I am older (40) and wiser and not too bad looking I think, and I want to be alone. I’m longing for peace and quite. Sex is out of the questions cause he passes out before we can be intimate. Intimacy is something I feel very strongly about. I have not had an affair yet but find my self fantasizing about other people. I know its wrong but what do I do with a husband who only comes home to empty his laundry bag.

I have no idea where to start. My fiance’ is not an alcoholic but is an alcohol abuser. She goes out a couple of nights a week with her friends and drinks to the point that she has no idea what is going on around her. These friends seem to enable her and this has caused me to resent them. These are our mutual friends so it is very hard for me. She also has a strong fondness for pot. She will seek it out from anyone. She was looking for pot last weekend and found someone that had some that was a total stranger. She got into his car to smoke it and he locked the doors and drove off with her. No one could find her. The group of friends that she was with could not find her and just went home. It was four in the morning and she still wasnt home. I called some people to see where she was and they then told me she disappeared and didnt know where she was. I was in a complete panic. I was so angry at these “friends” for not calling me when they could not find her and just leaving her behind. She eventually made her way home but was in danger and the guy just shoved her out of the car into our drive way and sped away. He must have lost the nerve to do whatever he was thinking of doing to her. It scared her badly but I know it wont change her behavior. She begged him to take her home. Thank God he did. This isnt the first time she has gone missing after being at the bar. I now resent them and all she wants to do is be with them and I feel like I dont matter anymore because they let her destroy herself and I try so hard to help her and protect her from herself but I cannot. She is verbally abusive when she is drinking and says horrible things to demean me. The next day she always claims to not remember any of that abuse. Now this situation is brewing inside me and we have been fighting about damn near everything. She told me that it isnt working anymore and wants to leave me. I find this almost surreal. You do stuff that is wrong and when I get angry, hurt, or upset about it it is my fault and you make me feel guilty for feeling that way. I could type for days and days but I dont know what to do. I love her with all my heart and have suffered so much to stay with her. I dont know what to do. I often feel like this is my fault.

It’s always the same, every weekend. He begins to drink,tries to control it and then something snaps. He becomes verbally abusive and argumentive. He holds conversations with himself and denies disturbing the whole household. I know he is sick. I know he needs help. What I don’t know is why or what makes him drink. Monday it’s like nothing happened. Throughout the week I gain hope that maybe this weekend will be normal. But soon it starts all over again. I want to leave because I know I can’t help. So I am trying to help myself. Any suggestions?

Hearing these stories gives me life . Just under 2 months ago my husband of 7 yrs 12 years together got into another argument . This time was different I had always had an issue with his drinking always told him id support him through it , this time he left and turned into someone i didn’t know . He gave up but I had realized he had given up along time ago . He’s been drinking for years but it became a clear issue 5 years ago . It only got worse from there yet and still we remaind a family in love Bestfriends and he promised to stop time after time again . He left and I realized I didn’t know the man I was with anymore he’d come by for a few nights and go back to his mothers home . He told me he didn’t know if he wanted this anymore I then realized there was another woman involved at first he denied it but I found out everything he promised to stop and work it out we did good for the next few weeks till
I realized he was still talking to the other woman . He wanted me to stay while he figured it out but I had to make the descison to leave unless he’s willing to get help but he doesn’t see that there is an issue to him he’s doing all this because he wants to not because the addiction is taking over . He’s mean to me punched me in my face and refuses to help financially with the children . I have a great support system so I’m
Gonna use it . Thanks for listening

I love my husband but not his drinking problem. This last year has been horrible. the lies increased and then started to catch up with him or should i say me. He has always set it up for me to take the fall for him and i let it happen. From him stealing from the fishing club he talked me into being on the committee for to faking the receipt for the rego on my car (to which i coped a huge fine).

I called him out on it all about 6 months ago and he promised to he was going to rehab (lie) instead one day he called n called n called me while i was at work damanding money and when i kept saying no he turned up and i felt i had no choice but to give in. He took not only my money but my car and took off. I had to report him missing he was gone and made no contact with anyone for 5 days. he left me to tell his family his kids ( he has two beautiful boys, i have one. No kids together). He turned back up covered in bruising and his tail between his legs. He blamed me telling me his kids hated me and wanted him to live on his own so he left to stay at a friends house (a fellow drinking buddy) one street away. He always has a way of making me feel like its my foult.

He got caucht steeling grog about three time and he did end up going to rehab (self admitted) the day he was ment to be in court I have stuck by him all this time. We have been togetter for 10yrs. He is such a carring loveing person when he is sober but i hate who he is when he drinks.

He lasted just shy of three months in rehab before he left. He didnt tell me straight away that he had left. i discovered it when i rang the centre and was told by the staff. It’s been 2 months since he came home and he has only just told me the truth about why he left. He has been drinking the hole time he has been home. He was telling me he was going to aa meetings but i knew he was drinking.

I asked him to go back to rehab. That i had decided that he had to chose. Thats when he pretend that all was ok and stole my bank card with out me knowing said he was going to aa meeting but instead went drinking. all i got was a txt. I haven’t let him back in the house since. MInd u we talk everyday. He keeps saying he want us to work that he is going back to rehab. he has even given me a date on when he will be going. Yesterday he lied again saying he was going out west with a mate to get car parts. i got really angry and couldn’t explain why. He rang me and told me this while i was at work. when i got home and had time to think o worked it out that he had gone to the town over (15min drive) to work in the pub with hia mate.

Today i called him out. Its the first time throught it all that i have got really angry. He had promised me and the kids he would never work in a pub again. Even the kids told him themselves they are angry and don’t want to talk to him cause he always breaks his promises. He is still saying he is going back to rehab but needs to work untill he goes that he would kill himself if u cant give the kids good chrismas presents cause they missed out last year due to his problems and he will be going into rehab i week before christmas.

He says all the right things but then he does the opposite. Im so confused. How is it that i still love this man and want him in my life? Yes he is not living in our home at the moment but i wish he was. Will he ever get on top of this and be the husband and father we need. im tired of trying to keep ir together all the time. I hate that i have no control on if my marriage will get through this even though its all i want. I can seen he is struggling and that hurts was there more i could do? I had to step back and make him deal with his actions. only time will tell if he will follow through with what he is saying. limbo land is not a fun place to be.

Today marks the 12th year of my roller coaster marriage. My husband has got a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde thing going on when he drinks. He can be great to have fun with but at the same time his mean side comes out and he doesn’t care who gets caught in his path. We used to have friends and family come over to visit but now, he’s run them off with his foul temper. Today he went off on me about taking his last beer, which of course is impossible because I don’t drink beer and I was chatting with my sister in our bedroom. He scared my niece and nephew so bad that my sister left. I’m afraid I won’t see her for a long time.
The name calling and threats are becoming way too much for me. He’s admitted that he loves to drink and that he doesn’t have plans to ever stop.
I’m tired of being blamed for his downfall. I’m tired of trying to help someone who doesn’t want to be helped even though he says he needs me.
Im tired of his need to destroy things when he’s in a rage. I could go on and on, share more similar stories of the downside to alcoholism.
My love for him is also destroying me and he doesn’t care as long as he’s got his beer and cigarettes.

Lately I’ve been feeling so down on myself for choosing to be with an alcoholic. Since the time we met my significant other drank, here we are 13 years later and although we’ve had many bad times and some really awful times with the drinking we’ve accomplished so many great things. Sometimes I question myself, is this right? Is this normal? I try to keep our kids away from seeing when he drinks so much but I can only do so much. I hate when he’s on a drinking binge and there’s cans and bottles everywhere. I leave them so he can pick them up himself but he doesn’t and so my kids don’t see it I end up picking up. I love this man when he’s sober and he is an amazing man and dad when not drinking. I only pray to God that he finds the strength to overcome his drinking addiction. I too worry about him when he goes off to work and I can hear in his voice that he’s been drinking. This is something that we argue about all the time when he drinks. Why is it that he thinks he can drive after drinking so much? Once he is sober and we talk about it and of course comes the remorse for drinking so much and the guilt. He can go for sometime without drinking but then he gets the urge to drink and thinks he can control how much he has maybe once or twice but then the binge drinking starts again. And it’s any alcohol he went from beer to wine to vodka to champagne… Doesn’t matter what he drinks he always over does it and can get to the point of blacking out.. Life goes on with my kids and I but it’s like I’m living 2 lives. It’s so hard my family knows he drinks but they don’t know about any of the troubles he’s gotten us into because of his drinking. I’ve veen trying my hardest to focus on myself so that I can be strong for myself and be there for my kids. I pray to God to help guide me down the correct path.

I have been married to my husband for 22 years. I still love him he has been drinking for a long time, he has gotten worse since his mom’s death. And after he found a job he finally slowed down, than he was starting to forgetting stuff like where he put his lawnmower at work. Than the doctor had ran test and he told my husband that he couldn’t work anymore. That really made him drink more the doctor told him that he alcohol dementia and some memory loss, and he looses his balance alot. Than we found out that his lever has gone bad, they told my husband to stop drinking my husband said no he was ready to die. And all we do is argue he says I’m seeing someone else but I’m not. When he starts I leave the house for a couple of hours, than he is still at it. He has never hit me just verbal words . I’m at my straw I asked him if he would go to detox again he said yes, than he says he never said it. This has been going on for about 2 years.

When my husband drinks, he gets drunk and acts like an ass. Been going on for several years but never his fault or I’m overreacting. As if my life calling is to point out that drinking and driving puts our family at risk, drinking and gambling away 20k sets us back, etc. Not that it matters because “he doesn’t have a problem.” I wish we never got married. God, I would’ve saved myself so much freaking stress. But nope, I get to play “bad guy” who criticizes “him having fun.” All while trying to protect our 20 m.o. from the B.S. I told him the next time he drinks I’m flat out leaving the house with our 20 m.o. and staying at my parents. He can be a worthless drunk on his own time.

I need help! My husband is an alcoholic. He has been sober for several years. He never got help. Went to a few AA meetings, but didn’t stick with them. He quit (finally) cold turkey. He is drinking again and he lied about it. Called me “too paranoid.” Made it feel like I was the one with the problem, but I KNEW he was drinking AGAIN. Found beer cans in his closet and I confronted him. He admitted it. Promised he would quit. A week later I come home to him asleep on the couch. I wake him. He was drunk. I told him he has to leave. He left but I think he will come back… I can’t deal with it again. We have 3 kids. He is very mean to them and especially mean to me when he drinks. I feell so lost.

wow. I read just through three of these postings and each one was just like my story. Except, I am not married to my guy. We have been together for 5 years now. I will not marry him. He does have severe anxiety he rarely talks of, and when he is sober I see the embarrassment and regret in his face and many a times he has apologized. But, it is getting old and I am not having any fun or feeling any good from this relationship. He hates that he drinks like that so he sleeps his days away, or works a lot. I hide the keys from him. He will try and go driving when he drinks like that.
I feel bad leaving him. But, this is not the way I want to live or have my daughters live. We are young and like to get together with friends and…he just takes it a notch way to far! Its embarrassing sometimes too.

I dont know what to do. I am angry at him for being this way. when we met, we would exercise together everyday, play and just have lots of laughs. He seems to be unhappy with his career and stuck. I just dont know what to do. I really cant do this too much longer.
I feel that perhaps I haven’t left him because I cannot fathom the thought of him with another woman! I just cant handle that. I have been working on getting myself past that issue so that I can move on. His behavior and drinking is just out of control.

Dear Husband,

Last week, you came home drunk after I went to bed, you know, like you usually do, hun. You started cooking something, then passed out on the couch, and the house filled with smoke. I woke up from the smell, ran downstairs, cleared the smoke out of the house, and threw the burning food away. The next morning, you promised not to use the stove when drinking. Last night, again, you started cooking on the stove after coming home drunk. This morning, I went into the basement and turned the gas off to the kitchen.

No, dear, your drinking doesn’t hurt anyone but you.

Love,
Your Wife

I have known my husband for about going to 9 yrs. We met an I saw red flags but did not knw how to identify them to him having issues w alchohol. He is a functional alcoholic. A year an half ago I started theraphy. I learned a lot about co-dependent. I did my own research an threw my therapist I got more inside. I love my husband just like all you do. The same story. But I got treatment for myself an its been a slow process but never the less I know that I gave my husband enough time to get treatment for himself but fails. Failed about 100+ times. BBut I had hope an fargave all the disrespecting and dishonesty from the disease of alchohol. I am more aware an see how this affects me and my children all under 7 the youngest 5. So enough is enough I dont want our kiddos repeating this cycle. Wich its going to be repeated and I need to peotect them. I no longer can keep hoping and feeling like my loving wife actions will safe my husband frpm this disease. Only he can so I hope the best for him I truly do. I pray for him he is always going to be engrave into my hearth. But I have to protect my kiddos this will no longer affect us this way. Unfortunately he is already destroying our family n affecting our kids but I will no longer tolerate this at my home. He is the bread winner but I will go forward I have plan A plan B plan C all leget ways to stay upfloat. Im already getting a full time job because of my will for my home to be a safe and norturing environment for my family to be a unit. Its a long road of recovery for me n my kids but we are on the way. And the recovery that a man we love has caused so much pain. When he is my husband and dad he is so awesome but we hardly see that person we love. We see the alchoholic and Im tired of doing this for him Im doing this for me n mi kids. Hope this help we deserve to live happy, and die knowing we did what we could so we can be happy. Better to be alone that with bad company.

I was in a relationship with my boyfriend for 5 years we had a daughter and I hoped he would cut back on drinking but instead it got worse I had to call the cops when my daughter was only 10 days old because he got drunk and started to yell at me and I new I needed to leave but wouldn’t let me he kept me from using car seat to drive away so I called cops so they showed up and said I can leave but that was the first of many other times because I thought he would change he would drink every other day get drunk and mean yell say horrible things to me and I would try to leave and he would block hallway so I would have to sneak out back door and go to neighbors and call cops or wait tulll he fell asleep then I new I was ok. He let air out of my tires so I couldn’t drive away . He would apologize but tell me why he’s so mad at me and it’s my fault he act like thatt he is nice for few days and back to being Ashe . So when my daughter was 6 months we went for trip to fishing and he drank for the day and di drove us back home except he got on subject how he hates my family and me I’m stupid and I pull over side ride he yelling I say stop our daughter is hearing u acting like this he wouldn’t shut up he got in driver seat and started to drive away funk with my daughter in care he left me and got a dui I prayed she would be ok and he didn’t change it only had gotten worse I left him and got my own place but kept going. Back and forth with him and keeping my house hoping he would quit drinking but no he slowed down and pickup where he left of from few days sober. All I do now is finally still go home with my daughter every night and he goes to his house and drinks away from me and I have a nice home with my daughter where he can’t treat me bad anymore I can leave his house with my daughter and a safe place called home and am still working on my boundaries and need support and wisdom of how to stay strong and not fall back to his tricks he won’t chang he likes to drink and it’s all a game for him I am trying to get get healthy and stronger and know how to deal with alcoholic who can chose better and I deserve better

My alcoholic and I have been together for going on six years. As i write this, he is puking all over my nice memory foam bed that i will no doubt have to clean. I have told my alcoholic how his drinking affects not only me, but his recovering mother who lives with us. It doesn’t seem to get through, no matter how many different ways i say it. He “knows” he has a problem, promises me he’ll “change”, and I’m the one who has ralph on my favorite sleep pants because he’s just letting it all out all over my bedroom.
I’m a child of an alcoholic so this type of behavior isn’t new to me. My mother was an alcoholic and subjected my dad, my brothers, and myself to years of hurt and abuse. On a few occasions she even had mild forms of suicidal tendencies. So as I said, none of this is new. What i never anticipated was how i would feel being less attractive to my man than a bottle of crown is. I don’t want to leave. He won’t stop. His mother is on the verge of relasp.
I just don’t know how to remedy this. He’s amazing when he’s sober, that’s the guy i fell in love with to begin with. But, but… I tell him these things and still i smell puke. Our relationship is suffering along with my self respect. I want there to be hope because tomorrow is always a new day. In this garbage can of a situation, though? I just feel like we’re always running in circles. I’m too damn young to feel this damn old… I just want to be happy. And not smell puke, that us on my bed, and my sheets.

Tears. So many tears

I have been married 36 years. My husband was a weekend drinker and I was a social drinker. However, now my husband drinks 24/7 and takes narcatics precribed drugs, already had open heart surgery by age 41. He has high blood pressure and diabetic with insulin. He lost the sight of left eye and I’d continue to drink. He’s right is losing he sight too. Now when he drinks his putting me down. I learned not to argue the point, I now let go and let God take care of it. I pray for him,cause I know he is lost. He’s mom died 5 years ago and he’s dad 3 years later at our house. He didn’t stop drinking since his mother died. Sometimes I feel like I am going crazy and how do I cope with this. So I pray again and listen to Christian music and always ask Jesus to help me. Which He Does After I Pray And Listen To Music I Get peace for a little while and it helps me. I have faith in God that one day he will stop abusing alchol and precription drugs

My divorce will be final in October 2016. My husband left me 10 yrs. ago. He is an alcoholic. In our 23 yrs. together, during his drinking, he abused me verbally and physically but I never left him, I forgave him and took care of him. I never was absent from work, not even when I got a black eye from him, nor when he left his finger prints on my throat. Many of times, I thought this is the day I will die. I don’t know why I never left him. This past 10 yrs. he still abuses me by lying to me just so he can get his way, sexually but I don’t give in. He doesn’t respect me always putting me down, lying to his family, friends about me. But in reality, he was getting deeper into drinking and smoking pot with our sons best friend mother. While I was working 2nd shift at the hospital, they were together behide my back. Who does that? He continues to treat me like am a call girl, a nobody and I can’t understand why! I never turned my back on him. I was the one he called when he hit bottom. I was the one who took him to the hospital and rehab. Now, he said he hasn’t drink this past year. He got a pin but I can tell in his voice that he had a drink and he is lying to the AA group. I still hurt, the pain doesn’t go away cuz I loved my husband and I don’t know him. I am a very religious, good, caring person. I think of others before myself. I forgive and I pray. Why can’t I move on? Why can’t I let go? Why does my husband have a hold on me when he is an ugly person, and am the opposite of him! I don’t drink nor smoke.

I feel each and every persons pain ..I have been with my alcoholic abusive partner since I was 16 ..I’m now 41..we have 5 chide 3 who are still school age at home ..my partner became alcoholic about 12 years ago..and it’s got progressively worse ..he’s had strokes ..been in intensive care he’s been admitted to hospital over 150 times took 10 overdoses of painkillers ..smashed the house up ..called me everything under the sun and blamed me for everything.he’s spent all our money and doesn’t work now either I’ve had to give up work to look after him as he is always causing grief .fighting in the street calling people names etc .I look in the mirror and don’t recognise the person staring back ..I’m a shell of my former self and I hate myself nearly as much as I hate him ..I have no family and nowhere to go..my children hate him and I feel that way too..he has destroyet any love I ever felt. He is not the same person and he will never change.I only hope a miracle happens to end this nightmare I live in daily and more to the point my beautiful children ..I wish each and everyone of you the best of luck with your journeys but take it from me ..it only gets worse ..and just when u think it couldn’t it gets worse again

I just don’t know where to start. All the emails have some kind of the same information that I am living. Met the best most honest man (54) in April the first date we have been inseparable. However, he is and has admitted to me he is an alcoholic. I was very scared at first to get involved because I have never been in a relationship with this kind of issue nor was I brought up in it. The first few weeks was good but we fight a lot . He starts fights and then don’t remember he started them and blames me for it. He has never been physical abusive but the mental is horrible. I do have my own place to live and he does his. He always wanted me to bring extra items like clothes, ect over and leave them so I will have them there. His son and his girlfriend lives with him also. They are in their early 20’s. They do not like me because I have tried to get him to slow down on his drinking at least and when he did the first month he stopped them from having Hugh drinking parties. So of course they think I am the enemy. About a month and a half ago he started a fight because I was staring at him. (that is all I done) and he told me to get my “””STUFF”” and get out. I had to do this right in front of his sons so I was humiliated. He called all weekend trying to make up and I fell for it. However, I feel so uncomfortable there with his family and he knows this. He says “well its my house I will have over here who I want to . Well I feel like I am in the middle. I am not wanted there by some and he wants me there. I hate going there I do. All it is to do is DRINK. He lives in the country and stays home all the time other than work. I hate it there…But I did tell him that if this ever happened again it would be the last time. Well this past weekend he drank maybe 10 beers but it was spaced out throughout the day. which he can handle fine but come Sunday (Monday a holiday) he started drinking heavy by that evening he was drunk and before the night was over he told me to get my :”:STUFF”” :: and get out. In the middle of the night I had to leave with all my stuff. Monday he called still kind of being an Ass then by Tuesday he is all sweet and loving. Thursday he is back to drinking a lot says his back hurts and he is taking mussel relaxers. (he does not abuse pills) he is a supervisor at a hugh chemical company. He told me today that if I don’t come over he is going to just set and drink. That he is bored and nothing to do. Well to start with I DONT WANT TO BE THERE… AGAIN HE HAS HUMILATED ME IN FRONT OF HIS FAMILY.

I have been married for 10 years and found out my husband was an alcoholic about 1 year after I married him. He is a high functioning alcoholic. He works from home. At 5pm, everyday, he starts drinking. He drinks a liter of wine with 6 beers every night. I have only discussed this with him a few times. It is useless. He is not going to change. I have no choice but to stay so I dont lose my house. I just never imagined my life would be this way.

Its almost 2 a.m. and finally my fiance, of 5 years,passed out. We had a really nice day together, having a picnic at a river. When we came home however, he got exceptionally drunk. He’d been an alcoholic for ad long as we have been together. He was playing the stereo really loud tonight, and I had to beg him repeatedly to turn it down. We are already about to be evicted over loud music and the drunken shenanigans. He was blasting rap music, with the bass shaking the walls. The security in our building said the last time the police come and arrest us for “disturbing the peace.” I Was having an upset stomach for hours, and he didn’t care in the least. Every place we live, we become alienated due to this sort of drunk scenarios. I took a chance tonight after 3 hours of pleading to be quiet, lower music at least, and I shut it off. Luckily, hr didn’t get angry, but instead fell asleep. This could’ve went terribly bad—I was at the breaking point- I was about to freak out. He looked so wasted- eyes glazed over, cussing me out, calling me names. Totally unreasonable. After a perfect afternoon, his behavior stung me especially bad. Yet, it is not new. He’s been in and out of jail his entire life- he’s 43 now- for drunk related offenses.CONVICTED OF 5 DUI’S. HITTING A COP. HITTING ME….MY daughter, who is 20, is DONE. ( NOT HIS CHILD) SHE FEELS I CHOSE HIM OVER HER, AND SOMETIMES I FEEL MAYBE I HAVE…. I AM ON A ROLLERCOASTER RIDE THAT WON’T END. I LOVE HIM AND KEEP HOPING HE WILL STOP DRINKING. …

I have been married for 3 years. My husband is an alcoholic. It is getting worse. He constantly rips me to shreds. He is getting physically abusive. He tries to burn me with cigarettes and lighters. Our biggest battle is over his driving. He has no license Thank God!!! He’s had 15 DUIs the last a few months back when he took our truck and I stood in front of it yelling for him not to take it. He got caught by being passed out on the road. As you can guess, he blames me for him getting a DUI. (NOT MY FAULT).
We recently moved to Kentucky were the DUI laws are incredibly lax. I am away from family and friends. I never have money due to his drinking. I try to attend alanon. But it causes a huge battle. I did recently get a job. I am not able to do for me at all. Fear keeps me as a prisoner.
I love my husband but I think he’s just too far gone.
Boundaries do not work with him. Even his family has tried boundaries to no avail.
I am feeling at a loss.

These stories are so familiar. My wife is an alcoholic. I also like to drink wine but if I drink too much I fall asleep; it’s like a built-in circuit breaker. She drinks too much and, sometimes, gets wildly angry. She’ll insult me calling me “pathetic” and a “loser.” She’ll scream and yell. She’ll insult my job, my bosses, my family, my friends. She’ll call me fat (I’m overweight but not so much; she’s proportionately much heavier from all the drinking).

She hates it when I talk to friends and will lash out at them to the point friends and family tend to stay away from me to avoid her. Then she tells me I have no friends and my family hates me (they’ve all been really clear they love me but they don’t want to face her wrath). She wrote a verbal attack against a co-worker of mine – that person’s crime being asking how she was doing, which I stupidly relayed to her – and that got me called into HR. They said “you could get fired for this.” And I said “really? for something my wife wrote?” Then the HR person started crying and said “no, not really, probably not – I don’t know – I’ve never seen something like this before” and reminded me there’s free psych counseling through our health plan.

Sometimes she’ll also hit me. She’s beaten me bloody a few times. All of times that happened I was asleep. She’d get drunk while I’m sleeping – I work and she doesn’t so she stays up drinking, alone – and wake me up and attack me. Then she’d say “you provoked me.” And I’ll tell her I was asleep, had been sleeping for hours, and when I went to bed she was perfectly happy (and either sober or not nearly so drunk). I’ve taken to recording her when she comes in drunk and angry. Sometimes that will calm her down because I tell her but other times it won’t. When I playback the recordings she’ll say “listen to me – I was trashed,” using the alcohol as an excuse. She thinks it’s funny.

Lately when she comes in raging in the middle of the night our daughter will wake up, come into the bedroom, and try to calm her down. She can get her to leave, to go to another room or the couch and stop the attacks but I think it’s really bad for her. She tells me she’s divorcing me and I say “ok.” Then she’ll tell me to go make that happen.

When she’s sober, and not hungover, she’s a different person. Fun, nice; we have a normal relationship. But she drinks almost every night; the only nights she won’t get drunk is for a night or two after an especially abusive bender but that doesn’t last long. This has been going on for years. Her doctor told her that her liver numbers on some kind of liver test are much too high, and that it’s from the drinking. He said she’s really hurting herself but she doesn’t listen. I feel like she’s killing herself and trying to make the rest of us as miserable as possible while she does it. I also feel like she’s a spoiled child but hate that I feel like that.

This sounds so much like my story. I’ve been with my boyfriend for nine years…..he has been drinking through all of it, and lying lying lying lying. I can’t tell you the crazy things he has done. Until him, I didn’t even know it was possible to hurt someone that much (I mean emotionally, not physically). He has ruined every holiday ever by either disappearing on a binge or showing up drunk, he has promised about a zillion times to stop drinking (never true, of course), he has gone on binges that last up to four days or even five days and during those times I’ve had to file missing persons reports with the Police….and on and on. Once he starts drinking, it doesn’t seem possible for him to stop; he drinks until he blacks out, every single time. I worry all the time he will die, because he is not young anymore, and binge drinkers like him are known to have heart attacks, etc. Plus he passes out in weird places, such as the middle of the road (true story) and once practically right in the river (also a true story – his lower body was in the river when he passed out) and he has almost frozen to death by passing out outside in winter. He lied about going to AA, saying he was going, when he had never gone even once. Same with going to a cousellor – claimed he went, and, years later, admitted he never went once. He promises to stop lying, and that never happens, of course.

He lies all the time about drinking. He stands me up. He ditches me to go drinking. He texts me and claims he’s working late, and then later I find out of course that he was at the bar with his drinking buddies (who he claims he doesn’t hang out with, but he does).He used to be a drug addict, too, and claims to be clean but of course I wonder about that. In fact, I pretty much wonder about everything….when someone lies that often, is anything they say true?? He ditches me whenever he feels like it, but expects me to always be there for him whenever he feels like it. He is selfish. He claims he loves me, but doesn’t seem to ever actually consider me. He pushes me away. He blows up at me. He yells and screams, more and more often these days. He blames me for his problems. He gets angry when I call him on his drinking. He claims that my “nagging” makes him drink.

I could say so much more, but I don’t want to type on and on. I wish I had someone to talk to about this. Some of you guys have stories so much like mine that I wish I could contact you or that you could contact me. Even if it was just email, it would be so nice to have someone to talk to.

I feel like my life is wasting away, and I hate that. I came here to the Al Anon page because I realize that I have to stop trying to make him change, and, instead, understand that I can’t make him do a thing, and focus instead on myself and on how to make my life better.

Well, I think I will come back to this page every now and then and see if there’s anyone who wants to chat. Good luck, all of you.

I’ve been dealing with an alcoholic relationship for 2 years now. At first, I didn’t know how big the problem was, and I wasn’t invited around his friends or family so I didn’t know anything about him, only the lies that he told me which made me think he was the greatest guy ever. Once he started coming over more, I noticed how bad his drinking was and it started affecting me. That’s when the mental abbuse started, and he would destroy my things on purpose in rage. After he punched out my window, my family noticed what I was going through with him, and told me I need to end the relationship. I wasn’t ready to give up on him like everyone else had, I felt like I could make the difference. Like if I showed him enough love that he would stop using alcohol. I was wrong. My family ended up distancing themselves from me greatly, I used to spend 2 or 3 days with them, and now I haven’t seen them in almost 8 months. It hurts so bad to lose them, but I feel really guilty for choosing this relationship over theirs. They are so great to me and make me so happy, and this is just feeling like a job that I can’t suceed at. The worst part is that now I do not love him like I should, I hold so much resentment towards him, and there is no way that is going to help him or me. It’s come down to me needing to give up in order to have a functional family again. The only thing that’s been holding me back is this thought that he will quit and be the great man that he could be, and I won’t be a part of his life, but now I have so much resentment, I don’t think I could live with him even if he was sober. I miss being happy.

I have been with my husband 4 years, and we’ve been married only one year. Never knew he had a problem until we moved in together. He will go get help and stay clean 5/7 months, then he goes real hard on a drinking binge. I’m looking for a divorce lawyer, because I don’t want to grow old with someone like this, I hate him, and myself for marrying a drunk!

I do not have the typical alcoholic as a husband. He is a very functioning alcoholic. We have been together 9 years and in the 9 years we have been together our arguments have been about the same 2 things. His drinking and his jealousy. Other than that we get along great. We have the same goals in life. He works hard and can even pull an all night drunk fest and still go to work the next day. We travel and have a good time together but the problem I have with him is his behavior when he drinks. He doesn’t listen to a word I’m telling him, he falls on things and people, he can be violent(not with me although he has in the past but more with other people. He has broken a man’s jaw), he gets belligerent and he makes terrible decisions like drinking and driving. We have a boat as well and he does the same thing on a boat. He seems to be ok and easy to talk to until he reaches a certain point then after that there is no return. I don’t even exist in that world. Trying to talk to him is like talking to a brick wall. He gets himself so drunk that he wets the bed which is something that crawls under my skin bad. He has gotten up in the middle of the night and has peed on the floor or in closets. When he gets up the next morning he literally doesn’t remember anything. He smells like a brewery. I don’t want him to even touch me when he gets that way. Nothing about it turns me on. I love the person that he is when he is sober. He is good to me, he helps me around the house and he is a good provider. He doesn’t drink every day but it is at least 3 to 4 days a week and it is serious binge drinking. I am so scared that one day he is going to kill someone or himself by drinking and driving and who does that leave to pick up the pieces…me! I am the one who could be left with no house, no money, no husband or a husband I have to take care of that is in a vegetable state. He has become a liability risk to me. I left him 2 years ago and refused to go back home until he got help. He went to 1 AA meeting and did not drink for 4 months at least that I know of. He called me every day crying to come back. He was a mess. He promised that he would change. I decided to come back home because I felt like he was making some changes and when I got back home we rented our house out and decided to move a little ways out so that all his alcoholic friends could be distanced from us. We stayed there a year and a half. He did start drinking again but he at least maintained it a lot better. He did not ever get out of control. His friends rarely came out to visit which was a good thing for our marriage. Don’t get me wrong. I love his friends but I love my husband more. We decided to move back home recently to our house. It has been 3 months. Since we moved back the problems are back again. It is hard on me. I have a very mental job where I have to think clear at all times. I sometimes want to break down in tears crying but I don’t want to let anyone know I am married to an alcoholic. I don’t want people judging him or me. I have to be the strong person and put on a smile every day like nothing is wrong and it is extremely hard. He doesn’t miss work after a drunk night but I have had to miss work from being up all night worried about him. I do not function the way that he does. I have to have sleep to be productive. He makes life very hard for me. I feel so alone sometimes. I am getting very close to leaving him again but it is hard because I cant imagine my life without him. I don’t know what to do. His family knows he has a drinking problem but they enable the behavior and take his side even though they know he is wrong. I feel like everyone is against me. If I leave him it is not just him I lose. I have nieces and nephews that will be taken from me as well. They all thought I was a bad person when I left him the first time. Sometimes I just want to give up.

I’ve been married for 35yrs. My husband started drinking heavily shortly after my son was born. We had been married yrs. My husband didn’t want children but I’d known him for 6 yrs before my son’s birth and he never mentioned that. It was only when we went for marriage counselling ..then married 15 yrs. .that he told the person we saw that he had married me for companionship, not to have children. In the meantime the verbal abuse continues whether he’s drunk or sober. He’s never normal. We run a business together and to cope I’ve ended up addicted to tranquilisers, painkillers and sleeping pills. I went into rehab and healed but 7 yrs later I’m addicted again and the verbal abuse continues with litres of whisky being consumed every day. Money we can’t afford and damage to his health and ultimately mine out of control. I’m more desperate than anyone who knows me can conceive. He has destroyed us our life and my son’s health.

I have been married to an alcholic for 12 years. When we met he was honest about having been to rehab for drug addiction but that he was clean for a year and drank socially. He was highly intelligent and educated. We were in our early 20’s and he seemed perfect. Now he a Freaking monster that I no longer want to be around. He drinks all the time. He hides boze all around the house, lies, and verbally attacksme for no reason. I am educated and make twice as much $ as him and he constantly says I am lazy and don’t work like he does. I have stayed for our 3 children. My parents were divorced and j never wanted thaf for my children. But he has become verbally abusive to our children now too. Pointing out every flaw. He promises to stop but it is always short lived. I do believe he will try to kill me if I leave. The sober man I loved would never hurt me but if he starts drinking he will come after us and I am not certain anyone can protect us… I hate him, I put up a front to everyone. I try to keep him away from social gatherings as he makes a scene or passes out somewhere. I am working on a safe exit plan but I will never fully exit his life because of our children. I wasted all these years… This is the first time I ever wrote or spoke of what he really is….

Just reading all other comments, I have been living the same, but now he verbally abuses me in public, at a Cubs game, when I never did or said anything. I’m scared at night to go into my own house, he spits in my face, head butts me. Calls me ugly ,defaces my kids , he is a 16 yr old bully, in a 43 year old body. It makes me sick that he has to beat up a small female. He does not have any memory of conversations when even when he was not drinking. He refuses to work, if I do not buy him case of beer he will destroy my house. I am the blame of everything , and his friends are all the same. Heavy drinkers who never grew up. If I only had know that you can not have a relationship with an alcoholic, they will lie , cheat and deny. They only love their drink. I need to
Recover from this abusive relationship, I need to find local meetings and attend. This has really my self worth at a low. I have to think about my kids, they do not need this abusive man in their life’s.

Everyone’s stories are similar in one way or another ,we have been through similar problems.me and my partner have been together almost 10 years we got together in our teens which makes it harder I’m in my 20s now I thought we would settle down and have a fanily,I kept hoping the drinking would stop or that I’d at least one day be worth giving it up for, he’s such a different person when he’s not drinking but I can see that not not drinking makes me happy but not him.how do you change or break away from that when its all you’ve ever known?

Where do I begin? I started dating my husband 38 years ago when I was 15 and he was 17. We have now been married 34 years and I still love him but not sure if I’m still in love with him. He’s the only man I have fell in love with and the only man I have wanted to be with but I now question that as he is an alcoholic. So many of your stories sound like mine.

The doctor has told him he needs to stop drinking, yet my husband says he’s wacko. I took him to a marriage counselor that said she couldn’t even talk with us as a couple until he got help from a specialist to stop drinking. He just says she’s crazy.

My husband usually drinks beer and thinks because it’s beer it’s just fine and not a problem. There’s not a day he don’t drink and not a day he don’t lie to me. He is not violent and he’s not abusive or a fall down drunk and people don’t even think he’s drunk. Sometimes I don’t even know he is but he can’t remember a word I said or what has gone on.

How long do I wait for him to get help before I leave? I feel I have given him every chance in the world to get help and I have given him well over 5 years to get help and it’s only gotten worse. When do I give up everything I have worked for and earned to leave him and his disease?

Story after story feels like my own. I love my husband, even though I have not always been the best. I tried to be a better wife to him. After a decade of being together the drinking has turned to nasty lies and blame between the two of us.
I can’t say anything about his drinking otherwise he says I am judging him. he doesn’t see how his drinking hurts the family we have. He says that everything he does is fine so drinking isn’t such a big deal as I make it out to be.
Most of time I believe him and try to look past the drinking. Yet, most evenings I find myself hiding in our bedroom trying to avoid him drinking. I cry at night asking myself what I could do differently to save our marriage. He only seems to be interested in standing in kitchen for hours where he drinks. By the time he comes to bed he is either yelling, blaming, or feeling sorry for himself or physically in pain. I tried to have a friend over for dinner and he kept yelling out about white people being the problem and its was humiliating. Sometimes I stay out at my mothers late to avoid his drinking.
Strange thing is that when he’s sober I am so attracted to him. I admire him and want to be around him. He is a wonderful father and amazing lover. I never felt so beautiful then when he holds me. I feel special and others tell me how lucky I am to have someone like him. I don’t want anyone else. Help me

Well this is my first time discussing any of this out in the open. I have been married to my husband for 25yrs. When we first started dating and in our early years of marriage, my husband drank but was more social drinking. Over the last 5 years it has gotten worse. He works different shifts each week and is home in the evening with me 3 nights a week. Those nights are the ones he binge drinks on. I started saying something about it to him and he gets angry with me and starts yelling. Then I get punished and he does not talk to me for a week or two. He can either be a know it all drunk or a horrible acting drunk that yells. His dad was an alcoholic and so are his brothers.

We have been married 10 years ….. the drinking was prior to me … at first I thought I could save him, change him …. now I realize there is nothing I can do … it is all him, I want to leave, I am so drained. I feel like our whole life revolves around his drinking ….. dysfunctional mornings as he is hungover, can’t function in the real world until after 10 am, ready for a nap by noon and drinking again by 5pm …………. there is no physical abuse nor emotional …. I feel like a roommate rather than a wife. There is no sexually intimacy, his health is so poor between the years of alcohol and smoking – he can’t breath and physically he gets worn out walking across the room. Someways I daydream about life after he dies ….. he almost died 5 years ago as a result of drinking – his heart is very weak now ….. I find myself eating to cover the pain, now I worry about my health.

My husband’s dad was an abusive alcoholic and my husband says one day he has a problem with drinking and then the next that he doesn’t and that he’s only had a couple of beer and it’s lite beer so it’s not a problem. However he’s at the beer store almost every day and it’s been months since he has not had a day without a beer. I don’t know how much he drinks because he’s always drinking in the basement while I have to take care of the kids and make sure they don’t do something to tick him off. He blames me for their misbehaviour saying I spoil them. I feel his drinking problem is getting worse as now he is getting more and more emotional and blames everything on the kids because they don’t let us spend time together when I say it’s because of his drinking he gets defensive and repeats that their the problem or sometimes I’m the problem. He is emotionally abusing the family and has also had break downs where he’s smashed a TV or punched holes in our walls. I love my husband which is why I put up with it I am especially bothered by the smell of alcohol on him I force myself to kiss him because again I love him but in my head I’m thinking don’t breathe through my nose. The latest thing bothering him is princess costumes I bought for my daughter not realizing how much of a sparkle mess they left all over the house.. And all I’m thinking is so what the smell of booze and smoke is 100 times worse but if I say anything it will somehow be turned back on to me. He seems to think going to work with sparkles is worse then smelling like beer and smoke. I’m tired of the consistent fighting if he’s not fighting with the kids he’s fighting me. He says it’s not the alcohol because during the day he works which is true he’s a hard worker but as soon as he gets home he has to have his beer. He doesn’t like to go to family gathering cause no one drinks so he says a few hours is enough. I need help to help him but not sure what I can do.

I have been with the same man for 37 years. He drank the whole 37 years, He,s drunk now. waited for decades to see a change. The only thing that changes is he drinks more and more as the years go by. Extremely hyper every night, extremely loud, loud yelling, loud singing,loud music, the alcohol energizes him, it does not slow him down. Extreme mood swings, He will be hyper happy, then raving mad, Goes to bed mad at the world. Literally yells himself to sleep while laying in bed. Verbally attacks for hours on end. The blaming, the name calling, belittling, berating, . try to walk away, he follows. Yells loud, in my face in my ears, spraying spit in my face and hair. Tells me I’m to blame for him being mad , I’ve lost every friend I ever had because he finds fault with everyone and was very rude to them. I suffer from anxiety and panic attacks

My Son is a Alcoholic.. When he’s drinking his life away everyday i can’t function my job. He drinks so much untill he throws up. I love my son very much. He gets emotional when he drinks he gets up n starts drinking untill he either passes out. I’m so tired of it.. How can i get him to STOP. I had to call the police in him one time because he was being very abusive tord his sister.. I tried to get him to sit down n he pushed me n i had Anxiety.. Please can anybody out there help me before i loose my mind.. I will not leave my son or throw him out of my house.. When my son is Sober he’s whole Attitude changes he’s a very Sweet n Kinded Hearted guy.. But when he’s drunk he’s personality changes

I’ve been married for ten years to my husband. He is angry sober but when he gets drunk it’s a 100 times worse. He picks fights, put me down and blames me for EVERYTHING. He is perfect in his eyes. The verbal abuse is can be unbearable at times. He’s been through a lot his brother was murdered during a robbery. He lost his mom at the age of nine, hid father at the age of 12. So he is angry at life and drinks to deal with his emotions. Drinking is only a band aide for the wounds in his heart.

My husband is an alcoholic. I always knew he drank to excess but lately it’s gotten so bad. I think about leaving all the time. We just had our daughter 7 months ago and things have gotten so much worse. He’s never gotten physical but he’s so mean when he’s drunk. He refuses to be hungover so he wakes up and keeps drinking. When he’s sober, he’s the man I married but it’s so rare that he will have a full sober day. I don’t want my daughter growing up around this but we moved across the country a few years ago and I don’t even know how I’d leave. We have no family here. We fight about his drinking constantly and nothing is changing. I feel so trapped.

My girl friend was a recovery alcoholic and drug user for 12 years, she have failed off the wagon and have now been drinking for 2and a half years. I have done all I can for her, but all she wants to do is drinks all days and nights if she can
It’s have taking a toll on me because I can’t seem to think straight at work, because of the crazy things she does, leaving the door open. Hanging outside with strangers. I want out of this relationship, but she have no family her nor no where to live. And won’t try to get help for herself. Have lost her job. I need help with this.

I lie here in bed wondering how I ended up here. I am successful. I am smart. Every night I come home from work to a total idiot. There’s no other way to put it anymore. He loves everyone in the world but me when he’s hitting the bottle. I feel crazy. He makes me feel crazy. He starts an argument backs me in to a corner and the manipulates the situation to make me feel crazy. I’ve tried everything. I’ve threatened to leave. I’ve left. I don’t know what to do anymore. He doesn’t believe he has a problem. He treats me like scum. In fact tonight he’s passed out on the couch. I have an important event tomorrow we are supposed to be at together and he already threatened not to go. So many nights I don’t sleep upset and awake and have to put on a smiling face in front of hundreds of people cause that’s my job. I have to wake him up in the morning, repeatedly beg him to get up and get moving. He then gives me the silent treatment as if I am the one who did something wrong or I am the abusive alcoholic. He will force me to apologize just to get a sense of humility out of him. He will finally apologize with a “but” or an “I am not taking full responsibility for that fight.” He’s cheated on me. He’s berated me in front of my friends. He’s left me alone at events. He’s jumped out of my car at stop lights. He’s grabbed my steering wheel while I am silently driving him home just hoping he passes out. Tonight, I lie here trying to convince myself that I have reached my breaking point and that I don’t deserve this anymore. I don’t. Why does someone drink when they know they hurt someone so? When he’s sober he’s amazing. I haven’t felt amazing in a long time with him cause the damage and verbal abuse from his drinking is like light dog hair on a black sweater. I pull one off and another and I think I am making progress but I can’t shake them all. Each hair is a wound on my heart. I finally settle thinking well that’s enough to make it look less noticeable but they are still there and everytime I come home, the place that’s supposed to be my safe have and samctuary and more wounds appear.

We dated for a year and a half before marrying. I knew that he was an alcoholic when I said “I do” but I loved him, he made me laugh so much, and maybe I thought he would stop or I really don’t know what I thought. But his drinking only got worse…he turns into a evil, mean, ignorant, immature, destructive, verbally and physically abusive tyrant. He was a functioning drunk meaning he went to work everyday but he always saved a little wine from the night before, that he drank upon waking up. And soon as he got off, he drank. He always lied about how much he drank but I came to realize after finding empty bottles in the strangest places that he lied. Weekends were terrible and paydays even worse. I dreaded Fridays because I knew he would start an argument which I couldn’t control my mouth and would argue back and there really wasn’t any reason to be arguing…he just wanted an excuse to leave and get drunk. He would come home late that night and be out of his mind with a rage over any little thing and if he couldn’t find anything wrong with the house or dinner then he would bring up something I said whenever!. He would rant and rave, argue and sometimes jump on me, threatening to hit me and if I pushed him away from me he would say I hit him first and then wail away at me. Everything was my fault…according to him. He didn’t take responsibility for anything. His drinking got to a point where I know he was drinking on the job and because he changes into a monster I’m sure his co-workers knew it….he lost his job. Our life went totally downhill. I was supporting his pack a day cigarette habit and putting gas in his car so he could get to job interviews etc. buying food and other bills all with a very low income. He was so ungrateful. And he lost 2 more jobs after that. Then the eviction notice came. The last job was lost because after a long weekend of him being drunk, verbally abusive, threatening and destructive, keeping me up all night, I couldn’t take anymore and called the police. He was arrested and had to spend 4 days in jail before going to court for domestic violence. When I got to the courthouse the domestic violence advocate asked me if I wanted to have the charges reduced. I agreed, with the stipulations that he be made by court order to get treatment for alcoholism, anger management and take domestic violence classes. That was 3 months ago…the court (probation dept) has not followed thru to insure his compliance and he hasn’t complied at all. So he started blaming me for all of that and losing his job because of the 4 days he couldn’t go to work. All of this is 5 yrs almost to the day that we started dating. I finally left. I put my belongings in storage and moved in with my mom…couldn’t afford to get my own place because his drinking and getting fired ate up my paychecks. Ive been here for about a month now, got my number changed, I do not call him, he comes to my window and asks me why I am doing him like this! I’m starting to feel normal again. I’m not tired anymore. I know my life is going to be so much better especially with my children and grandchildren. none are his. I’m so glad I finally got away from him, had tried a few times and always took him back…not this time! I see my previous life in most of your stories. There is so much more ugliness I could tell you but you probably already have an idea. When you are good and tired of the life you live, the stress and tiredness, you will leave. Good luck to you all. Sorry for any typos

my wife doesn’t drink everyday but when she drinks she makes dangerous and impulsive decisions, generally lies about it, and turns into an abusive psycho. She doesn’t need 8-10 drinks, just one or two and her personality and judgement change. She drives our children home from her other stay at home mom friends who all seem to use play dates as a reason to have day time cocktail parties. I don’t know what to do.

I read all these stories, and I begin to realize I am not alone. However, do I understand being married to an alcoholic can make you feel alone.
My husband and I have been married for almost 6 years, and have always been drinkers together. However, when I found out I was pregnant with my son and my drinking came to an abrupt end, I quickly realized how much my husband really drinks.
My husband comes from a very dysfunctional family where issues are never discusses, and major problems go years and years without being addressed…or addressed at all. Sadly, the effects of his up bringing and his earlier years of life have affected him, and he now suffers from anxiety and depression. He also works for a very stressful, competitive company, so the additional stress of work leads him more to feeling anxious and depressed, and (sadly) leads him to drink more.
Anytime I try to address the alcohol addiction/abuse, he immediately gets defensive and calls me names. He makes me feel crazy, and pushes me fight more and more until I feel like the crazy one.
With our son only being 16 months old, I am afraid to let this situation get any worse. I want to help my husband and I want him to realize that I do care and love him, but while he is drinking, he only sees me as a monster. I do not know what more I can do. I feel CRAZY, but I know I am not.

My husband and I have been separated for over 2 years now. I am grateful he continues to pay our mortgage note as that is the only involvement he has with us. We have two beautiful daughters who try to love their dad, but he left them and one is “hard” towards him and the other “cries for his attention”. He never involves himself in their lives unless his family is involved and then the girls don’t know how to respond as he has had no involvement with them.
Recently, he called panicked as he was throwing up blood and I told him I would be over taking him to the ER. He declined and “nursed himself” back to health. Today he is an ornery jerk again and explained that the reason he threw up blood was because of his personal life.
He calls me for help, I am there to help me, he declines, and then is aggressive when the phase passes. His family is of zero help.
Tough, just very very tough and keeping my kids out of harms way is tough.
I wish I knew what to say or do.

My boyfriend has just been arrested for assault on myself and also a colleague at work. We’ve been living together for a year and a half and in the beginning it was truly wonderful. I felt so lucky, I’d found this wonderful man who appeared to adore me.
However, I started to realise that there was a problem with alcohol. He stayed out for hours and hours on end, often returning the following day. The last few weeks have been hell. He became verbally abusive, controlling, paranoid and demanding. His mood swings were horrendous, even though when displaying this behaviour he wasn’t always drunk.
Unfortunately the worst happened and he physically assaulted me. I decided I couldn’t take anymore. I’d been threatened and was scared to go home. I decided to go to the police and get the assault logged. They took the decision out of my hands and informed me that because I’d reported an assault, he would be arrested.
Anyway, the police have just left my property after having the locks changed and a panic alarm fitted. My ex is not allowed anywhere near my house and will be arrested again if he try’s.
Alcoholism is a dreadful disease. I tried everything to help my ex and attended Al-anon meetings to help myself and how I react to the substance.
This is the most difficult time I’ve ever had in my life. I still
love him dearly and really hope that he’ll get the help he needs, unfortunately only HE can do that. There’ll be no going back for me. I have to look after myself and my daughter and move forward. I wouldn’t wish alcoholism on my own worst enemy. It certainly is a family disease which affects everyone involved.

I have been dealing with this for about 27 years…sick of his drinking..absolutely hate alcohol….he says he shouldn’t be told what he can and can’t do….I only asked him to stop…he turns it into me focusing on the bad he does and not the good. He is a pest when he drinks…constantly seeking approval of everything he does or has done that day…those are not the only concerns I have tho….he takes several medications which in themselves are hard on the body…alcohol is not a good idea with those….I don’t know what I’m going to do but I have had enough of it.

My husband of 34 years is a secret achoholic. He does not hurt me physically but he does emotionally. We have 3 children one is married, the second is on his own.My 3rd son is 11 years old and in grade school. My husband works as seafarer for almost 20 years. During his vacation after being at sea for 6 months, soon as he arirves he starts drinking too much beer. He starts with few bottles and continues when he wakes up. Rest awhile and wait till its almost afternoon and there he goes drinking again. He tells me excuses that he never had a drink for 6 months though but i told him im not in favor of what he said. For his 2 months vacation, i would say we are glad to see him home, happy perhaps but not the reality. I now realized he is selfish in the sense he never got involve himself bonding with his boys. He does not pursue them to do outdoor activities like playing basketball or walking them around. He prefers to stay most of the time at home, cooking and preparing food. Its his defense mechanism so as for him to stay home and does freely his drinking spree. Now that he could not be hired as he is in his retirable age. It was a big confusion on my part. He never told me of his optional retirement. I felt i am now at the point of my most difficult situation, i thought 1 to 2 years more so we could save some money to stat up our farm. Now i always cry almost everyday. We don’t have any saving, worried of my son’s schooling and our everyday needs. How could i go about this? my husband could not provide yet he goes on with his secret drinking now not beer but liquor- in expensive one. I knew he had almost done with the whole bottles i could smell the awkward smell of the liquor. Yes i always confront him that end with an argument. He use to moan or hurl badmouth that i tell him to stop. My son is a smart kid, he is an intelligent student at grade school, i am just worried he knew what going on. He is just taking time to perhaps confront his father. He did at one time and he said will you stop drinking beer or ill put them in the garbage. He checks on the ref if he finds beer inside he will surely shoot it in the garbage. My husband ask for sex of which i make excuses of having stomach spasm, when he ask for sex and i smell the liquor in his breath it will im going to puke, it is very disgusting and i hate him a lot when i see him drunk anf falls asleep like a fetus. As if his body transforms, i hate it. I’m now the bread winner, i handle my time as a Sales Consultant. I tried talking with him in a peaceful way to cooperate with me but he secretly drinks still… What should i do?

My husband and I have been married for 3 years..together for about 11 years. We are both older…he in his 60s. He has always been a social drinker…life of the party. In the past year his drinking has increased to almost a bottle of wine anight…and now harder liquor. He gets drunk at night watching TV and is jovial at first but invariably one little thing will set him off into angry mode. He becomes verbally abusive and won’t stop. He stinks of wine and liquor at night and totally turns me off. It’s becoming more frequent. I planned on spending the rest of my life with this man. When he is sober he is wonderful to me…have 0 tolerance for the Jeckyl and Hyde. I plan on demanding counseling or AA. Life is too precious at any age.

My heart goes out to any and all who have lived with the emotional and/or physical abuse of an alcoholic spouse. Married for 13 years husband was a very heavy alcoholic along with addiction for the first 8 years and the past 5 years have been a constant struggle with relapse after relapse. I’m not sure which was worse knowing who and how he was in the beginning or the last five years hoping he would change to only be let down each time when the alcohol/addiction took over. It would break my heart to finally see the man beneath the addiction to only have him dragged away in a split second over and over again. I finally came to a point in my life last year and told him to choose his lifestyle, you guessed it! He hit the door running, short time later he had heart attack and quadruple bypass. I thought for sure this was Rock bottom as he laid in the hospital asking for forgiveness and said “I don’t want to die” I brought him home, helped with his recovery to only discover he was drinking again two months after his surgery. He once again said he was going to do better, few months later he failed drug screening, again I forgive and moved forward. This past few months I’ve noticed I’m loosing patience, I’m tired of his lies, manipulation and his family telling me “sickness and health” “till death do us part” and “suck it up” when they have no idea of what this life of mine is like. I love my husband more than I love myself but he has left once again because he did not want to walk a straight line. Ive spent countless nights and days crying my heart out and all I can say is the only thing he will ever give his life to is his addiction because it’s slowly killing him everyday. I love and miss him dearly but no matter what I can say I was a good wife to him but no longer can I give him the best of both worlds. I am a human being and I have feelings too. My prayers to all!

My husband is an addict and an alcoholic.
Just a few nights ago, he drank himself into a stupor with his 13 yr old Son right next to him on the couch. It was humiliating for me and has been several times before now. We have been together for three years and he’s been an addict since I met him.
Early on in our relationship he admitted to ‘huffing’ paint, which devastated me, but I basically turned a blind eye to.
After working in the middle east for the last year or so, he has been getting drunk almost every few days and I mean horribly drunk.
He gets mean and loud and it breaks my heart when he is on his binges.
Not sure what I was thinking or feeling when I decided initially just to ‘look the other way’! he needs to quit for him, for his family and for us, or I won’t stay! I do know that I’ll be ok without him in my life, but I want him to be healthy and happy-without the liquor or the drugs!
-signed, Very frustrated

My story is quiet the same as pearls , I have been with my partner for 2 years it started out ask he was binge drinking as a result he signed himself into a rehab 4 3 months . It was great he was like the perfect fella but as soon as he left it started again but a lot worse he’s gone from a bindge drinking to full on none stop hides his drink thinking I don’t no even though now it’s got that way I can tell over the phone his whole ora changes he to is like jekyl and Hyde I could be sat there not saying anything to him having a go at me over anything. He constantly having a go at me about my ex partner so everytime he comes for his son there’s a constant battle with my partner , it has got to that stage now we’re 2 weeks ago he gave me a black eye I was devasted he smashes the house up the constant lies saying everybody else thinks I’m great it’s just you and I’m starting to question myself !! He gets drunk and wants to be intimate but I can’t even stand him to touch me I can’t even bear to look at him . I have to wait till he’s coming down off the ale for us to even have a conversation but then he’s depressed says he’s bored that’s why he drinks but he’s had numerous job all of which he has lost cos of the drink I really don’t no what to do ??

It is really hard finding myself writing here and being to some point unhappy with my life and fed up with my husband’s drinking. I am at the point that I just want to leave and don’t look back. I can’t say everything is very bad now, but reading all the stories here and know my dad who drinks all his life – it is going to get worse with my husband and I don’t want to waste my life… I want to be free of all that and be happy, do things that make me happy and be surrounded bu people who make me happy.
We married for 3 years and we do not have kids. I love my husband a lot, he is smart, interesting, he likes to learn new things and do things for the house, he has hobbies and friends, he is kind and funny. I love being with him when he is sober and we do a lot of things together. BUT he likes to drink, and in my opinion he drinks too much.
When we met 6 years ago it was summer and we both were on vacation – I saw he liked to drink, but I did not think it would be really TOO much one day. I always thought it can’t happen to me and my husband because I already have one alcoholic in my life – my father.
Seeing my father drinking while growing up made me strong and I decided for myself that I will never be an alcoholic or smoking person and I will never marry one. I drink like one light beer very rare and completely against smoking. But I married my husband who is an alcoholic.
My husband likes to drink on Friday night, likes to celebrate the end of a long week, he gets 6 pack of the strongest beer IPA and drink it all. He can’t just have 1 or 2. He will always finish it all and whatever else we have in a house and crash on a couch. Or if it’s not enough he will drive drunk to get more. And a lot of times next day he will be to lazy to get up and have a productive day so he will go and buy more and start drinking early in the morning. It all can last 2-3 days completely being shit face and have no participation in our life together. And then he will wake up, tell me that he got to get his shit together and will start doing normal things like nothing happened. Like he was doing normal thing by being drunk for days. He drove completely drunk so many times I can’t even count it. He embarrassed me in front of my friends many times being stupidly drunk, falling on the ground, throwing up, even trying to hit his own best friend with no reason. He screamed at me while being drunk. He left our dog outside in a middle of a night while crashing on a couch. He hides alcohol in a house and drink it after I go to sleep…. it’s so many things that I can’t even believe I am still with him. And of course sex is not even there any more, I just don’t feel the same and can’t do it remembering him being disgusting drunk. I feel like I have a child who is going through rough teenage years and I have to babysit him and explain his what is good and what is bad… so sad… I want to have a man in my life who is always in control and takes care of me!
When I talk to him about it he does understand that he should stop. His dad & mom used to drink a lot and he is saying that he has learnt it from them and he has emotional trauma from childhood. I do understand it, and that is probably why I am still by his side thinking that he needs my help and I can help him…..
He promised me so many times to stop, but it always starts over again. When I start realizing he has a problem I was trying to explain to him that I will not live with him being drunk like that. I need companion in life who will be there for me always, emotionally and physically. He tells me he understands but it always goes back to a little bit and then a lot of alcohol. I asked his best friend to talk to him and he took my husband to AA. He came back, was crying, he said he would do anything for me and he will stop drinking because he doesn’t want to have future like other people at AA left by their wifes. Well, it was over a year ago and things got even worse.
It is so hard because we are young, I am 27 and he is 32. And in my opinion he should not be like a crazy teenager drinking and partying with no reason, by himself most of the time. But he should think about the future, our future, start thinking about future kids and what to do to be strong for them and be a good example.
I will keep trying to talk to him and help him, but I have a feeling I will just have to leave one day. I can’t leave right away because I do not have any relatives in this country and I never told my relatives that my husband has a problem. I also can’t afford to go on my own right now. So my plan is to work hard, get a promotion I am waiting for, find a place to move out, and then just DO IT! I know I can, I know it won’t be easy because I am like all of us here LOVE my husband and want to be with sober him. But I also can’t waste my life by his side if he decides to drink the way he does. I pray for all of you to find peace and happiness.

37 years married to my husband, and half or more he has drank, and used drugs. Disappeared for days at a time. Had affairs. Got fired for drunkin bad judgement, manic behavior , then drinks heavy and disappears except drunkin phone calls to me blamimg everyone else are the problem. I want to leave but depend on him financially. Plus, my grandson depends on us and livrs with us also. Depression is dragging me down.

Hi All,

I am in the same situation. My husband does not drink everyday but when he does he abuses me mentally and verbally. He can’t stop drinking. I have been to a point where I don’t go to any social events because he will say I am only have 2 beers and then after that party stops at the store to buy more. He will stay up until 5 am in the morning drinking. Won’t let me or baby sleep. He threatens and me its just a dysfunctional place.

My husband is an admittant alcoholic. Before we met, he had been to treatment several times for alcohol abuse. He had been sober for about 3 or 4 years before we met. I admired that he was able to beat it and was committed to his sobriety. We married after dating two years, only to find out that he’d been lying about his sobriety. I found a near empty glass of gin on his bedside one day after coming home from work. He lied about what it was at first then admitted to it being the gin he found in an old suitcase. Later, I found out he would start drinking as soon as I left for work. It seems he felt as if admitting to the drinking opened a floodgate because then he would drink every day as soon as he got home from work. I’ve had to leave functions because he’d call me and was incoherent, sending questionable messages like he would hurt himself. I was so disappointed in not just him but myself. I promised never to entertain an addict after having one as a father. Now here I am. I feel so stupid and annoyed with myself. Our sex life is just about over because I hate the way he smells. It’s happened so long that I don’t crave it at all anymore. I’m enraged when I find him drunk and just want to leave. I love my husband but I hate the drunk. Now I’m starting to hate myself too.

Met my future husband in Sep 1998, he is a functional alcoholic. He retired in 2008. During those years he drank, lied and blamed everything on me. I educated myself extensively on alcoholism and in 2009, I told him I was leaving. My health had deteriorated and I was sick of it all. He said he would go into intensive outpatient therapy….which he did for 3 months. It saved his life. He was sober for 7 yrs. Last year he started drinking in Feb 2015, by the end of the year he was drunk 5 out of 7 days….I left in Jan 2016.. in April 2016, he almost died of alcohol abuse, hemoraged through his esophagus and is still trying to get his health together. He had been in and out of the hospital 3 times , including ICU for 3 days and a total of 7 units of blood. Now …all I hear is I love you, come home, I won’t drink again…I know I have to be sober. I care for him but don’t have a desire for any repeat performance. I feel quilty but I have come to like a stress free environment, less money, but more peace. Also wonder if he just doesn’t miss me cleaning, mowing the lawn, etc. He makes me feel bad, but I have to think of myself for once.

My husband is an alcoholic. He told me fourteen months ago he had a problem, and I told him I would help him through, but that I couldn’t be with him if he kept doing it. My grandmother on my moms side was an alcoholic, she abused pain meds, and committed suicide in 2005. My mothers brother was just placed in a rehab facility for drug abuse, and my dads parents and some of His siblings have trouble with alcohol as well. To the point we had to leave family events, like thanksgiving, when they brought out the liquor.
My husband knew all of this, and even after telling him I couldn’t be with someone like that he continues to binge drink alone at the house. He has told me that all of this is my fault, and that he shouldn’t be a problem since he’s never hit me before. I don’t want to wait around for him to hit me before it’s acceptable for me to leave. I love him, but I also pity him and despise him all at the same time. We got married last July, our one year is coming up and it will be spend apart. We went to counseling last Friday and she asked him if he wanted to take a substance abuse test, he unsurpringly said no, so she gave it to me. I asked him to take it that night and he answered yes to 7/11 questions which stood for severe dependency. He told me anyone would have that many and it was a dumb test… I only had 2, and I asked several others and each answered two or three. He is in denial, but every time he can he emotionally abuses me and I’m at the end of my rope. I think divorce is in our near future.

Iv been married to my alcoholic husband for 4 years nearly, together for 6 years. When we met I fell pregant pretty quickly he blamed his alcohol and drug issue on going threw a bad time getting divorced 18 months previously. But he never stopped drinking. We relocated to Spain and mostly things were OK until he would just say he’s going to the shops and not come back for 24 or 48 hours sometimes longer his cocaine use got more and more and I’d find him in some awful states then he was so bad I got him admitted in little hospital where he was kept sedated and rehydrated until his body had recovered then we took him to rehab. Rehab did really help but he only lasted 6 months then he wanted to be normal and drink with friends or be social. On and off now for 2 years nearly it’s getting more frequent but very also discovered that he goes to brothels now he’s says it so he can get a steady supply of Coke until he’s kicked out. I don’t believe him. 10 weeks ago I had to call an ambulance and the police to go find him as he didn’t know where he was and he couldn’t breath properly and last night he did it again both times Iv found him to be by a brothel again. Today Iv asked him to leave. We are now expecting our third child. I’m heartbroken he’s wonderful man when he manages to be sober. But at the moment I’m just feeling like he’s a really good liar and scammer.

I have been married for 43 years. The first 25 years my husband was violent towards me. I called the Police many times and he was cautioned. Now he is alcoholic. He drinks and leaves me for weeks on end. Comes back in a bad way and I forgive him. My 3 older children dont talk to me because of his behaviour and because I didnt leave him. I feel at my wits end and dont know who to turn to. I have no self confidence and want to harm myself because I am hurting so bad

I need help! I got married in october an when he isnt working he is usuallt drunk. He is verbally abusive towards me. I dont know what to do?? Where can I get help??

I’ve been married decades to an alcoholic. I wish I would have believed more in myself to leave in the first year, not keep wasting my life hoping he will get better. Now leaving is even harder and more emotionally painful.

If you are reading this and questioning “should I go?” my answer is a resounding YES! get out while you still have time and some of your sanity. Seek counseling to help you get through it. You can do it.

I plan on going to my first Al-Anon meeting this week. I have been with an alcoholic for just over 10 years. We have been apart at times due to his drinking and abuse. I have had to move 3 times because of it. Ive been losing sleep over how I could be so stupid to have taken him back. I’m afraid of him, and he always has something to hold over my head (financially, or our daughter), combined with tears and empty promises. The last time he hot down on his knees and cried and said he’d go to AA. That lasted a year, until he announced that he is not an alcoholic, I am too controlling, and he’s going to do as he pleases. The verbal abuse has started and now he’s going after my daughter with it too (saying she’s the reason we fight etc.)
I’ve told him to leave. He won’t. I’m horrified that my child is living in this environment. Trying to remain detached and not get angry over the financial mess and the things he says isn’t working anymore. I need some support. As you can imagine, I don’t have a support system left. Family and friends gave up on me years ago because I have “chosen” this. And I did. But I finally understand that he will never change, this situation will always be what it is, and I now choose to not be in it!

In desperation l write this post. My partner was in the forces for 24 years but developed a drinking habit. Usually a very loving man (When sober) – I love him dearly but his behaviour has now become unacceptable.
Last week we had the week off together and both agreed what a lovely week we had. Saturday morning as l was getting ready so we could go out in the afternoon l asked if he could cut the lawn – A very small lawn l may add! What followed was anger swearing etc as he cut it then when l came down he had taken his self off. Rather than apologise he has taken himself off ALL weekend and I have only had a text to say he is staying at his place of work for a couple of days to calm down. I have found out from his brother that Saturday night he drowned 2 and a half bottles of vodka with a male work colleague – He popped back home yesterday and made himself food, did a couple jobs from his own free will but refuses to talk about his actions then off he went again… Silly reason for starting I know
I have asked he not return to the house until completely alcohol free and willing to talk – Can anyone give me some advise or guidance

My husband and I have been married for 34 years. I met him when I was in college and he was the most incredible man I had ever met. I am familiar with alcoholism as my Dad was not only an alcoholic but a pediphile. One of my brothers is a recovering alcoholic and has been for 25 years or more. I have learned a lot from him. Not to mention I have attended ACOA and went to therapy for years to deal with my childhood. You think I would have recognized the symptoms in my husband before I married him but I was young and knew very little about alcoholism then. I should have left him years ago but didn’t because I had young children and no place to go. I have stayed with him to this point because I love him and it is easier but I don’t want to die like this. I am 54 years old. I know alcoholism is a progressive disease and it gets worse. I don’t know how much more I can take. I want to give up everything and leave. And that would be a lot. I am frightened because I have never really been on my own. Even in college my parents were taking care of me. He has given me everything I have ever wanted just about and I feel guilty leaving him now but don’t know what else to do. I cannot make him stop. He did for a few years several years back but started again. Not sure what to do at this point but leaning towards running for the hills.

I need advice alcoholic spouse unacceptable behaviour swearing and generally bad behaviour can’t hold down a job down.

I am 56 years old. “Combined”, my husband and I have been married 33 years. I left him once. We divorced for two years. During that time we worked on rebuilding our life. I wanted nothing more than for him to quit drinking, or at least have it under control. He worked hard to get me back but here we are again. He drinks a significant amount every day starting as early as noon. He is retired. When he drinks he is insensitive and simply unappealing. I relate to the gal’s comments about the smell of stale alcohol on his breath. It’s getting worse and yesterday he said something extremely inappropriate and mean to our daughter in law who we dearly love. I’m not sure if things can ever be the same with them and with us. At this age I dread splitting up again, financially or otherwise so I am not ready to give him an ultimatum. I bury myself in work, friends, crafts, working out and my kids. I am bright and independent and angry at myself for getting into this situation again.
I feel like i should have known better and failed. I am starting to feel more empty and lonely every day. Trying to figure out next steps.

Here it is: What my life looks like after getting involved with an alcoholic. People are complex, capable of a full range of personality, emotion, desire, intention. Alcohol is single-minded: its only goal is total destruction. It hurts, it tears, it’s cruel, it’s selfish, it’s narcissistic, and it’s completely unable to look at itself critically.

My time with an alcoholic has eroded my self esteem, it has sapped my energy, it has sucked me into an emotionally and physically violent drama, it has made me question myself and my fundamental values, it has made me believe that I am worthless, it has made my want to die, it has harmed my performance at work, it has taken my attention away from my own personal interests, it has made a mockery of my love, and it has funneled all of my resources into another human being who is only capable of taking care of one thing: feeding the addiction.

On Monday night, May 30th, I called my mother and her boyfriend to come over after my alcoholic husband punched me in the stomach and would not let me out of our apartment. Together, we forced him to leave. He stayed with his brother that night and has done so since. I’ve offered four times since he left to take him back on the one condition that he quit drinking effective immediately. These offers have been received with hate and rejection. He cannot stop.

I’m devastated at the loss of the person I love most in this world. I’m hurt and confused and I want him back with me more than anything. But, I am beginning to accept the full toll that a year and half in an intimate relationship with an alcoholic has taken on me. Now, I must focus on myself and heal. I have not yet attended a meeting. I will go to my first meeting this Sunday.

This has been very helpful to write out. Thank you to anyone who has read it.

Been married for 35 years of which the last 20 my husband has drank. He has lost his family, now his job and I am going to a divorce lawyer on Monday. Get out asap. They never stop. There is no one that Dan help them but themselves. Don’t ruin your lives as I have. Now 60 and single. Lost the best years of my life!!!

I too live with an alcoholic. When he is sober he is a wonderful man but the only time he is sober anymore is before he goes to work. He drinks with his boss they quit work early and start drinking comes home already drunk. He goes out all day on Sunday’s and drinks with his boss. He gets upset when I don’t have meals ready for him. He has never hit me but, has hit walls etc. he is verbally mean talks about my weight gain in the mean time he has lost a lot of weight from his drinking. I don’t feel like I can do anything right anymore. Don’t know how much more I can take. I am 54 this should not be my life.

My boyfriend is an alcoholic. We’ve been together almost a year now. When its good, its great! But when its bad, it is really bad. He’s gotten alot better than he was but I don’t know if he’ll ever stop. His father was abusive so his mother kicked him out when he was just a few months so he never met his father. At the begining when he got drunk he would throw things and punch walls. Now he accuses me of cheating and yells at me. I broke up with him multiple times and last time I told him he needed to cunsult and stop drinking. He agreed to this but the last time he called a social worker he was drunk and made her cry, so now I just don’t trust him. He refuses to go to AA and he said he’d try the hotline again but then told me they refused to have him call again. I don’t believe him. My hearts says that he’ll keep getting better but then again my brain says to leave him. I’ve been in a mentaly abusive relationship before so I don’t know if it’s heading down that path again. He IS getting better but is it going to be okay or is the cycle just going to start again?

My name is samantha I’m 22 soon to be 23 been in a relationship with the father of my kids since I was 15…
I’m living life with an alcoholic he has 2 dwi charges and recently got pulled over again but let him to thank God..

My mind is constantly in over drive, hiding my keys wondering what the day will turn out to be I’m so young and I’ve been through so much emotional abuse through it all I’m slowly losing myslef we have 2 little girls 6 and 4 and it makes me sad they have to go through it also…
I love him he’s perfect when he’s sober but when he’s drunk he’s someone else he’s hurtfull he’s selfish and most importantly he’s angry and hateful. As the saying goes when things are good they’re great and when they’re bad it’s bad..
More bad memories than good sad to say..
My the best morning he’s sorry crying begging for us back..its allbminf control I feel guilty I come back for the kids and at the end of the day it all ends up to me getting hurt and disrespected I pray God hears my prayers I can’t find the strength to get up and leave before its to late…

I’ve been let down. Lied to..put last…mistreated…I’ve been through it all I cant help but think is this life..is this my whole life leaving miserable what did I do to deserve such love I do everything right and still im wrong..

My children’s father and I were young parents without support. When his mother passed away, his drinking became horrible. First with the verbal abuse, then the physical abuse – even in public. It’s strange to see normal people, good people, look the other way.

After a couple more years, I planned my exit strategy. By this time, he had 2 DUIs and no job. I convinced him to separate by giving him my car plus $2,000. And it worked! He would still stop by my house and job to harass me, but I pretended to be happy to see him and I had to run an errand. A couple times I had to tip off the police.

Another couple years went by, my kids were 5 and 6, and he passed away. It was his birthday and he was walking in the road and was struck by a vehicle. It was very difficult explaining this to the kids. I’m beyond blessed they only have good memories.

Since then I’ve been married and now have a 2 yr old. The kid are 10 and soon to be 9. My husband is showing alcoholic tendencies. He’s at 2-3 cases a week. I do not drink because he’ll drink more than usual. He’s not mean, and he has a good job he goes to every day.

If I mention how many he’s had, he gets defensive. I have this horrible pit in my stomach. I do not want to see this unfold again. The smell of his breath brings up so many bad memories-I can’t help but compare. And now I’m starting to resent him.

My husband and I have been married for 6 months, and together for 3 years. His drinking habit started a little over a year into dating. It possibly started because of me, among other little things as well. I have had my mental problems, and could drive my husband insane a lot. However, I am much more mature and better than I used to be, thanks to God and my husband, but now my husband just drinks just to drink, and doesn’t have an excuse anymore. He has gotten physically abusive with several times, the most recent being a month ago and was by far the worst. I literally had to escape from my apartment because he wouldn’t let me leave. I ended up calling the cops but didn’t press charges. Our priest friends were kind enough to help me set up a place to stay for a few days with an older lady. My parents know what he’s done, and were very forgiving. I was too, and moved back in. However, my mother is very adamant about not giving him any more chances. She doesn’t know he’s drinking again, and I don’t know if or when I should tell her. If my husband loses his job, this will be the 5th time he’s lost a job due to drinking. I’m not even worried anymore. We’ve been through this so much that I just don’t care anymore. If anything I hope it will wake him up. I am so angry and frustrated with him. He is a liar and a monster when he’s drunk. I feel like I am just riding his wave and wonder how long this problem will. Now, all I can do is trust in God to help us.

I am married to an alcoholic and the road is getting worse by the minutes. We have a 4 year old daughter who has a rare genetic disorder and a step son . We are the 4 of us under the same roof.
I try to Make the kids see the less of they possibly can , my 12 years old step son is well aware even tho he doesn’t ask any questions , I am afraid he will truly believe that’s how a man is to grow up to be. A dad that can leave for days at a time because of alcohol leaving us al behind.
To grow up to think that’s how a relationship works a man Able to do whatever he wants to.
From cheating to alcoholism to be influenced by his peers to go drink to who drinks the most.
I’m truly trying to hold on to the good days but they are showing up less and less, alcohol Always have to be involved otherwise is not fun.

He drinks to the point he passes out and can’t get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom , I wake up to a wet bed on weekly basis , sometimes several times in a row. Who cleans it all up me? I haven’t been doing that lately.
I have been hiding tears falling down my face so the children don’t see it. He has missed important events such as my birthday , Father’s Day or his birthday because he would get up and drink and not come back or when back he would be beyond drunk.
He has shown up beyond wasted to a school meet for our daughters who has needs.
He has shown up to the nicu 24 hours after she was born wasted. And who he blames me. I know I’m not the one to be blame. But hearing when you done talking I’ll come home . Or when you are done talking I’ll stop drinking . I know it’s not my fault but the blame hurts . I have forgiven the imanagible, most would of left for a lot less.
I have found him in a bar with women , seen texts and photos and I still hold to that great man that is slowly consumed by his alcohol . I am mentally drained physically too exhausted to fight.
I am not with him for financial reasons , truth is I believe I would be more stable without his alcohol. My heart is speaking louder. I want to help him but I know I can’t help Someone that doesn’t see he needs help. I’m tired of sleeping on an empty bed or with a drunk man.
I am tired of holding the family together when he can’t see past his bottle. I’m just giving up hope because I don’t think there is any left

My husband and I have been together for a decade, all of which he has been drinking. I didn’t realize he had a problem until our son was born and he promised to quit. Needless to say, that never happened.

He works very hard to support us and is a wonderful person. Like all drunks, he is terrible with the attitude and name-calling. He starts fights for no reason and will say or do anything to get me to argue with him. He breaks things around the house in a drunken rage. When he is sober, I see such pain in his eyes. We have been through terrible things together, some of which can never truly be let go.

I wish I could suffer these things for him and I want to help him so bad, but it’s not my choice to make. He has to want it for himself and I don’t know if he will ever. Why would he? He gets to drink his problems away, while I have to pick up the pieces sober.

We have always loved and supported each other immensely. It’s just this one thing, this terrible affliction. I’m tired of my son seeing his dad with a beer in his hand every day and I am desperate to have the man I married back. God only knows how my son will be affected by this in adulthood.

I look at these stories and see how much my life is the same. I have left him before for 6 months and he stopped drinking. Obviously the problem lies too deep for him to control on his own. I will never leave him or give up on him, but I feel like I’m drowning and he’s pushing me under. I wonder if it will ever end.

I feel like I am in a self-made hell most of the time.

I met my husband when I was 17 and I am now 26. Nearly ten years together and 6 years married. Since we met I have dealt with infidelity, drug abuse, volatile verbal abuse while living in fear, sadness and anger. What have I become?

The most devastating realization is that our stories are so similar. He is different when he does use and he used to be so loving, but he changed. We change as humans and this is natural, if not welcomed. However, he changed for the worst. He doesn’t love himself, so how can he possibly love me or his son?

He almost killed me today. He drank with his friends and picked me up from work buzzed. I was upset. He was driving too fast and was late picking me up. I was upset and I should have just got in an uber or something. He drove so crazy and was punching the steering wheel screaming at the top of his lungs, while driving over 80 miles an hour.

This husband of mine justifies the abuse by blaming me for everything. My son loves him so much, I can’t help but feel like I am tearing our family apart. But when will it be enough? There is always an excuse – no money, my house, our son’s school, his friends, but what weighs the right decision?

My heart is so heavy and I feel like the light in my soul is fading.

My husband is an alcoholic. I’ve been married to him for 14 months. In December we went on a cruise. He beat me up & passed out. I ran for my life.

I’d never been beaten up in my life. My dad used corporal punishment when we were children, but this was way different. I called on the authorities and they took him off the ship.

He’s a beautiful person when he’s sober. A complete Demon monster when he drinks. He spent 4 months in prison. I don’t know how to deal with this. I can’t tell my family. They’d disown me. I love him, but I fear him more than I love him.

I’m new to all this. We grew up in a very strict church environment. We don’t smoke, drink, dance or party. He’s trying to convince me to go back to him. He’s such a good liar. I’ve heard everything he says before. I just don’t trust him.

I am married to a drunk. We have been married for less than a year now. I am 30, he is 29. I feel like his drinking is getting worse, then better, then even worse.

We fight about it, then he stops for 2-3 days (depending on how bad we fight — if it’s a little fight, he doesn’t stop drinking), then he starts again, quite bad. Then he goes on binges. He drinks about 2 bottles of wine a day. He thinks he is having fun. When he stops drinking, he is bored and depressed. Must be the withdrawal.

I feel that I can’t talk to him when he is like this. I feel I often have to wait until the morning for everything to turn back to “normal” so we can talk about whatever I had to tell him from the previous day. It’s Jekyl and Hyde. It is ruining me emotionally, plus we have to sleep separately as he snores quite badly. He only snores when he is drunk.

Also, I find the smell of stale alcohol so repulsive I often cannot bear to be close to him. He also cannot perform too well sexually when he is very drunk. This is also making my skin crawl if he asks for it when he is drunk. I often have to say no, because I just cannot stand him touching me.

I want to help him & I want to leave. I often ask myself if this is going to be the rest of my life, and it fills me with sadness when I think about the answer. I am only young and reading these comments here. It makes me question whether I should stay married to him and help him or leave and don’t look back.

My boyfriend has started binge-drinking and blacking out and putting his safety in jeopardy 3 times per week, that I know of.

We have only been together for 3 months, and I’m learning that he has severe impulse control problems (caffeine, alcohol, pornography, diagnosed ADD). He has been so kind to me so far, but now I am genuinely afraid that this is his true personality coming out and that he is an addict. I can’t be involved with an addict. I won’t be.

He told me he thinks he needs to cut back, and I agreed, but he’s already passed out drunk in public once (that I know of) since saying that. This is my first experience with this stuff and I don’t know what I can say that will be received well. When I told him his behavior is “dangerous” and he’s putting his safety in jeopardy, he responded with, “I don’t really drink that much” (um obviously that is pure denial), and when I asked him why he is drinking 8 beers instead of 3-4, he could only give the answers “boredom” and “probably because the weather is nice now,” when the obvious answer is, “Because I desperately want to escape my life and my feelings, because I’m unhappy and stressed out and scared about the future.”

My inclination is that if he can’t be honest about what’s driving him to drink this much, there’s not much I can do – he needs therapy. These binges only happen when I’m not around, so I hardly know how to set a boundary. Maybe “I am not going to kiss you when your lips are all chapped because you’re dehydrated after drinking so much last night.”

My husband and I are newly weds; we’ve been married for seven months and almost three years total together. I’ve always known that he was a social drinker, but the past six months he has gone into overdrive. It started out slow and has been increasing steadily.

Many years ago he did get a couple of drunk-driving charges. He also served seven months in prison and just got his license back a few years ago. He had to drive with a machine in his truck, which has been gone for almost a year. He’s going back to the same things that got him in that predicament. This time if he’s charged he will lose his licenses.

We very seldom talk or do anything during the week, because he’s either doing yard work or drinking. A couple of times during the week when he gets off from work he goes straight to a friend’s house and drinks. When he gets in, it’s late. He doesn’t call and if I call he doesn’t answer; he always has an excuse.

There is no intimacy, just sex, which has decreased from three times a week to once every 10 days or so; he can’t. He has told me he knows he has a problem, but he’s not ready to quit, which isn’t leaving me with much choice but to leave. I just don’t know what to do; my self-esteem is so jacked up.

My story is pretty much along the same lines as all the other people, unfortunately. I am not married to my partner, but we have been together for 20 years and have 2 daughters, 11 and 17. I would have left a long time ago if it wasn’t for them, but I am so unhappy.

My partner comes in late most nights and he drinks a lot (about 6 nights a week). He is not aggressive, unless I show that I am annoyed with him. He is just really silly, slurring his words, looks terrible, and basically my girls and I cannot have a decent conversation with him.

I have made threats of all sorts and he says he will try to stop and in fact he did go to AA sessions for a while, but now he has stopped and things have started to slide yet again. I feel desperate and wish I could leave as I don’t think I love him anymore. I don’t know where it has all gone wrong.

I have been with my fiance for almost 7 years. I knew he was a drinker, but not the full extent of it until many months into the relationship.

I guess I am like most women and have this compelling feeling that I need to “save” him and I wish to God I could. He is a very late stage alcoholic at only 38 years old, drinks beer daily, usually a case.

His goal used to be 1 pint — 1 quart of vodka, but that was a few years ago. He’s been good for a while, just drinking beer, but the last year I see him slipping a lot. He lies about it, but I know the difference.

He is pretty scary on hard liquor. I’ve been pushed around, threatened, etc., and the worst part is there is no support from his family whatsoever. His mother is a drama queen who screams and cries over everything. His brother thinks his drinking is great, and his sister and niece believe every lie that comes out of his mouth when he’s drinking and have it out for me because of course I’m the bad person. What’s worse is they know the way he is and his track record with prior relationships and still believe it all.

I love the man dearly, but I feel so stuck. I don’t want to watch him die (and he’s been hospitalized more than I can count), but I feel so alone.

I’ve been married to an alcoholic since 2009. He’s been abusive physically and mentally, mostly mentally! He is an all out control freak. He has put me down so much that I barely have any self-respect. He has also isolated me so much that I don’t have any friends and only have communication with my son, and I had to fight for that right.

He is a typical alcoholic who tells lies and gives every excuse in the book for his inappropriate behavior. He can’t see that his negative actions cause all of his problems. His lying is so out of control that he has told all his friends and family that he is dying of lung cancer. The only thing physically wrong with this man is that he sits on his unemployed butt all day and is out of shape! He told this lie to see who really loves him.

Remember, I said he is controlling and has made it very clear that I am not to tell anyone the truth. Everyone knows that he lies and they’re texting and calling me to know the truth. I do not answer the phone or reply to the text messages because of the repercussions I will face with him. It gets better — one of his friends has posted it on Facebook. Now hundreds of people think he’s on his death bed. Of course he is blindsided by this and I know he doesn’t know what to do. He has become angry.

I actually can’t help but to have an internal hard laugh at this fool. But I also know that alcoholism is so cruel and a side of me feels sorry for him.

I plan to leave him in June, because I’m so unhappy and just want to be a normal person. I am also scared because I know I will be facing a full-out war.

In summary, alcoholics absolutely are impossible. What an ugly affliction. Then my husband does nothing but yell at me for not wanting to have sex with his stinky, vile, vulgar, alcoholic self. He actually gets mad and threatens me. I try to tell him this in a much kinder way. Something like. “It is simply not possible for me to want to bond physically and emotionally with a person in that state.” But not the morning or the next day, either.

If he cared what I thought, he wouldn’t be drunk and nasty all the time. I am legally married, but I refuse to have sex with him because he repulses me and says vile and nasty things.

We are older and for many years I hoped he would die long before me, but that isn’t a sure thing. His parents were just like us, except that she probably did have sex with him, because he certainly was out running around. He was a good man, just a pain -in-the-rear drunk by the end of the day. She ended up dying several years before him.

I left for fifteen years and raised my kids alone and it was wonderful. Now I am back for financial reasons, but not for long. I just need to get my ducks in a row and then I am finding my own place again.

It has been really amazing (and scary) to read these posts – so many of them reflect what my life looks like now and I can see many of them in my future, if that makes sense.

My husband of less than a year is a functional alcoholic. I didn’t realize that when we were dating – he had a few drinks, etc., but seemed fine. It wasn’t until we were engaged and I moved in with him that I came to see the full extent of it.

When he drinks, he does it at night and is able to go to work the next day (he’s only had to stay home with hangover-related symptoms once or twice). He is not himself when he has been drinking – he is surly and belligerent to me. It’s as if everything I say or do is an imposition or a drag. He doesn’t help me at all at home and has passed out on the floor, couch, etc., on a number of occasions. He swore that he could control it and tried to keep it to “just 2 beers” several times. It’s only when I caught him sneaking alcohol or he came home too drunk to deny it that I’ve realized he’s been lying to me.

At my insistence in December, he finally sought help. Unfortunately, I don’t think he believes he actually needs it and resented me for “making” him go. Last night, he came home drunk. He said this has happened another time that I didn’t know about (I work during the day and go to school at night, so it’s very easy for him to go and drink if he chose). As much as the drinking upsets me, it’s the lying and sneaking that hurts me more.

I am at a loss as to what to do. I moved halfway across the country to be with him when we got married and have very little support in my new state. I work and go to school and I can barely manage that with all of my household responsibilities without throwing an alcoholic husband into the equation. It’s very lonely and isolating.

My husband of 17 years started really drinking heavy in 2013 when his dad died, and then he broke both legs. We have been thru almost all his inheritance. He blames me, but he had a seizure at work and was laid off.

He hates A.A. and is seeing a psychiatrist, but contunues to drink and blames me for spending his money. My mom died and we got a free house and 80 grand. He then broke his foot and was out of work for 1 year — goodbye money, hello mortgage.

I hate him. He won’t look for a job and keeps spending his father’s inheritance, but it is my fault. I work every day and he does nothing but watch tv and feel sorry for himself. I don’t know how I get him out of my house and life.

My husband is an alcoholic. At the moment he is on a drinking binge. These binges happen every couple of months. It’s been this way for roughly 4 years now.

During these binges, he stays home from his job (he’s a small business owner), drinks all day until he passes out, wakes up, and drinks again until he passes out. We’re on day 3 of this binge. He’s lost his wallet and ID and can’t buy his own alcohol, so I do it. If I don’t buy it for him, he breaks everything he touches until I do.

I want him to sober up, but he’s destroying our home. He says terrible things to me and tries to put his hands on me when he’s like this. He rages and screams at the top of his lungs until he has no voice. It’s extremely terrifying to witness. When he is sober, he’s wonderful and loving. I know that somewhere in there is the man that I love.

I just don’t know what to do anymore. I’ve allowed him to alienate me from my friends and family, so I don’t know what kind of support network I would have if I left. We don’t have any children, and I’m so thankful for that. I do have pets that I am afraid to leave in the house with him. I don’t know what he would do to them if I left. I feel hopeless.

I have been married for 17 years and we both have always been social drinkers. However, within the last 4 or 5 years, my husband has taken it to another level. He doesn’t drink every day, but when he drinks (2 or 3 times a week) he gets completely wasted. There is no such thing as one or two beers anymore — it’s shots and hard alcohol when he drinks. He is usually depressed the next day and says he will cut back, but the cycle continues.

We have two teenagers who are exposed to this. I haven’t discussed anything with them, but I know they are smart enough to know when he’s wasted. I feel like he’s a horrible example at this very impressionable time of their lives. I want to help him get better, but I also don’t want my children exposed to this anymore.

I have been with my husband for 20 years. He has always been a drinker, but then he quit for about 5 years. He started back, got a DWI, and it’s only been going downhill from there. Going on a year and a half — hospitals, rehab, affairs.

Now it’s just the drinking — 2 or so bottles of vodka a day, more if he can. My problem is that it has taken control of me. I am finding my temper getting worse and things happening I don’t seem to be able to control.

I don’t like how his problem is making me feel. I don’t want to be like this and the worst part is it’s all for nothing. He never remembers anything. I just get myself stressed for nothing, all because I can’t control my own life — his drinking is.

I don’t want to lose everything we have worked for, but I don’t think I can live with this anymore.

I met my best friend a little over a year ago, when I was a single mother with a 21-month-old daughter. The man I got pregnant by has never been in our lives and I never dated since him. When I met my current boyfriend, I knew right away he was different. God, I loved him. It was special and I felt and saw it in his eyes when he’d look at me.

He is a truck driver. When he quit driving over the road and began driving local is when the behavior difference started. First just being mean, annoyed, then he stopped even talking to me. I knew he was hiding his drinking and I would put out a little bit of hints, hoping he would come to me and talk, but instead he would tell his friends and family made-up stories about me to then justify what I now know, how he was cheating on me. That lasted about 3 months.

In those 3 months he got so mean and nasty, and all I kept trying was to show him how much I loved him. Then I caught him outside in his truck, slamming down a bottle of vodka. That’s what he drank every night, a bottle straight down with nothing mixed. When I found out about the cheating, he was in such denial about that and drinking.

We have argued pretty nasty. Before he would call me names at first, then he would push me down on the ground really hard until 7 months ago he literally picked me up by the neck and threw me through 2 doors and down a flight of stairs. When I was able to look up and realize what happened, he was on top of me, choking me in the front yard and I was never so scared in my life.

The next day he was pretty mean, but the day after he cried a lot and apologized. 2 weeks later, he beat me so bad I really should have been in the hospital. My daughter saw almost the whole thing and still has nightmares from it. She had never even seen her mom get a sliver before. He was in the process of adopting her as her dad, and still is her dad.

I kicked him out before Christmas, but can’t stand to be away from him. He’s been staying at his mother’s and tonight I get a call he’s in the hospital, having seizures because he’s trying to quit drinking and hasn’t had one since yesterday afternoon.

I’m sitting here thinking about how at one time I was so strong and didn’t ever need any man to depend on. Where does one get so caught up in someone else that you lose all of your morals, your common sense? Where did I become so weak and desperate to put up with this man for any length of time?

Over 7 months later, I’m still struggling with my left arm that was torn so bad I can only use it for short periods of time today. And I have to watch my daughter’s heartbreak as she constantly asks and wants to know where and why her dad doesn’t come home and see her. I hate myself for letting him in my daughter’s life, but yet I still want so bad to be sitting next to him in that hospital room. I don’t know why.

I have an alcoholic husband. We have been married for almost ten years and he drinks every day. Sometimes it’s two six-packs and then three. When he gets so drunk, he acts like an idiot and makes everyone feel uncomfortable. Most of all our three kids.

It’s like he is mentally stuck in party mode from high school. I don’t know what to do it anymore. I am so sick of going round and round with him. I want to leave, but I love him and want him to change. I just don’t know.

I have been married for 15 years to an alcoholic and he is mean to the kids and I. Our kids are very well behaved young adults that do not do anything to get into trouble. He yells at them for having an opinion about certain topics and tells them “to quit being like their mother.”

He tells me I need to quit being a friend and be a mother. I try to do everything right, but I still do it wrong and get yelled at and told that I am stupid. He yells at me because I have to talk to a guy at work about work-related issues. Then he lies about the drinking, especially when he is driving with the kids in the car.

I don’t know what to do anymore. My kids ask me everyday, “Mom, why don’t you leave him?” And my response is he loves you all. What do I do.

Most of these stories I find are very similar to mine. My husband and I met back in April 2005. We’ve had a pretty close relationship. Of course we had our struggles, but I fell hard for him fast. Before I knew it we were moving in together!

My husband came from a family full of alcoholics. He grew up in and out of shelters. I met him through his brothers who were friends of mine, when he moved to Oregon from Louisiana. We were immediately drawn to each other. After 10 years together, going through struggles and fights, me losing my mom to a pulminary embolism back in 2010, my fertility issues (diagnosed with PCOS 3 years ago) we decided to get married, finally.

After saying our “I do’s,” we decided it was time to start seeking medical help with our fertility issues. Step one was to quit smoking. Our new family doctor gave us a prescription for both of us to start Chantix. Everything changed. The drinking went from weekends to every single day. He became very hostile and constantly called me names and screamed in my face for hours. We went back to the doctor and she recommended he be put on anti-psychotics — risperidone.

He then became a very heavy drinker. He stopped taking the risperidone about 2 months into it, because he felt it made him tired and loopy. He started taking Saint-John’s-wort, but that didn’t continue long either.

Every day he was coming home from work with beer — spending our bill-and-rent money. His work started to be affected by his personality change. Eventually he lost his job for blowing up at the C.E.O. He had no drive to find work for a while. All he wanted to do was drink, and smoke marijuana. When he would drink, the smallest things would set him off. He became very paranoid and hostile.

Nothing I say can change his mood, and if I say nothing, that’s just as bad. I’m so lost. I went from being in this relationship with my best friend, doing everything together, having maybe one little fight a year, to being married to an alcoholic that’s in denial.

I love this man, and it kills me every day to watch him drink away our life together. I can’t even imagine not being with him, as sad as that is. But I find myself asking myself, “What more needs to happen before I do leave?” Maybe when it gets physical? Will I leave then? I want to say yes, but I never thought I’d stay with someone who calls me the names he calls me.

I do everything I can for this man. I wash his clothes, wake him up with coffee most mornings, clean the house, cook his meals, do his laundry, etc. Whatever you can think of, I probably do it. But now I find myself not wanting to do it anymore. What’s the point? I fear that I’m closer to leaving than I think I am. I have nothing left. I know he’s changed me. Watching him go through this is killing me. Every day I lose a little more of who I am.

Tonight I sit in front of my HP Laptop, wishing I could just not exist. I feel so alone. There’s nothing left. I’m terrified.

I’m 33 and have been married for almost 3 years. My husband is really sweet and amazing and funny. He enjoys drinking for holidays and to cope with emotions like fear. When I show disappointment, he drinks and binge-drinks and is hurtful and mean and contemptuous.

I feel unsafe to be human. It’s a lot of pressure to feel like I have to please him all the time, as to not “set him off” (drinking). His contempt is unbearable. It comes out with just me being around. He is mean and angry. Everything is “GOD, leave me alone for just one minute,” as I ask if he would like dinner. Or I’ll stub my toe and “sounds like you made a mess.” It’s constant blaming and criticism. This stems off to habit when he is not drinking, the anger.

I’ll ask him a question to make small talk or to get his opinion and he gets angry. It is as if I have some ulterior motive other than wanting to hear what he thinks. It’s almost as if he feels like I’m out to get him or something. This makes me very sad.

I’d like to have small talk and laugh more with my husband. I’m very afraid to get pregnant and have kids because dealing and managing his drunk, violent, abusive behavior will be even harder with children. I’d like to break this cycle before having kids, but come to realize that it will always have to be managed if we have kids together. I already feel like I want to protect them from the yelling and impatience and hostility.

All I really would love would be for my husband to love himself so much he could face sadness and anger and disappointment without the illusionary crutch of alcohol. The anxiety is too much and the love is absent. If he were to love himself as much as he says he loves me, he would work hard to make staying healthy a priority. Please, if you’re reading this, send him and us a prayer of love.

Reading these stories makes me want to cry, cause I feel I am no longer alone.

I have a family full of alcoholics — grandparents, uncles, brothers, etc. –and I’m a newlywed. And guess what I married? The last thing I wanted, an alcoholic.

I do not drink an ounce of alcohol. I had a problem in my teenage years with it when my parents got divorced and have been sober since the age of 19. I am now 26 years old and married the man of my dreams.

Like everyone, when he’s sober he is amazing, we are happy, loving and full of adventure, but now I find myself hating him for this. I get the struggle of addiction. I was addicted to what felt like everything possible for 5 years, and since I’ve cleaned up I have a wonderful job, great friends, a beautiful home, everything I ever wanted.

My husband and I started as a long-distance couple. I was from Canada and he was in the U.S. For a year we went back and forth and everything was great. He drank, but what I assumed was the normal consumption — 1 or 2 on week nights and depending on where we were on weekends, a little more.

We met through our work and our work was so supportive they got him a visa to work here in Canada, which saved us a lot of stress, being long-distance. I am so thankful to them. It gave us the chance to get married as we wanted. He came here August and we were married in November. I secretly inside wish I never did and he tells me every day he wishes we did it differently, but this is his way to trigger me so that we fight and he has a reason to drink.

I gave him every option before he made the decision to move here and now he hates me for it. He’s not abusive, but when he drinks he blames me for everything and tries to control me. For instance, “I don’t love him.” And “I don’t want him.” Or, “Who you talking to on the phone? Who are you texting? Where are you going?”

He doesn’t trust me, but the best part is he has no reason not to trust me. I don’t got out with friends. I stay home and clean up after him, cook for him, buy the groceries, do the finances. If you can think of it, I do it — including doing all the wedding planning and asking him to marry me.

I highly believe in if you make a promise, you keep it and I won’t promise anything if I can’t keep it. Unlike him, you know how many times he canceled the same day, plans he made with me and friends or family? All the time I end up solo and get home to him drinking. Or the promise of if I have all this beer tonight, I won’t drink for the whole week. Yeah, that was the case on Sunday and he hasn’t stopped since then.

I know I shouldn’t believe it, but I love him so much my heart secretly believes it and I end up hurt every time. I’m so emotionally done, it’s incredible. I don’t care anymore. I want him to go back to the States and divorce me, but he won’t cause he knows I keep coming back and doing everything.

I’m just so tired. I suffer from Crohn’s disease and this stress slowly kills me, but he doesn’t care. That’s the problem. It’s always his way or the highway.

He’s the most arrogant, miserable, ignorant man I have ever met and gets mean when he doesn’t drink. I’m just so fed up. I want to leave and may have to. This isn’t a give-or-take relationship. This is a take-only-from-me relationship and I’ve lost my mind. It feels like I have nothing more to give.

I am so young and do not want this for the next 20 years of my life. I have so much love to give and want someone to give it back to me in the same amount. I love this man, but nothing I do will stop him. If I tell him it’s me or beer, he always drinks.

I’m starting to lose myself in the process, as he’s taking all I have left in me. I need help.

Married 18 years to what you would call a functioning alcoholic. The story rings true to the fact that he is truly a wonderful man when sober. I think back to when our kids were young and how much they have gone through. He was abusive physically in the past. That part has not happened in a while. But lately he is on this kick where he talks to me for like three hours when he is drunk. I call it the drunk talk. It’s a mixture of verbal abuse, emotional ups and downs. I don’t talk. I usually just listen, sometimes cry.

I made myself a goal a long time ago after I got sick of him calling me a burden (while drunk) that I would be able to support myself and my kids. It was very hard to find the courage, but I went back to school and became a nurse. I have been one now for a couple years. This decision has changed my life, because I learned that I am capable, smart and if I choose to leave I can do so knowing that I can take care of my kids.

My husband spends a lot of time at the bar. He is going down a path that is destroying our family. He blames me for a lot of the problems. I know the truth. It just hurts. I love him very much.

I am praying for the strength to do the right thing. I know that I am enabling him, but I need direction. I don’t want to have any regrets. I don’t want to give up if there is hope, but I don’t know if there is hope, and if it’s worth the wait.

I’ve been with my boyfriend for over a year now. I knew he drank when I got with him, but I didn’t know how much of a problem it would become.

He recently got a DUI –totaled my car on Christmas Eve. I told him that was it. If he didn’t see a problem and wasn’t willing to fix it, I was gone. He did really well for about a month. Then the Super Bowl came around — he drank. (He never comes home when he drinks. I sit up all night, freaking out. He doesn’t answer his phone. Claims he doesn’t hear it.) But I told him to leave.

We got into a huge fight. He doesn’t seem to care how badly it hurts me to see him literally drinking his life away. So he kept telling me he’d only drink occasionally — I’m thinking maybe holidays is what he’s talking about. Last night he proved that was not the case. His friend comes over and they are playing Madden and he asks me if I mind if he drinks with him. Of course I mind. Barely 2 months ago he totaled my car!

So the begging ensued — he said he didn’t like that I was telling him what he could and couldn’t do. I told him he was free to make his own choice, but not free from the consequence. Claimed I was threatening him.

I love this man. He has stepped up and been a great father figure to my kids, and when he’s sober he’s amazing. But when he drinks he’s completely different. I don’t know what to do.

He says he isn’t an alcoholic anymore. Tried to tell him it’s like cancer. You’ll always be an alcoholic. You are just in remission. I would like to find someone to talk to.

My husband was in recovery when we met. He started drinking when our son was two. Our son was just diagnosed with autism. He’s almost 4 now.

I can’t do autism and alcoholism at the same time. I just want my husband back, but I fear he is gone forever. I need him now more than ever, but it looks like I have to make a choice and it has to be my son, because he chose alcohol.

My boyfriend is an alcoholic. I’ve been with him for two years. He is becoming verbally and emotionally abusive when he’s drunk and refuses to see that he is. Everything that’s wrong in his life is always all my fault. Until he thinks I might actually walk away and then he starts apologizing, begging me to stay. He says he drinks because he can’t sleep. But that means that he gets himself so wasted that he has no filter on his mouth at all.

I divorced an emotionally abusive man. There is no reason that I should have found myself in a relationship with someone who would do this again. At the beginning, he hid it from me. I was in denial about his drinking, that it wasn’t that bad. But there it is, in all it’s bad glory, staring me right in the face.

My therapist says that I unknowingly got myself in a relationship with an alcoholic because my mother was one. And there is that child within me seeking out that approval or love from an alcoholic knowing in my head the whole time I’m not going to get it. He triggers the heartbreak of the love I didn’t receive when I was a child. So I find myself begging for that love when he’s drunk and telling me I’m worth nothing.

It’s hard in the moment to tell yourself that you will be ok whether you get from him what you need or not. The truth is, there is no hope for this to work if he continues drinking. I don’t know why I haven’t’ been strong enough to leave yet. Maybe I’m waiting for him to screw up so bad there’s no way he could see it as my fault. But let’s not kid ourselves, he’s an alcoholic: it’s always everyone else’s fault.

One day at a time.

He’ll say such mean things to me and the next morning I always get I’m sorry & I love you. Then night will come and he’ll do it all over again.

My husband and I have been together for almost 8 years. He has quit drinking several times, I thought, but was hiding it in places that I found.

No matter what I do, it’s not good enough, but when he is sober I am wonderful, the best wife and mother.

I am finding from my stepson that even when his father is home that he isn’t taking care of our son, but my stepson who is 12 is taking care of him.

I’m at a loss for what to do. He has quit his job without a back up! Found another, but is only working 4 hours a day and I have been paying all our bills and rent for this house for 3 years. I’ve always supported us.

I am an addict . I am powerless over my addiction. My wife divorced me and now that is the only motivation I have to be a better man.

I work the program and I hope that one day my wife can forgive me. I understand that if someone doesn’t admit they have a problem, they will never be helped.

For me, it took losing the one person I loved more than anything in this world to wake me up. I am sober now. And I am working the program. I pray one day I can redeem myself in my ex-wife’s eyes.

I am married to an alcoholic. I relate to all the stories, but I am still here 30 years later. I, too, am jealous of his co-workers. They spend hours with him sober, but I only get less than an hour.

On the weekdays and weekends he goes out to his garage and drinks a 6, 12, or 24-pack of beer, but he says he doesn’t have a problem — I am the one with the problem. He complains that I am not affectionate and that is why he drinks.

I don’t want to be near him when he drinks because he is sloppy, verbally abusive and a jerk. He makes hurtful comments out loud and he doesn’t care who hears. My grown children have seen his outbreaks as they were growing up and still continue to see it. Our oldest son, who is 26 years old, has not spoken to him for over a year because he holds a lot pain and resentment toward his father.

I stay in the relationship because I love him and he has an illness. “Would I leave him if he had cancer?” is what I ask myself. I feel sorry for him at times. I don’t know how and where I can get the strength to leave.

Sometimes he is good, sometimes he just turns on me and the kids. It is like Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde. I don’t know who is going to show up sometimes.

It is always my fault and I am always the stupid one. I am so tired of the yelling from him, with him and the kids — there is always anger and yelling. I know I can only change me and and not him, but I just want it to all be better.

I am worried he is going to lose his job; we can’t leave, we would be broke, the kids would have to leave their home, school and friends. I can’t afford to keep them where they are. Not only would they lose their father, they would lose their home, their school, their way of life. But he may take that away any minute by getting drunk and alienating his boss. It is like Russian roulette and all of us are on the edge.

Things could be so good if he would stop, go back to being the responsible, kind human being he used to be.

My husband and I have been married for 37 years. For the last 15 years, he has become a binge-drinker. He has stopped drinking many times. I start to feel like he has it beat and then out of nowhere he’s drunk! He’s never abusive, but he is a staggering, blubbering idiot. There’s no trust or respect left!

I never know what triggers it. I threaten to leave, he begs me to stay and promises he’ll never drink again. So goes the cycle. I’m trapped!

I don’t think I have the courage to leave. It would tear our family apart. He promises to go to AA and work the program this time. I want to believe him. I feel like a fool!

I’m 52 and should know better, I’m old and should be wise — right. I started dating a 33-year-old. Stopped drugs when we first started dating. But can’t give up his liquor. He was raised by druggies and drinkers — so what should I expect. Certainly nothing different from his parents. That’s all the poor boy knows. How sad — a wasted life.

I have just celebrated my 32nd wedding anniversary, so you would think I had a great marriage. I met my husband at 15 and married at 17. He is 5 years older than me, so all our dates where revolved around pubs.

I had a son, but after having him I suffered 12 miscarriages and became so agoraphobic that I drank as well as my husband, but sadly I became addicted and was told that if I didn’t stop that I would be dead in 5 months. So without any help, I stopped and that was 7 years ago.

My husband has always drank, but since I have stopped I have noticed just how much he is drinking and it’s getting worse. The hardest part is that he takes it out on me. He is sarcastic, always puts me and my family down. He is never wrong.

I can’t take it anymore, as I have begged and pleaded with him to cut down, but it goes through one ear and out the other. It’s affecting me badly. I am so stressed that I’m having bad palpitations, I don’t eat so I weigh 6st 10 and been diagnosed as anorexic, and today he just made me feel so worthless that I really have considered ending my life.

I am disabled, so stuck in this house 24/7 unless he takes me out and that has to be in the morning when he hasn’t had a drink, but as soon as we get home out comes the lager.

I do love him, but this is killing me and I mean literally as I’m not a strong person anymore– and how can one person make you feel that you are better off dead? I’m lost in a place that I don’t understand anymore and I needed to get this of my chest, as I can’t deal with this anymore.

I’m at this point in my life at age 29 (30 in April) and I’m with my fiancé,’ age 33. We have a beautiful daughter together, who will be 4 in April as well. I have been with my fiance’ since I was 19, and I feel that our relationship is over.

He has drank every day since the day I met him, and I never realized what kind of an addiction he had till my daughter was born. He drinks 3-4 Margarita Bud Lights a day, and on top of it smokes. His money just goes down the drain. We haven’t had intimancy in 14 months, and when I try he says he just doesn’t have the drive anymore. It’s been 3 months since he has said he knows he needs to see a doctor, but hasn’t made the phone call yet.

As a young vibrant, very energized young female, I need to be acknowleged and need that intimancy to keep this relationship going. I know that his drinking problem has made our relationship rocky, but it doesn’t seem like he’s going to change. I asked him on Thursday when he had to get our daughter from daycare if he’d had anything to drink that day and he said, no. Needless to say, I saw a Margarita sitting in the center console — yes, he was drinking and driving with our 3-year-old. He claims it was his first drink of the day.

I don’t believe him anymore, and he’s never going to seek help. I don’t know what one should do in my shoes. I don’t know whether to stay or go. He has sucked all my energy out of me, to the point where looking at him just disgusts me. Laying in bed and his back turned to me makes me want to get up and leave. I know I need help.

All the heartache, pain, anxiety, stress, longing, and needing I’m reading here hits home. I’ve been married 8 years, together for 10. I can’t remember seeing my husband sober for 2 years — alcohol was always a feature, but has been his “everything” for 2 hideous years.

He has verbally abused me, his family and his friends — resulting in gradual isolation from everyone who cared for him. He has driven while being so drunk he could hardly stand up, smashed up furniture, kicked in doors, passed out on the couch for days, stopped eating or taking any personal care of himself, and so on and on.

It took a huge verbal fight one night that resulted in him going missing, being found by the police and locked up to cool off, that made my mind up — I couldn’t live with him anymore. I had tried everything. It broke my heart, but I threw him out — changed the locks and stepped off the roller coaster for my own sanity.

I refused to enable his behaviour and I also refused to watch him killing himself. Everyone I spoke to told me, “He was an adult, he needed to help himself, and he needed to hit rock bottom.” It took 2 years to find the strength to say enough is enough — and while he still had me as his safety net, he had no reason to really make the effort.

That was May. It was hard not buying into the pitiful text messages, the great apologies and declarations of love — I did for a while. He was and still is to a certain degree, Jekyll and Hyde — since he moved out I have never contacted him. He, on the other hand, has never stopped inundating me with texts and phone calls. I have refused to answer him for 3 months. In the beginning he got angry when I didn’t respond.

I have to say having to survive on his own with little or no support, not much money to feed his addiction and no comforts of home, has led him to an epiphany. He took himself to AA, and is now attending an addiction program and receiving counselling. It’s “early days.” I’m under absolutely no illusion. Happy endings with hearts and flowers is not where my head is at. Until he finds sobriety and proves himself, I can’t let him back in my life. Yes, I adore him. I adore the man I knew without alcohol, my husband, not the person this disease turned him into.

We all deserve to be treated with respect and kindness. I guess it comes down to loving myself more than the alcoholism. It’s in my nature to help people, so walking away from the most important person in my life, the person who needed help, was the most difficult thing I have ever done — but thanks to lots of support, I found my self-respect.

If people offer support, I take it. I talk about how I feel and don’t hide what is going on, like I did for a year. I find time to do things that make me happy, even if it’s just going for a walk or having coffee with a friend. The alcoholic in my life took over everything. I had to learn to take back something for myself.

I’ve recently discovered my husband has been secretly drinking for, well, I don’t know how long. When we met, we both liked to party and then I got pregnant. So I stopped drinking, quit smoking and got healthy for our son.

I recently found bottles in his closet. I confronted him about it and told him that if he was going to drink he needed to not hide it from me (I hate lying more than anything in the world — this was my failed attempt to try and build trust). He agreed to this and for a couple weeks he was talking to me and telling me what he was doing.

Then I noticed that he got super drunk Monday night and he didn’t have that many beers (he’s typically a beer drinker — then adds vodka to ease the stress). I checked the bank account. He stopped at the liquor store on Monday after he picked up our son. I went home to try and find the bottle, but it wasn’t anywhere to be found. When he got home, I checked his work bag and there was the bottle — half gone, from one night. I confronted him about it and he said he only had two shots Monday. I kept asking him “Well, where did the rest of the bottle go?” He kept saying he didn’t know.

We have been together for two years and married for almost one. I love him with all of my heart. I am at a loss. He’s not mean, hateful, or abusive when he drinks. I don’t know what to do. We are already going to counseling for a couple of issues that have come up. I don’t want to bombard him to where he drinks more and more. I want him to be healthy. I want him to see our son graduate, but if he continues on the path he’s going, he will be drinking a bottle a day within the next couple years, if not sooner.

I have no clue what to do, either, just as many of you. Most of these stories resonate with me to my core. It’s scary to see people in these destructive relationships for 20+ years — I don’t think I can handle another day. I’ve been married for three years, with a two-and-a-half year-old. I don’t have a conventional job — I do contract marketing and website design — so my income fluctuates.

This is one of my biggest obstacles, my child and money situation. Our daughter loves her daddy and he is great interacting with her. But in all reality, he is a horrible father, as he doesn’t provide for his family, he lies to me (probably daily at this point), he steals money from me and our daughter is missing $6 from her piggy bank, he has turned physically violent, and the list goes on.

I did tell him to leave last week after finding money missing (yet again) and after him admitting he drank once when I was away for business, which I found out from my neighbor that he was drinking more than just once when I was gone. I am scared. I have no childcare or money to even pay the mortgage and he’s off in yet another rehab.

I feel he goes to rehab when I kick him out. He gets drunk, then goes to a rehab because he has nowhere else to turn. My parents are done with this roller coaster. I finally convinced my mother it isn’t heathy for our child to be witnessing fights — verbal or physical, or both.

I don’t want to break up a family, but this time I feel differently. I don’t want to see him; I don’t want him back in the home. They say you need to want something more than you fear it, and I am hoping I am strong enough to figure out a way to pay our bills and not lose my home — all while keeping my husband out of my life, while he is self-destructing.

This is by far the hardest thing I have ever experienced in my life. My heart breaks, but my self-worth and the happiness of my daughter has to trump my emotional (irrational) thoughts. I wish every one of you the best — sadly, I can truly empathize with you all.

This disease is horrible. It’s breaking my heart to watch my husband destroy everything we have worked so hard to achieve. Can’t fix someone who doesn’t want to fix himself.

I’m a 24-year-old man, a drug addict (6 months sober). My fiancé is an alcoholic, has been to treatment twice now, doesn’t attend any meetings (won’t even go with me). She drinks a 1.75 of whiskey in 3 days. I don’t like it in our house, so I usually take it and dump it, but last night I just took the bottle away from her and it’s sitting in our closet.

Recently I’ve been keeping all of our money in a lockbox and locking it (my meeting said that it was acceptable), and over the past few weeks things have been good, but the other night I left it open because I felt I could trust her. Well, I was let down.

I love her unconditionally, but I’m going to college now, working a different kind of job that doesn’t pay as well. I just need to focus on school, but it’s hard when I know my life can come crashing down again at any moment.

When they say they don’t know why they stopped at the liquor store to make the purchase, they really are committed to alcoholism. It is sad to let them kill themselves slowly, and watch. As his wife, I have been very patient and waiting for 4 years for him to stop. He just told me that he doesn’t think he can do it. He knows that our marriage is on the line — and it is, so he is moving out.

I met my husband in 2013. I dated him for a year, living with him for 5 months prior to our marriage. We had to marry in order to be together. He had orders for Masawa, Japan — he’s military. I left my career, etc. to be by his side.

Well, it is Saturday afternoon here and I am spending another day locked in my bedroom. He started drinking this morning at 9:30. I busted him at it and his excuse was it was last night’s glass. I called him out, reminding him that I cleaned up his glass from last night. “I only had a sip” was followed by him bringing up every subject in the book that caused me or my teens pain. We all lock ourselves down in our rooms to get away from him, hearing how “I haven’t done anything. Why are you mad at me?”

If I even have a glass of wine, then I have a problem. I go days or weeks without so much as a sip, but he can’t go 48 hours without approaching me with, “Let’s make a deal.”

We will soon be married for 2 years and I already want out. But out to what? My career is gone — no parents, etc. How will I support my kids without my career? My home is gone and the money was spent re-establishing ourselves here in Japan — on cars, etc. To report him to his supervisors means his career and our family’s financial well-being is over. He cannot seek help because AA out here reports back to his supervisors.

The only thing that keeps me going at times is my kids, but then again what kind of mother am I to put them in this situation? Maybe they would be better off without me and could return to my ex in-laws. I continuously ask God, “What did I do to deserve this?” He didn’t drink or act like this before we married, because I honestly would have never married him. I at one time wondered if he did and I didn’t notice. But all the kids to include his own daughters don’t remember him “drinking this much in the states.”

I couldn’t ask for a better husband when he is sober, but those times of sobriety are fewer and fewer between. I envy his co-workers — they get to have the man I married, while I only see that man for about an hour after he gets home and the effects of alcohol kick in.

Night before last was horrible. I started packing the next day. I took him to his first AA meeting. He doesn’t drink every day, from what I know, but when he does and mixes the pills he turns into my own personal form of domestic terrorism. Just learning about Al-Anon. Just want my husband back and not this two-eyed monster who abuses me.

Well, my story is the same as everyone’s. I’m married to the most amazing man, when he is sober. He doesn’t think he has a problem, he doesn’t think he does anything wrong, he is very verbally abusive, and he always makes me feel like it’s my fault, which I sometimes believe.

I really want to leave and start over, after 23 years. But I selfishly don’t want to be broke and have to work two jobs. So I’m at a point where I decide which is going to be better to live with — alcohol binges every couple of months, or possible happiness all the time by myself, being poor. Or maybe it won’t be happy times.

I don’t know and I don’t think I’m strong enough to find out. I think alcoholics that “love” you, will never fully love you, because they can’t. I think their first love is always the bottle. I’m exhausted emotionally and torn up inside!

My father is a nightmare to be around. I am currently living in my college dorm. I worry for my mom and our pets. He is a functional drinker. He works and excuses his actions because he worked all day. He has an office job with secretaries who do his job for him. When he’s drunk, he becomes loud, angry, rude, unreasonable, etc.

He was in the Marines and uses that as a crutch to drink. I genuinely hate being around him, period. He makes me feel guilty because he has to pay for my college books. But my scholarships and grants pay for everything else. I am hoping to save enough to buy my own books for this next semester. My goal is to become an optometrist, then take my mom and pets out from under him.

I currently have two jobs. I’m so sick of living this way. We fight. He doesn’t work. I’m 51 years old and never thought this would be my life.

I love my husband, but I don’t know how much more I can take. It’s like babysitting a grown man. He is also bipolar. I feel guilty when I think of leaving him. I truly believe if I leave him he will die.

I’ve been married for 18 years this year and have two beautiful little girls. Tonight I’ve finally realised that my husband will never change. He has secretly drank for the past 10 years and been verbally and very physically abusive.

I always forgive and hope that he will change. I try and believe his apologies and promises that it will never happen again. I am a strong woman and yes I used to be one of those women that asked, “Why does she put up with that? Is she weak and stupid?” And now, it is me.

I stay because I understand that sometimes life gives you lemons and my husband has been given nothing but lemons! That is, until he met me and I have given him love, reassurance, support, two beautiful daughters, a lovely home and yet still he works hard to destroy this.

I’ve finally reached the end of my tether and I’m getting off this terrible emotional roller coaster.

I have been married 1 year and with my husband for 8 years. When we got together he was a drinker and I was too, but we were young and liked to party. He drank every day and it didn’t bother me until we moved away to another state and I found a job quickly and he didn’t. He partied every day while I worked a full-time job.

We moved to our very own apartment 4 months later and his drinking got worse. We fought a lot and it got violent sometimes, just pushing and breaking stuff. He would drink so much that I’d be at work and he would show up telling me to give him my bank card or he’d make a scene.

He would have seizures and black-out and pass blood. Then one day he quit drinking and smoking cold-turkey, because he wanted to be better. He was sober for 2 or 3 years. Things were good. We had a baby and located to a place with more opportunities. He loved his job and then he proposed. A few months later he started drinking again, because his back went out at work and it wasn’t getting better.

He started getting depressed. He started off with just a few beers, because he said he just felt like a beer — wasn’t getting drunk, but then it turned into a 6-pack, then a 12-pack. Then a 24-pack. Then he started drinking hard liquor, which started off at pints, then fifths. He is now drinking fifths and 2 beers.

He’s starting his patterns again, getting drunk, then taking off and withdrawing all the money in the bank to gamble. He used to do that before, the first time he quit. I told him if he messes up again I’m done. But then tonight we were arguing because after drinking a pint and 2 tall cans he took the car to go get more.

I don’t approve of drinking and driving, so I was livid. I don’t care if the store is around the corner. Anyways, we were arguing about that and I’m telling him he has a problem, you need to quit. And he has the audacity to tell me to change being a slob, go for walks. I’ve been working harder to make sure the house is clean. And I just started doing small exercises because I’ve been gaining weight being a stay-at-home mom. He’s trying to make all these excuses, that he works hard to support us and he deserves to unwind.

I get angry every time he buys booze because I’m afraid he’s gonna mess up again. He has a great job and I don’t want him to mess it up. He’s the meanest person to me when he’s drinking. I don’t know how to help him anymore. I want him to quit and be happy again, because we are not happy. He’s drinking every other day as of right now, but it can easily change. He’s also bi-polar and, I’m sure, manic-depressive. It runs in his family.

When he messes up, it’s because he’s gone on a suicide run — which means he loses all the money, then calls me to pick him up after midnight, because he feels terrible. I just don’t know how much of this I can take.

Where do I start. Everything I have just read is me. I’ve been married for 30 years and I dearly love my husband. He provides well, and we are both professional people. And he again, sober, is the nicest bloke anyone would meet.

Then there is the other husband, the one who drinks a bottle of rum every night, who becomes abusive verbally. We live in separate parts of the house, spending our time apart as I can’t bear him when he drinks. Retirement looms. Is it going to get worse when he doesnt have a job to hold down any more.

I ask myself, what can I do, where can I go. I can’t leave him, so I don’t know where to go.

When do you say enough is enough? I have been married 2 years and with my husband for 9 years. Within the last year he has been hiding the bottle, as if I do not know he has been drinking.

Like all the others, he is a great guy, very giving. But when the firewater starts going through his blood he gets angry, yells and is verbally abusive. We no longer go anywhere, because he cannot be away from home very long. He goes to work and works hard, but once home the bottle is being poured.

He has heart issues and is overweight, I just hate watching someone I love kill himself. I have asked for God’s guidance.

Reading all this makes me even more sad at how many women suffer within marriage. I cannot even put in words how much I empathize with all of it. I had that hell as a child with my parents and have it again now. Like you all mentioned, my husband is a very nice man when he sober, which is a few hours a day if I am lucky. Now these days, he is a full blown alcoholic, but can’t and doesn’t want to see it.

It’s such a cold, loveless and lonely place to be in, and there seems no way out of it, as there is no proper communication, just denial and avoidance. At least there is the Internet, as with all this headache and heartache one doesn’t know where to turn to, and can share the pain. They can make you feel like it’s all your fault. There is just no getting through to them.

I am at a crossroads. I’ve had enough. My husband of 20 years is an alcoholic and just like most of you expressed, his drinking is out of control. He lies, he is manipulative, violent and what’s worse he is has 2 children out of wedlock due to his alcoholic episodes. We have no children, thank God — no life, either. I hate him, but realize for my heart I have to forgive and leave.

I just can’t take the betrayal. I am ready to give him the ultimatum to get help or I am out. He loves his bottle more than life. He hides the bottles. He lies about where he is going to drink. He was functional, but now he is out of control.

I fear for his health. He doesn’t see what a low place he is in. I can be a catalyst to point him in the right direction, but I cannot let this destroy me too. I cannot enable him either. Unless he makes the choice to get help, I am out. Enough.

I have been with the love of my life for 5 years now. I found out he was alcoholic well into our relationship. He is the most wonderful, caring, considerate man until he drinks, then he turns into a very critical and emotionally abusive person. He always says, “I’m not in reality when I have been drinking.” He wants to pick a fight every time he drinks. I try my hardest to ignore him or just be calm. It hurts me so bad inside. I feel like I am screaming, but no one hears me.

Married 27 years to the best man I have ever known. 15 years into the marriage, he became a binge-alcoholic at age 55. Imagine my surprise! It can happen to anyone at any time!

Success rate of recovery is 3 out of 10. Not good odds. After the loss of just about everything and 12 years of living in an emotional hell, I divorced him, blocked his phone number and started my own withdrawal.

I had a very good self-image and a solid love of God, but it got me anyway! Now I am climbing back out. I sure as heck did not want to give up. I just wanted the man I married back, but he is gone forever.

When you no longer respect them, trust them and are embarrassed by them, you can only forgive them. However, the marriage cannot survive with no respect or trust. My words to him were, “We have a sober friendship. In others words, if you are sober, we are friends. If you are drunk, do not come to the house, do not call me (I block his number), and good luck to you!”

I was fortunate that his drinking started after our four kids were grown and out of the house. How awful when it affects the children! I have come to learn that “givers” need to set boundaries, because “takers” never do! May God bless each and every one of you!

I have an incredible 28-year-old son. Type-1 diabetic since age 12. Seems as though there is much commonality with experiencing a family member actively drinking. The behaviors are bizarre and it simply makes me cringe. I realize seeing him in a drunken stupor every evening and then “worrying” about his sugar through the night does no one any positives.

Being fairly educated on the diabetes aspect just makes me envision the health effects of the sugar in the alcohol as well as the disease. This disease does ravage through the family.

The lies, manipulation alone are difficult to deal with. The anger bursts and the “visual” when impaired and the “food-binge” and mess are fairly intolerable. I see “a soul” in hiding or absent.

I truly feel for all those whose lives are touched by this disease. I know it has robbed my own heart many times. I wish there was a magic button. It seems so so true that you just cannot “help” yet go thru much chaos when saying “no.” Actually carrying around a form of humiliation, due to
this disease, and how my son’s life seems to have turned into a “bad movie” with no future.

I married only two months ago. I’m 27 years old. It seems like after marriage everything got worse. I’ve lost it. I had been so patient with my husband, always positive when he was down and out, felt so much love for him. All I wanted was to show him how much he was worth loving. He’s a very sensitive and unhappy person, just miserable with his life. I would beat myself up over trying to figure out why he drinks — if I can only help him, he’d then be happy and move forward and live peacefully, and then he’d love me as I deserve. But things just got worse.

I lost my job, which I have come a long way from, lost my children because they are afraid of him and hurt that he keeps hurting me, angry with me. I then got pregnant. Having already one ectopic pregnancy, I still felt the need to please him, to give him what he so badly wanted — a little girl. I was naive to think it’d bring us closer, after one of his drunken episodes where he tried to kill me — poured lighter fluid on me, threatening to light me on fire, screaming at me how unworthy of a mother I was, how my children deserved better, how he deserved better.

I can’t believe he’d want to hurt me so bad. He wasn’t even upset with me. The trigger to that episode didn’t even start with me. I had learned to not argue with a drunk, after ending up in the hospital prior and with eight stitches, on crutches for a week.

We had finally gotten pregnant, after a year and a half of trying to conceive. We first thought it was going to be a miscarriage, to find out only a few days later it was another ectopic pregnancy. I can no longer have children. With all that pain, he left me in the hospital. After making excuses to leave, he ended up drunk. I recovered well, so went home the same day. But in all that time after hearing that I could no longer have children all I found myself thinking was how he was going to leave me because I couldn’t give him a little girl, how much of a failure I felt as a wife, a woman. He took care of me after surgery, apologized, said he’d never leave me, but then after two weeks he had yet another episode, threatening to leave, divorce me, go sleep with his son’s mother or his ex, and go live with her, have children with her. He then acts like nothing happened after he takes off, then calls like nothing is wrong.

I’m losing my mind. I’m losing myself. I do not know how much more of this I can take. I have panic attacks, anxiety, because I never know if he is going to have a good day or a bad day. I don’t know where or how I will get enough strength to walk away. I feel like if I leave him, I’ve failed him and my marriage. I don’t know when it’s enough and it’s time to walk away.

Well, my fiancé just recently left me. I’m pregnant with his child, 28 weeks. He left me 4 days ago. It’s so hard because he’s been going to the bar every night and he’s in love with his friends, I swear. He has his other daughter, but leaves her with his mom while he goes and parties. It’s so hard. I love him and he just left, hasn’t talked to me or anything.

I’m losing patience and becoming a crazy person in the process. My husband binge-drinks on the weekend, especially on Sundays because NFL is on–and since he works all week he feels as if this is his earned right. He drinks alone and starts drinking before 11 a.m. every Sunday and then makes a big mess in the kitchen, which he never cleans. I ask him nicely to clean his messes, after the 4th time I lose it. At 32 you should be able to clean your own mess. His mom’s a big drinker, wine, which is his choice. I truly believe this is learned behaviour and he thinks drinking is okay and normal.

I grew up in a house where drinking alcohol was not the norm, unless it was a special occasion–like Christmas. But never did my parents get drunk. For this reason I am not a big drinker. I am currently 12 weeks pregnant and want my kids to have the same views on drinking that I did, as opposed to my husband.

When he’s sober, he’s a great guy. Unfortunately he has made me hate weekends, because I’ll have to deal with him being drunk. I don’t know what to do about this. I talk to him about it all the time and he doesn’t think it’s a problem. I’ve even brought it up to his parents and been laughed at, saying he’s my problem now. He’s an addiction counselor, so you would think he’d recognize his problem.

I’m so lost. So angry.

So, I secretly married my fiancé, now husband, a couple months ago. Our kids don’t know, just my mum and 2 friends. I thought it would help with his insecurities.

He’s jealous, anyway, but when he drinks it’s horrendous and he becomes violent toward me.

After an afternoon of drinking, with lunch and friends, we went into the pool bar at the hotel we were at, and a man with his wife began talking to us all, as did his wife. My fiancé lost control. We got home separately, as he was going on to drink more, whereas I was ready for home. Yet, when I returned he had already got back to our place. The violence was horrendous and our place looked like a robbery had taken place and I called the police too. I didn’t press charges in the end, but I moved out. Two weeks later, a trip to the doctor’s and him being put on meds, and I returned. He didn’t drink for a couple of months, but then it’s started again and he said, “He can handle his drink.” After not seeing him for two weeks due to travel and work, we went out yesterday.
He started again, questioning my loyalty, my love and adoration to him.

After a nasty previous break-up and my ex taking my children, I have shown my love to him and my desire to be with him, but have explained that I don’t need him to survive — but I want him in my life always.

The result of this was him grabbing me round the throat and almost breaking my back over a wall! He then took my purse, phone, and shoes and left me. As he walked off, I ran away and hid. Two hours later, he found me asleep on a concrete floor in our building’s car park. He was sorry, full of apologies, begging for forgiveness, promising to change.

I do love him, but don’t know how much more I can take. If I go, I have lost everything — my kids and home to my ex, and now this! I don’t know why he won’t stop drinking and hurting me. It’s been three years.

I have been married to my alcoholic husband for almost 11 years; we have been together for 15. He has always drank. When he drinks enough, he is mean, not physically, but verbally. I have sat all day and read all the posts on this blog. I want to scream at some of you saying, “Why would you let someone do that? How can you let someone treat you like that!” And then I realize I let someone do that. I let someone make me cry and make me feel not good enough. I let someone scream at me and embarrass me. I let someone take away my joy because in the back of my mind I am waiting for him to get drunk and embarrass me or scream at my kids for something small. I allow him in my house to cause chaos and possibly emotionally scar my kids.

What is wrong with me? I am an educated woman. I have a masters degree in, are you ready for this, counseling! I hear woman talk about their abusive, alcohol-addicted husbands and support them and tell them it’s not their fault. I tell them they are strong enough to leave. I tell them they can’t change the person, the person has to change themselves. I sit and wonder why they would allow someone like that in their lives. Then I go home to my dirty little secret. I go to home to my alcoholic husband. I go home to the stress and embarrassment.

I know what I should do. I just can’t make myself do it. I love him, fiercely, but that is not the reason I stay. It is because I am embarrassed. I feel like I knew what I was getting when I married him. He didn’t hide this about himself. He didn’t wait until we were married to start drinking. I made an educated, calculated decision. I thought I could love him enough. I thought I could “fix” him. I thought he would love me enough to “fix” himself.

I know he doesn’t drink because of me. I have met his family. I hear how they treat each other. I see how they interact. I know it isn’t my fault. That is what makes me stay too. If I go, I am leaving him to them. There is no seeing what a happy family can be. There is bitterness and resentment and hatred. It is all the things that make him drink. When he is sober, he sees what “normal” can be. He likes it. He is a better man today than he was when I met him. He wants to change. He has a disease. I tell myself, would you leave him if he had cancer? No. I promised in front of God and everyone to love him in sickness and in health. I wasn’t lying. How can I leave? How can I allow him to treat me that way? How can I allow my kids to see how he is treating me? He is modeling for them how they are supposed to treat their mother and their wife. Is this how I want them to act towards me or their future wives? So I sit in indecision. I listen to the lies and shake my head. I protect my kids the best I can.

Here is my next dark little secret. I hate myself a little more every day for being weak. For deluding myself. For not being the mother I need to be. For being scared. For loving someone who has no idea what love is. For thinking that I can “save” him and failing so miserably. For being embarrassed. For not asking for help. For not leaving. For not fighting harder. For not making the right decisions. For feeling like it is my fault. For allowing someone to make me feel like I am worthless. For allowing someone to have so much control over my feelings. I hate myself a little more every day.

I have been married for 25 years. We have 3 children, 2 have already left home and both have jobs. We still have 1 child at home — she finishes school in 2 years.

My husband abuses alcohol. He has these drinking frenzies every other weekend. He will go out with his friends on a Friday evening, return in the early hours of the morning, falling over everything, puking. I sleep in my daughter’s room on these occasions.

He does not abuse me physically, but uses bad language and will sometimes call me bad names or say that he is sick and tired of me. I try to be a model parent to my children. I don’t drink, smoke or hang out with friends. I spend most of my time at home with my daughter.

I am worried, as it feels as if I don’t have any more feelings for my husband. I used to help him get to bed and make sure he’s okay. Lately I just leave him where he passes out. I don’t like him touching me anymore. We hardly speak when he’s sober. I’ve begged him to stop drinking.

Lately he’s been lying about where he is, and he spends a lot of money at the bar in one evening, not that we can afford it. He gets angry at himself, but just does it again on the next occasion. He keeps saying he’s sorry and that he is going to try hard, but 2 weeks later it’s the same all over again. I don’t think I can go on this way.

My partner of three years drinks, not every day, probably 3 times a week, but it is always vodka and always hell on earth. What surprises me the most reading this is that we all seem to put up with it because we love them. Also, like other comments, when he is sober everything’s great, but not when he’s drunk.

He will start in on me over nothing, like he is picking a fight with me about my children, or putting me down. He doesn’t even know what he is saying half the time, but still there is the little man shouting at me, scaring me when I haven’t done anything wrong.

I doubt myself and have to try hard to tell myself that there’s nothing wrong with me, this is his problem and he behaves this way to me because he is depressed and bitter. I hate it if it ever gets to the point of having to throw him out, as everything flares up 10 times worse. When I do, he’ll call the police on me and tell them that I’ve stolen his phone, wallet, etc. as it is still in the house at the time. It’s almost like a way of trying to “win” for him, I think, even though obviously the police are always more concerned about me.

I’ve been told by the police that I need to be careful if reports go in to social services, as I’m seen as letting the behaviour carry on. But when I have kicked him out we are all miserable because, like I say, when he doesn’t drink it’s great and I don’t mean just ok, it’s great.

I guess I don’t know what’s best to do for my little family. The kids see him as a stepfather and have been through so much upheaval already. I just want our happy ending now.

There was a flare up a week ago when he rang the police on me again. I haven’t seen him since (have spoken on the phone) — not because I kicked him out, he knows that he has gone too far. I will see him today for my daughter’s birthday and I feel like it is make or break.

I have been married for 6 years and have known my husband for 8 years. We have three children. I’m not sure where to begin. I knew he drank a little, but I always thought it was just the typical beer after a hard day’s work.

In the beginning, we had a great relationship and he really put a lot of effort into our marriage and relationship. Then I decided to further my education. It was a huge commitment on my part for 18 months, but somehow we made it through. I noticed him drinking more at this point. He had the responsibility of caring for the kids while I had class in the evenings. I think he got really stressed with making dinner, caring for the little ones, and our oldest had homework to do as well. It was too much for him to juggle.

I started smelling beer on him when I would get home after a 15-hour day. I would be so upset because he was there with our kids. He would have them bathed and fed, but there was that smell and he would be slurring his words. We started fighting over it. He got worse.

He would get full fledge drunk at this point. Passing out on our couch, while I was trying to manage the kids, dinner, etc. He would say that he was just exhausted, but I could smell it. Then he started just sleeping on the couch. Night after night would pass of the same old thing. Him drinking enough to be paased out on the couch. Me trying to wake him up to come to bed. Him getting irate and acting like a lunatic. Until finally, I quit trying to get him to come to bed.

He lost his job. I was too embarrassed to tell anyone, so I told my family and friends he was laid off. I covered for him. He had been late so many times, they were sick of it and fired him. He went to work at my family business and used the company card to buy beer. Many times. He was told he could stay but he would no longer be trusted. I was mortified again.

He has a new job and started easing up on his drinking. However, it has changed. He drinks less in one sitting, but more often. He is angry at me all the time. He treats me like a burden. We never have sex and he lies constantly about his drinking. Constantly! I am educated and in a professionally licensed field. I have a reputation that is important to me, and my children deserve a normal childhood.

I was brought up in a typical middle-class family with lots of love and laughter. My entire existence is nothing but happy memories. I want the same for my kids. His upbringing was one big party. His parents drank to excess. His father died of stomach cancer and liver failure. Both perpetuated by alcohol. I don’t know what to do. I still see the guy I married emerge every so often.

I just need a mental break. I feel like I’m going crazy. Dealing with my drunk parents is totally different from my drunk husband. I don’t know how to deal with this.

I am 34 weeks pregnant and this is my first baby. I am emotionally stressed due to my alcoholic husband. I feel he doesn’t care about me anymore. He always blames me for everything and drags me down. I just cried and want to leave him, but I keep on coming back.

Many times I pack my stuff, but after so many days I find myself coming back to him. He promises me not to drink or to do some stupid stuff, but he can’t keep his word. I am tired dealing with him also, but I don’t have the nerve to stand on my own since I’m just new in his place and I don’t have family to support me here.

I am very sad because his vices are destroying us and driving us apart. I’m just really hoping I can stand on my own and have the courage to leave him some day.

My fiance’ and I have been together for almost two years. He is a severe alcoholic. He has destroyed past relationships, lost great jobs, been in several near-death experiences and still continues to drink his life away. I am a recovering drug addict and have been able to control my addiction only by the grace of God.

We just recently found out that I am pregnant. I was only 8 weeks when we found out. He slowed down a lot whenever we found out, but now he is slowly slipping back into his old ways. I am terrified.

He is verbally abusive and sometimes physically (not since the pregnancy, though). He does outrageous things, such as trying to shave my head, throw my clothes and things out the door, destroy our home, and tell me how much better his ex was. Then he wakes up and has no recollection, sometimes claiming I am lying.

He has put me in situations where I wanted to put a bullet in my head. It’s so hard. When he is sober, he is everything I could ever dream of in a man.

Thank you all so much for your comments – there is a strange relief in knowing that others are fighting similar battles. I wish you all well in fighting them.

My fiancé is an alcoholic and has been since I met him 5 years ago, but it just keeps getting worse and worse. When we became pregnant, he promised to stop and never managed to. He hates his drinking and is always apologetic and saying how he wants to stop. But two days later it happens all over again.

He just disappears without telling me where he is or who he’s with and will stumble into the house, breaking things and vomiting and urinating all over the house. He says that it’s normal — that lots of people do it. His friends think it’s funny.

It has gotten a lot worse since he started working for his brother-in-law, who is also an alcoholic. He just can’t say no to him. They drink at work and afterwards. Weekdays, weekends, mornings, afternoons. He excuses himself by saying that they didn’t have a chance to eat lunch, so that’s why they started drinking.

He combats his stress about money by spending hundreds on alcohol every week. On the rare occasion he is home before our daughter goes to bed, he wants to hold her when he can barely stand up, then yells at me when I tell him no. I feel like I have tried every approach and nothing seems to help. He is the perfect man and we have the perfect relationship when he is sober.

It frustrates me that we both want him to stop so badly, but he still can’t manage even for a short time. It is such an emotional roller-coaster and I can feel myself losing my trust in him, and my tolerance is growing thin. We talk about it all the time and still no changes. I’ve gone from being worried sick to barely caring at all when he doesn’t come home and that terrifies me.

I love him so much, but I don’t want to raise my daughter with a drunk. Thanks for letting me get this all off my chest — with vomit all over the bathroom and him passed out on the couch right now, it really does help.

My fiance’ is an alcoholic. He isn’t harmful to me in any physical or mental way. He breaks himself down. He only drinks maybe one night a week (someone told me this is binge-drinking). He can’t just have 1 or 2 drinks, he will drink a 12-pack of beer and an entire bottle of vodka.

Last night I finally reached my breaking point. He walks around outside our house and inside, screaming and yelling at the top of his lungs. He is depressed, he is lonely, he feels like other than me no one cares or loves him. No matter what I do, he won’t go or seek help. I feel like the worst person, wanting to walk out and not look back.

When he is sober, he is my soul-mate. When he is drunk, he is someone completely different. The last few times he has been drunk/obliterated, I actually became frightened he might hurt me. I don’t know what to do anymore.

My husband is an alcoholic. He’s been in detox over 30 times in the past eight years. He stays sober for a month or two, then drinks until he gets so sick he has to be hospitalized. He knows it’s killing him. He knows it’s destroying me. He just keeps getting worse and I can’t do it anymore — the cycle of one month sober, one month drunk, and then in recovery.

This is insane. I don’t need him financially, he doesn’t work. He just upsets the kids most of the time, and makes life difficult and often unbearable. I want him to leave. But he has no money and no one wants his drunkenness in their lives.

My boyfriend I’ve known since childhood is an alcoholic. He is the perfect man until he gets drunk. He has broken many material things and inflicted bruises on me. I don’t know why I stay, besides the fact that I tell myself that he was there for me through multiple suicide attempts.

I am at my wits end, as he left last night on foot. The police brought him home at four a.m. wearing underwear and a T-shirt. He had lost his phone, keys, wallet, shoes, socks, and pants. He was found blocks over, knocking on doors.

He recalls none of this. I just do not understand. It pains me to think how anyone could do this to their family. He has depleted our bank account and destroyed his vehicle. I do not want to take our child to my parents’ home, but what other choice do I have? He has destroyed his life, and I am so distraught and perplexed.

Unlike others here, I’m not married or related to the person who undergoes personality change when they consume booze — she’s my live-in landlord. I have an undiagnosed chronic ilness that has created friction despite me being current with all rent and expenses.

Laura (psuedonym) is 57. I’m a 54-year-old never-married single male, active in recovery since 9/6/04. Having a sponsor that was in Al-Anon,and AA, was immensely helpful.

My issue is the unpredictable, abusive, belligerent behavior that suddenly comes on — the only warning, her flush, red face. I do not engage her anger, just the factual content of her outbursts, which have usually been discussed twice prior to eruption.

I look forward to the podcasts and the day I’m financially able to relocate, as this illness has left me unable to work since 12/28/13. By the grace of my higher power, God, I’ve been able to pay rent, although my net worth status is indigent. I am able to use phrases like, “It must be very frustrating, given the anger, living with a chronically ill roommate. You never know how I’ll be — bedridden or able to perform minimal walking exercises. I can see it is chaotic for you also.”

It doesn’t help with the tongue lashings, but helps me see me from her perspective. A humbling action. Rather than responding (some say righteously with quid pro quo, factual debate) in reality. That’s not effective when one is absent from the discussion. Thanks again for this forum. And I remind myself I’m not special. Laura behaves that way to most people.

My husband of almost 15 years is an alcoholic. It is starting to affect our relationshiop and the children. The kids are upset and cry often.

When drunk, he is very mean. Threatens to divorce me and take our daughter.

It is so hurtful. I do not know what to do.

I’m in a pickle. My husband is a full-scale alcoholic. He binge-drinks whenever he can. Some weekends he can drink close to one hundred beers. This is usually followed by being very ill for days, as he is a diabetic.

Obviously he has difficulty holding down a job. Every day is a living hell for me. He belittles me and verbally abuses me. Sometimes he can be physical, but usually it’s verbal.

When he is on a binge, he plays the stero music full blast and keeps me up all night. There are days when I go to work that I am so exhausted. I have asked for help from his mother, but she is in complete denial and gives him money to feed his habit. I’m so tired that I also give in to his abuse and give him money for his booze and cigarettes, as he is a chain smoker. He is putting me financially in the red.

I am just so fed up. I never imagined that my life would be this way. I can’t bring myself to get a divorce, as I just don’t have the resources or the strength anymore. Thank you for listening.

I can’t believe this is happening to me. I think my husband is an alcoholic and I don’t know what to do. Feeling really scared. Thankful I can at least utter the words here.

My husband and I have been together for 22 years. We have 3 children and our first grandchild is on his way. Should be happy times — except alcohol is a big problem. He drinks as soon as work is over every day. Weekends, he starts drinking as soon as he wakes up.

He suffers and has been recently vomiting and choking in his sleep. I’m scared that something will happen to him. He is a great man, but he says I cause his drinking by being concerned about his drinking. My kids lost all respect for him.

I feel since I’m his problem, I should leave. I work two jobs just to help, because he spends so much money on alcohol. I cry every night and pray that he wakes up the next morning. I feel so lost. I have no family. He and my kids are my only family.

My boyfriend is the most amazing man I have ever met. I love him so much and he loves me too. We want to get married and when he is sober, I feel like he is my soulmate and we have the perfect relationship.

It’s when he starts drinking where all the problems occur. He just doesn’t know when to stop. He will drink all night and even into the next night and doesn’t have a problem driving drunk either. He loses all sense of judgement when he is drunk and behaves so selfishly. We had a fight one night and he tried to strangle me as I was leaving. He didn’t want me to leave.

When he is sober, he tells me that he knows he is ruining our relationship and that he thinks he has a serious problem with alcohol. He even wants to go see someone. But, a day later, he will be back to drinking and will do the most stupid and selfish things.

I love this man so much. At the moment, I think I want to break up with him though, because I feel like I need to make a drastic move in order for him to change. I keep telling him that he needs to change for himself and not for me. And maybe I also need to take a break from this relationship and work on myself. Maybe one day we will find each other again and be together. But for now, I think he has some serious issues he needs to work through and I need to let him do that.

Letting him go is going to be so difficult. I dread the thought because I just want to be with him. However, I know that things will not change if I continue to pretend as if nothing happened and that his alcoholic behaviour is not a problem.

My partner and I are together for five years now. In the past he suffered from a drug addiction and eventually quit, just before we started dating. We got married two years ago and at first I just let him have a beer or two cos he always asked so politely, but before I realized it, it started becoming an everyday thing, and now he drinks a minimum of three beers every day.

I have tried talking to him about it, but he totally ignores my feelings. He believes he is not harming me or anyone else, so why should I have a problem with it. I have even left home to get him to realize that I hate his alcohol dependency, but he just lied about trying to stop, got me to come home, and here I am three months later, unhappy, scared and confused. Last night he was rude to me and told me he is tired of my nagging. I only am trying to help him. I love him.

Is my husband an alcoholic? This is a question I ask myself all the time. We have two wonderful kids and he is a very involved father. The issue is he drinks. Not all the time, but some of the time, and when he drinks, he drinks.

He slurs his words, makes poor decisions, and acts horrible. We typically fight and I take the bait and fight back. Then the low blows come. He yells, swears, calls me horrible names I dare not tell you. I go to bed alone and crying and then he goes out to smoke pot because it helps him not have a hangover.

I have tried therapy and setting boundaries, all of which have failed. I have a hard time admitting he has a problem, because it is not the same list of issues you read about. (My father has been sober for 30 years, so I have been through this.) Drinks every day, not involved, etc.

It is almost like he is allergic to alcohol. I am going to my first Al-Anon meeting tonight, hoping the end of this roller coaster is coming, because I just want to get off the ride.

My boyfriend of almost a year fell off the wagon about 2 months ago, after being sober for 8 years. But I now know that the behavior that he was showing was the precursor of him actually taking a drink.

In my horror, I discovered he is a mean drunk. I tried going to an Al-Anon meeting, but I didn’t click with that particular group. And quite honestly I was too angry and emotionally drained to try again. Now here I am 2.5 months after he fell off and even though he is not actively drinking he is still doing addict behavior.

I had to tell him yesterday that he needs to make his recovery his number one priority. I love this man so much, but I love myself more and I just can’t watch him destroy himself. Hopefully he can start to work his program and get back into his recovery. This is really hard to do–stepping back, that is.

My husband is an alcoholic and nothing changes. I have been with him 15 years and it’s always the same thing. I married him and knew he had problems. I need to leave him. He has 3 DUI in under two years and actually things by the grace of God worked out, but I am ten years older then he is and I think at my age now, I still have a chance to have a decent relationship.

I wish him well, but it’s interesting how all the alcoholics have such good, decent people loving them, and they give so little–the alcoholic, that is. The best thing I read, was to live with an alcoholic is not to live with them, LOL.

I love my husband very much, but he is a selfish man. Nothing I say or do means a thing to him. I gotta leave, cause I mean something. We do nothing together and it’s a no sex and no connection marriage for the last six years.

I am done, but he does not know it. I will file for divorce but not yet, I need an exit strategy. I can do it. My cats are better company then he is. He likes to be with his men friends all the time. I really believe he is gay, which is fine. He needs men around him all the time. I could go on, but why bother. Ya know alcoholics are really boring and selfish and everyone, including me, thinks ohhhhhhhh, what to do.

My husband is an alcoholic. We’ve been married for 3 years, but have been together for 7 years. When we started dating, he didn’t drink. Then one day he started and hasn’t stopped since. He drinks 5 quarts of beer on the weeknights, and drinks stronger stuff on the weekends. He’s always irritable, angry, and mean.

He tells me it’s my fault. He even acknowledges that he has a problem, but doesn’t want help. I’m at the end of my rope. He’s physically and mentally abusive and I can’t go on like this. We have an 18-month-old and I’m currently pregnant with twins.

He has to be forced into spending time with our son, and he’s so short tempered that he always ends up yelling or screaming at him over doing normal toddler things. If he doesn’t consent to help soon, I’m going to leave him. I refuse to have my babies grow up in the same hell that I grew up in. I just need to know I’m not alone.

It’s so hard waking up next to him every morning and having to pretend I’m not upset about the night before. I dread seeing him come home from work because I don’t know who I’m greeting at the door. It’s time for him to try, or I’m going to stop trying.

I have been with my fiance’ for 3 years and have been his best friend for about 10. For as long as I have known him he always drank.

About a year into our relationship he got very sick and he had to have surgery and lost a lot of weight. He has something that has to do with his stomach and esophagus–after all this has happened he quit drinking for about a year. Everything was amazing. He was the perfect man.

Well, for the past two years he has been drinking, trying to hide it from me. He’ll come home and say he only had one when I smell it often so strong and know he has been lying about everything. He turned into a demon, said very horrible things to me, put me down, disrespected me, accused me of cheating, while I just sat there and listened and waited to fall asleep. Meanwhile my children heard him talking to me this way.

Just two nights ago it was the worst. The verbal abuse was so bad and went on for 6 hours straight. My son, who is 18, lost it. He was going to fight and even had a knife in his hands. I had no other choice but to call the police. My fiance’ was arrested and I made sure I got a restraining order, but why do I feel so bad? He is sleeping on the street in his car and he needs to go every morning into the public bathroom to wash up. Knowing all of this stuff breaks my heart and I feel so lost.

Married almost 26 years. My husband is an alcoholic and says, “Oh, well.” I am screaming inside and have virtually given up on life. I am so depressed and am just tired–needed a place to share this.

Thanks for all the comments here. I feel empowered by them. I have been married 20 years and have 5 children with my alcoholic husband. My husband has been binge-drinking since we got married, but no overnighters or blackouts until 10 years in.

He has had two arrests for DUI and now lives in another state, where he is starting out at the entry level of his career yet again. He is pleasant, intelligent, educated and funny when he is sober. He is also a liar and selfish and depressed, whether drunk or sober. When drunk he is reckless, depressed, inappropriate, dangerous to himself and others, and embarrassing to our friends and families.

I was afraid to leave for 3 years, but finally kicked him out. I support our children and care for them by myself. He visits occasionally and calls once a week. He is very pleasant on the phone, but after reading the comments here, I know I can never take him back.

I have to have enough self-respect and concern for our well-being to know that I have to keep our lives separate. I will support him and love him always, but my happiness and that of our children cannot depend on whether he is drunk or sober. I’m sorry for all that is gone and will never return, his income as a doctor, our home due to foreclosure, a father for my children, a partner for my life.

On the other hand, I am grateful that when I come home, I feel peace. I can open the door glad to be home and see my kids, not afraid of what will happen or what has happened while I was gone.

What misery, what a colossal waste of time, 30-year anniversary yesterday. Told him to ignore it, nothing to celebrate. Married him because I was pregnant, knew somehow there was a problem with alcohol, but my upbringing was full of sober people.

I was 18, he 28. Thought it strange that he was about as mature as I was. He drank at the reception and in the wedding bed and I thought, “My God, is it too late to get out of this?”

Always spending our last dime on beer, hiding it–lies, lies, lies and more lies. How dare I point out that I know he lies? Nothing to respect or admire. In the beginning he’d give me the silent treatment for 2 or 3 days, then relieve himself on me and pretend there never was a problem. Now I prefer the silent days. Seven children moving out as fast as they can, two left. Never bought it for him and the only mess I cleaned up was when he messed in my shoes. Asked him today if he’d consider any kind of counseling–no, of course.

Somehow everything I see belongs to him–every asset, the business, the equipment, the livestock, everything. He says I’m welcome to leave empty-handed. I don’t think the courts or any law would agree with him but he’s the law. He would sabotage everything, just so I wouldn’t get anything.

Seems I have two choices; do like he says and shut up and stop complaining, or leave. I refuse to leave empty-handed, so there lies the difficulty. I would have to destroy him and the business just to get anything for myself. It would be the ugliest thing yet.

My mother decided she did not want to talk to me ever again. She left a drunk message at 10:30 pm last night on my cell phone to tell me that.

I don’t know when she started drinking, if it was before or after my father died 15 years ago. But I do know that once the drinking and her anxiety became so bad, I stopped answering the phone after 9 pm. Then 8 pm. It was easy because my job just kept asking more and more from me.

My job has intensified. I told my mom I was sorry I hadn’t been answering the phone after 7 pm because I have been waking up so early for work. That was really only part of the answer. After her angry and harassing drunk calls, my anxiety sky rockets. I can’t think. I want to vomit. I can’t get work done.

When her drinking became earlier, I had to say something. Her drinking has led her to fall and break her shoulder. She refused to do PT correctly and she kept drinking after surgery, which led to her falling on the shoulder over and over again.

I couldn’t be honest with her. I tried, but then she screams at me and then pretends the next day nothing was said or happened. She must be right all of the time.

She does this to my older sister too. It isn’t just me. She cut the neighbors out of her life. She just wants to die alone in her house. And she wants us to feel guilty for it.

She wins. I really do feel guilty. I should have answered her calls. This is my fault.

My husband first abused me a few months after we married. We’d just arrived at his boat at a marina, where we were planning to live, and he celebrated by having a martini. I’d never seen him drink more than a couple of glasses of wine in the 5 years we dated. He ordered me to go get sandwiches for dinner, as there was no food at the boat. I asked him to come with me, the neighborhood was unfamiliar, it was dark, I’d never driven in that city before, and I didn’t know where to find a place to buy food since the downtown was pretty much closed. He called me an obscene name and told me to go get the “obscene” food.

I decided I’d better go. I was in such shock over this abuse that I could hardly think. I got lost and disoriented on the one-way streets, but finally found a mall where I went in and got the sandwiches, took them back to the boat, and he was even more drunk. He didn’t even ask me why I’d been gone for almost 2 hours, and he expressed no concern for my safety driving around in the dark, but he did yell and say that if I’d taken off in his car to go back home (700 miles), that would have been the end of the marriage. We ate the sandwiches, mine tasting like sawdust in my throat. He passed out on deck and I went to bed. Nothing was ever mentioned about this again.

This was the beginning of my realization that my new husband was an alcoholic. It took me 10 years to leave him and I wish I’d left on that awful night when we first arrived on the boat.

In the course of our marriage, I found him passed out on our bedroom floor twice. He often painfully grabbed me sexually when I was driving home after evenings out, despite my pleas to stop it. Usually he’d pass out after 5 minutes or so.

He insulted my best friend with sexually inappropriate comments to the point that she and her husband refused to see us anymore, though they kept up their friendship with me. His former brother-in-law ended the friendship when my husband insulted his girlfriend during the course of one of his drunken phone calls.

Various friends, his kids, and relatives called me and voiced suspicions that he must be drinking, due to phone calls that he made to them under the influence. He insisted that he didn’t drink and drive, but there were times when he was weaving on the road and got lost in familiar territory, becoming angry if I spoke up about it.

He advanced on me with fists clenched, screaming in my face, because I’d mistakenly erased an answering machine message meant for me. He struck a phone out of my hands because I wasn’t dialing it fast enough. On and on and on, typical alcoholic behavior. As his wife, I felt that I had to help him. I contacted his doctor, who didn’t help. I asked my husband to moderate his drinking, I watered down the vodka. Nothing did any good, and I’d become an enabler.

The drinking increased his snoring, which caused sleep apnea that had him gagging and stopping breathing every night. This went on for years, during which my husband insisted that he wouldn’t treat it because he didn’t want to sleep hooked up to a CPAP machine. He showed signs of oxygen deprivation and got angry when I pointed this out.

Eventually he was hiding bottles all over the house and drinking from morning to night. Finally he had a major stroke. His doctor told me that his brain scan revealed mini-strokes caused by oxygen deprivation. His brain showed signs of dementia, and his neuropsychologist suggested that some of that could have been caused by alcohol.

I’d been halfway out the door the month before his stroke and had lined up a place to live. Once he had the stroke, I was stuck. I couldn’t leave him and he was unable to care for himself. It took 2 more years of misery, abuse, and his continued drinking until he could function on his own. I left, and now he’s telling anyone who will listen that I left him because of the lifestyle changes due to his stroke. Not that anyone who knows me believes him, but it is galling to have given up 2 extra years of my life to be the sole caregiver to this alcoholic sleazebag of a husband.

I was 70 when I filed for divorce, and managing on my own has been hard. I’m okay! But I continue to be haunted by all the terrible scenes caused by this alcoholic and abusive man. It’s hard getting over it.

I can relate to each and every person here. I am so tired and feel so helpless. My children’s father drinks every single day. We have been together 19 years now and we have two beautiful children. He cannot control himself at all. He starts drinking in the morning until bed.

I am so fed up with his behavior. He tells me the worst of things. I am so ready to leave with my kids. I have nowhere to go, going to a shelter would be my only hope, but I don’t know how life will be in there with my kids. I’ve heard it is not easy in there.

He is not going to stop drinking and does not want to go to AA. If he doesn’t like something, he will curse, argue, call me names. He puts me down, he lies, he has serious anger problems and gets out of control. Sometimes I feel I have to leave him because I am so unhappy, but it’s not so easy to do.

He works and I’m a stay-at-home mom. Money is always limited. He is not getting any better and he is destroying our family and doesn’t see it. He was arrested twice, he begged and promised that he would stop drinking, but he never did. I was a fool for taking him back. He has gotten worse, he is extremely verbally abusive towards me. He knows he cannot put his hand on me because he would get arrested again. The verbal torment is just too much.

I pray and ask God to give me courage and strength. I hope and pray he would overcome this disease, he would ask me how is his drinking affecting me. He came so close to losing his family twice and I forgave him. He never even tried to stop drinking, not once. When he came back in the apartment, he got worse. My only hope is God–only God can change him. I will continue to be strong for my kids.

My husband binge-drinks. While we were away in Cuba, he was physically aggressive with me. I changed resorts the next day. Now back home, he has started AA and is showing remorse for his horrible behavior. When drinking, his ego ripped us apart. I had him charged, but no charges due to the fact that the assault happened in Cuba.

We are talking now, but live apart. I start counselling this week. He wants his last chance with me as a sober husband. I feel lost and I don’t know what to do.

I was debating whether I should attend an Al-Anon meeting. My parents are both alcoholics. I am still trying to figure out what is normal and what wasn’t acceptable. I have had my own drug problems, but then I ended up dating an alcoholic at age 17, with whom I had my daughter.

I then met my husband at the age of 24. We were together for 13 years. I used to use drugs, but 7 years ago I got clean. He got clean 5 years ago. We got married when he was clean, but he began using again and lying pathologically for the past 4 years. He tells me it’s my fault he uses and my fault he lied to me. If I wasn’t such a witch, he wouldn’t have to lie to me.

He has been unemployed for the past year and a half and I refuse to buy him drugs! For the past 3 months things began to get violent, and 2 weeks ago he broke my nose. I immediately went to the police, got a domestic-violence restraining order. I asked for help and stayed somewhere until I could get the sheriff to remove him from my house. I changed the locks. I had already filed for divorce. He was losing his control over me and he knew it. I feel like I am beginning to come out on the other side, but I know one thing, I absolutely must stay single for at least a decade, and get counseling and help.

My husband is a drug addict because he is a drug addict. He lied because he was a liar before he met me and he will continue to lie until he dies or gets clean. No one deserves to be lied to! I didn’t deserve to be lied to. Nothing I could have done would have changed his behavior or been good enough for him. I could have spent every dime I made on his drug habit and moved our family into a homeless shelter, and he still wouldn’t have been satisfied.

This podcast was absolutely helpful.

My husband and I got married almost a year ago. We were dating while he was an active drug user. He is now 7 years sober and I am fully supportive of him going to AA. He’s very active in the program.

I don’t have a problem with alcohol and we have had many conversations about having alcohol in the house. It doesn’t bother him, he is in a great place in his sobriety and I know if he was struggling he would talk to me about it. He basically feels like I shouldn’t have to change my lifestyle of enjoying myself with friends and having a couple drinks, because he’s the one with the issue.

All of his friends are involved in the program as well, and I find it very uncomfortable drinking in my own home when his friends are over. I feel like they are constantly judging me or make me feel like I am an alcoholic because I drink. I am 24 years old and I feel like the normal person my age would be living similar to me. I don’t know how to get past my feelings of guilt.

Married to an alcoholic. Stupid to believe that some day things will change. Emotionally affected dealing with the ups and downs of drunkenness, verbal abuse, meanness, the nasty insecurity of my husband.

After reading all the stories, I find comfort that the behavior pattern is all the same. It is all somebody else’s fault. It is my fault that I don’t love him enough, do not show him affection, did not give him enough attention, do not appreciate him enough. They have an amazing ability to make you feel guilty and suck you into it, and I did it for a long time.

As a Christian I wrestle with verses to love those who hurt you and that God put these people in your life to straighten you out. I have a job and can support myself and don’t know why I keep sticking to this man. The truth is I still care and when he is sober he is caring.

I am so filled with guilt at the thought of moving out. I have tried Al-Anon and I did not find it helping me. He has tried AA and that has not helped him either.

I really don’t know what to do. I am tired and life is so empty and meaningless, depressing, and I feel so helpless.

I have been with my boyfriend for 2 years. He has had a drug problem forever, but it wasn’t like this. He tells me he hates me because I complain that he uses and tells me he doesn’t want to be with me, but he says this all the time. He says bad things about me, but I know it’s because he’s struggling.

Everyone has told me to leave him–that’s so easy to say, but to do it breaks my heart because I still love him and care about him. It seems that he just doesn’t want to be around. He’s always getting high. He hasn’t slept with me or showed any emotion, he just says bad things. I’m not a bad person. And I stand my ground, but the more I do this he gets angry, so I stay away and give him space–but I feel like I’m losing him.

How do I leave, how do I deal with it–I cry all the time because of the things he says. I try and help because I love him, but I feel like I don’t mean anything to him anymore. I know from talking with friends that they say it’s the drugs talking. But how is this fair to me. He finds it so easy to leave. I can’t.

My husband of 8 years (we have been together 14 years, since I was 18 and he was 28) walked out on me and our 2-year-old daughter.

He has always been verbally abusive. I only started waking up to the abuse in the last year when our relationship was really rocky. We decided to have a child during the only time that he was not drinking, but soon after finding out I was pregnant he began to drink again and it got worse.

He drives for the movies and recently got fired due to getting caught drinking while driving a big star. He blamed me for making him miserable over fighting and spending too much money and not helping enough, as his reason for drinking at work. I have cared for a child completely since she was born. Besides paying for her food and needs, I do it all. Sometimes he tells me what a great mom I am and he knows how hard raising a child is, and then when he’s mad he tells me I am an awful mother and I should be able to get more done like cleaning the house, laundry and all the errands, bills and phone calls.

I’m the only one that does any cleaning, shopping and cooking. Could our home be cleaner? Yes, but he refuses to watch our daughter so I can get chores done. We are completely broke. I have tried so many times to come up with a budget with him, but he refuses to talk to me or shushes me because he’s watching tv.

He has put his hands on me in anger and then denies it happened or says I started it. I am ashamed I did not leave him when he choked me in front of our child a few weeks ago. It was over a fight about me not wanting him to drive our child to swim class because I thought he was buzzed. I was so shocked and upset I just cried after he left.

He is trying to get us thrown out of our house. He won’t give me any money and he refuses to pay the bills. He wouldn’t even get our child diapers–my family had to buy them, and food. He says I won’t let him see our daughter, but I have offered visits and phone calls–he has refused them all. She is only 2 and she misses her daddy and he won’t even talk to her. He said he stopped drinking, but I know he has not quit.

He makes threats of taking our child from me if I don’t give him his big screen tv. I’m scared some judge will believe his lies and put my baby girl in danger. The only reason he wants her is to hurt and get control of me. I will not allow him back.

I am going to join a support group. I will go back to college and I will learn to take care of myself and my daughter on my own. I know I can’t make him get help for his alcoholism, drug abuse and anger. He has to want to get better. It’s just hard when you still love someone who is sick and refuses to see it. He did me a favor by leaving this time. I will no longer take his abuse or let my child be a witness to it.

My husband (separated again as of his last 2-day bender weekend) doesn’t drink every day, but 2 to 3 times a week he will consume a whole bottle of bourbon and the port by the schooner. He gets so disgusting and emotionally abuses me, and my poor 16 & 12-year-old have witnessed this for years.

They have found him many times in his own vomit. They beg him to stop. I feel like a bad mother for letting them witness this. I try and keep them occupied and even send them for many sleepovers, but he wants to interact with them when he’s wasted. He also suffers depression, unmedicated.

I’m so lost. I can’t help him. We’ve broken up 4 times now and each time he promises and begs me to come back. This time he has broken up with me and blames me for his depression and drinking. I have enabled his behaviour and I take full responsibility for my actions. He makes 6 times more money than I do and I’m so scared of facing this world alone. I’ve always been attentions middle child syndrome. I’m nearly 40 and been with him almost 18 years. I don’t know how to do this.

I live with an alcoholic, am fed up with life at the minute. I don’t know where to go or what to do. He drinks from getting up. I work and have 3 children that I would die for. I love my partner but I can’t live like this. It’s destroying me inside.

I have a son who has been drinking now for 18 years. Started from university. The first time I realised he was turning into an alcoholic is when I found black bags of beer cans in the shed.

My elder son and I started taking him to AA meetings. Little did we know that as soon as we left him there he used to leave and go out drinking. We then decided to sit outside and wait till he finished his meeting.

For a short time he stopped and had a girl friend, whom he got married to. The marriage lasted 2 months. My elder son left the house after his marriage. I live with my alcoholic son. He has lost 15 jobs because of his drinking and is a burden on me.

I am divorced and he lives with me. Several times I have had to call the police, as things go out of hand when he is drunk. 45 times I have picked him up from hospitals, till I could not do it anymore.

I have spoken to my doctor to section him to send him to a mental hospital, but seems like he does not think it is that bad. Twice he left the gas on. Breaks things, like the sink and tiles. Bangs doors at night, abusive language, comes home drunk, day in and day out. Blames me for breaking his relationships. He suffers from arthritis and skin problems.

It is a never ending ordeal. My life is ruled by his drinking. I don’t go out. I hate leaving the house and going on holidays. He fights with everyone.

After reading the comments, I feel I am not alone.

God bless.

I hate going home.

My first husband was abusive–although not an alcoholic. Just mean. I left him years ago.

Since my husband ignores us, I took my son to his place of employment, only to give him the Christmas gifts he had for his daddy. I noticed he was wearing a new bracelet, but not his wedding ring. He hasn’t worn it anytime I’ve seen him, all of four times since he left.

I asked him about the new bracelet and found out it was handmade by another woman. How childish, right? So I asked him why he would wear that from her and not our ring. He said she made everyone one. So I later asked him if anyone had kissed him or if there was ever anything with anyone. He went silent and didn’t answer my text.

I know in my heart he’s done something that he feels guilty for, because that’s when he doesn’t answer me. He’s the father of my child, but he’s no longer the man I married. I was heartbroken all over again. However, I will get my revenge the best way and I will tell you all how.

My husband, who is consumed by alcohol, is not the man I fell in love with. He can’t be because he’s numb inside. I have to get out. My revenge will come with my success. He may not see it right now, but someday he will, or maybe he won’t. However, I will see it.

I will see my success and that will empower me even more. I am strong because I have to be and I deserve the best the world can give me. I walked around for months, feeling like his leaving me was my fault. It’s not and it wasn’t. I love my child, but he will not repeat his father’s mistakes. My husband’s father did the same thing to my husband’s mother.

My child will learn better and be better because we deserve better. I feel sad sometimes, but I’ve had a lot of support and these words have been said to me. So, if my saying them here helps someone else, then that makes me very happy. I must and will love myself.

My husband went to work one day in October last year and never came home. He left behind me, unemployed, and our child of 6 years. I’ve been in counseling almost ever since and now I’m going to take our child.

My husband has spent this entire time ignoring us. I’ve done so much to try to get him involved in our child’s life. He said he left to find happiness and that I was angry and manipulative. I know now after several counseling sessions that I was not the cause of our failing marriage.

See, my husband has been in trouble with the law and got a DWI last year, lost his license, and had to go to classes. I thought the classes would straighten him out, but as soon as he graduated and got his license back he went to drinking heavily again. It’s like he has no feeling and that he’s numb inside.

As much as it hurts me to divorce him, I know I must. I gave him the news and asked him to talk with me before taking such dramatic measures, but he just continues to ignore me and has no contact with his child. I’ve learned that the alcohol must have a tight hold on him because he used to say we were everything to him and he lived his life.

Years later, after 7 years together, he has cut himself off from everyone and won’t even return his mother’s calls. The best way I have found to deal with being in a relationship with an alcoholic is to get out of their way. I’ve asked him to get help, but he doesn’t think he needs it, yet he continues to make excuses.

He didn’t show up for Christmas and didn’t bother to call. He doesn’t answer my child’s texts or voice mail or calls. I protect my child by reminding him that his daddy has issues and it’s not my child’s fault. For me, I know I have to file for divorce because my husband is lost and I have no idea when or if he will find his way back.

However, I believe in the power of positive psychology and as hard as it might be to support an alcoholic, if they are strong enough to see they need help and want it, then I believe it’s ok to help them.

I have been married 44 years. When we were young he drank, but not on a regular basis. Then he was afraid he was becoming an alcoholic, because many members of his family were. He quit drinking for 20 years. We had a wonderful happy life. Then about 6 or 7 years ago he started drinking again.

We are now 67 years old and he drinks daily until he passes out. If he wakes up, he will start drinking again. We do not interact when he drinks. All our family and friends have witnessed this, therefore we are not asked to parties or family events if beer will be there. Because most people are afraid of how he will behave, we no longer have interaction with anyone.

On the days he drinks, he stays outside and I stay in the house alone. Currently, I am not financially able to find another place. Our home belongs to his sister. I cannot drive at night, so I am alone every day. All my family and friends have moved on, so even I am not included.

People hate when I call, because they do not want to hear my depression. I should have left years ago when I was still working, but I thought he would quit. He never has, and does not plan on stopping. He says I can go or stay, he does not care. This is when he is sober. My story is when I realized he would not stop, I needed to find my own life. My husband is a Christian and used to be a churchgoing man. Not even that stops him.

I am so sad. After four years of my husband being sober, he has relapsed. It started over a month ago, “only on special occasions.” He simply states he is ready to drink occasionally. Of course, I know that as an alcoholic this is not possible. He then blames me because he is a converted Christian and says God has cured him, so he is able to drink now.

The first time I tried to believe him, I stopped talking to him for a day or so, but then things went back to normal. I tried to forget about it. Two weeks ago he came home buzzed or drunk after work. He said that was because he was sad, that he was not happy with his life, as excuses to justify himself.

The next day I told him that my kids and I were not going to go back to our old life. I also was told by all of our 3 pastors that we have to set boundaries, and if we say something we have to do it. So I told him I was not giving an option. Next time he would do it, he would have to leave. Of course, he said he was going to stop.

Today he got home buzzed and I immediately noticed, so I confronted him. He had all the signs, the anger, the denial, saying it was me who was the one who had the problem, that I was never going to be happy with his actions, etc. So I told him that I was going to keep my word and that he had to leave our house. I just do not know what is the next step from here.

I am not sure I should even comment here, as I divorced my husband of 14 years due to his progressive alcoholism. I say progressive because he was not an alcoholic when I married him in my late 20’s. Weekends of BBQ’s and drinking with friends – social occasions that are normal for that age range. It was only after the birth of our first, second and third child that his drinking became progressively worse – more frequent, weekdays, weeknights. Verbal abuse was rampant by him and by me in my defense. I did not learn to walk away from a fight until he got physical a couple of times. Then I did walk away in tears every time. I felt ashamed, belittled, weak. But I knew I was strong inside, but he chipped away at that time and time again. Our fights would escalate, then deflate, then silent treatment. The next day, no apologies, no discussions, no make-up sex. Nothing. This went on for years. Just swept under the rug.

To say my beloved home was toxic, then loving, then toxic is an understatement. We hid it well from friends and family. Still the picture of a perfect family unit for years. Then he began to start fights with me in front of family. Eventually, we sold the house and he moved out of state. I was absolutely fine with that arrangement. I moved in with my folks, as the kids were still in school. I was emotionally scarred from all the verbal abuse so I sought verbal abuse counseling at a domestic violence center in my area. I was beyond how it looked anymore. I needed serious counseling to remember myself. I also went to church often as well. I did this for 2 years.

This separation lasted 4 years. I continued to visit him with the kids for summers and winters but he never once agreed to counseling or AA. He wanted a divorce but refused to initiate. Eventually, I did initiate it and saw it through. I have been divorced for 3 years now. He moved back to my area last year but is not the verbally abusive person towards me anymore. I think a lot of time has gone by and even he recognizes what he did to me, to us. Total separation was about 6 years before he moved back here.

Today, we are friends at arm’s length. He sees the children, who are now teenagers. He has been to detox and rehab for himself and for the first time has broken down in tears and admitted the pain of losing me, the house, our life together. I still don’t trust him but will be supportive if he continues with AA and an outpatient program. However, I will never take him back. I am not emotionally safe with such a loose cannon.

I don’t regret divorcing him. I was miserable, emotionally hurt all of the time. I could not be the best parent I knew I could be to my 3 beautiful children. He was dragging me down and using me as a target for his verbal backlash. That is no way to live life on this earth. I remember what it feels like when I was younger to be loved and adored. I am still young – late 40’s. I deserve so much more from a partner.

Alcoholism is a disease and until the p