Would the drinking stop if he or she loved you?

I am the wife of a binge alcoholic. I just left home this week after being married for 23 years. My two sons (ages 23 & 19) are alcoholics and substance abusers. My 19 year old just finished 30 day residential treatment for heroin (after his 2nd relapse). My husband thinks because he has cut back, he is fine. He gets drunk, says horrible things, antagonizes me and the kids and then apologizes or most often, blames me. As I began reading these comments, the damage that alcoholism causes is so deep it is simply overwhelming. What is also overwhelming is how many wives, girlfriends, moms, dads, husbands, etc., believe their love will just overcome this addiction. It won’t. If it could, none of the drinkers would continue drinking. Every one of you loved this man, woman, son, daughter, etc. so much you would and did anything to save them. Have you ever heard an alcoholic say “I stopped drinking because my mom, wife, kids, husband” just loved me so much and they told me how much it was hurting them”…said no one ever. So, recognize you cannot stop the drinker from drinking, only they can stop themselves. We must all either save money, stay with a friend, move out, kick out the addict, let them live on the streets and realize they may die and know we will be blamed, made to be the bad guy or girl and feel guilty, shunned from our family or friends for not sticking it out, hear “he is such a good guy, how could you do it, etc.” and then turn to the rooms of Al Anon where none of these statements will be uttered, where you are understood and loved. Where your madness is known and shared by EVERYONE in the room, where you can find peace. Keep coming back. You are not alone and your love will not stop this addiction. It can’t. Anymore than your love can stop cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc.

I should have left my husband 23 years ago when early in our marriage (I had a 1 month old) at Thanksgiving where of course there was drinking, I said we needed to go home, get the baby ready for bed, fed, and his reply was “I am having fun with my family. What is the matter with you?” When he said he would only spend Christmas with his family and he would golf anytime he wanted and that was all there was to it. When I was home with a very sick baby and he was out drinking with his brother until 3:30 a.m. When he wouldn’t answer my repeated calls nor the calls of my children (then about 10 & 13) who he was supposed to take them holiday shopping and had been out drinking. When he went drunk over to my divorced neighbor and tried to proposition her and she told me to come and get him…the list goes on an on. It was always my problem because I was a bitch, didn’t have sex enough, was too controlling, needed to relax and have more fun…whatever. I feel enormous guilt for not leaving sooner and also because we did have good times. He would go a few months without heavy drinking and it was good. He has a good job and never missed due to drinking. But he was still angry and mean. He flies off the handle and I walk on eggshells. So now, I am trying it on my own. My kids know I didn’t leave them, I left their dad. My husband knows if he will face his problems, I will go to counseling every day for a month if that is what it takes. He won’t. It’s my problem “because I am too controlling”. There is hope. God has opened doors I never knew were unlocked. Friends I didn’t realize understood have come forth with their own stories. I am sad, scared and concerned but I am hopeful and my friends, know that the drinking won’t stop and it’s not that they don’t love you. They love their disease more or are just incapable of seeking treatment.

I’ve been with my husband for over 18 years, married 9 years this past August. He’s the most amazing person when he’s sober, but when he’s drinking, he’s a monster. He becomes angry, mean, verbally and mentally abusive. Like everyone else, we have been through a lot, lost a baby boy in 2014, my husband lost his father 2 months after. He’s always been a drinker, since the first day I met him. Its just been these past 4 years that its been out of control. He drinks almost every day. I find double shooters everywhere, hidden in the bathroom, in his pockets, I even seen them as I’m driving up to our condo (he tosses them out the window before he parks). I can’t take it anymore. His drinking consumes him, we don’t have a life anymore. I’m basically married to myself and he’s married to his double shooter fireballs. There’s no intimacy, no romance, no date nights, no nothing, He wont even kiss me because he knows I’ll smell it on his breath.
I recently got the courage to leave him. I left my home for my sanity and peace of mind. Don’t know what my future holds, but am hoping to find peace with in my heart. Being married to an alcoholic kills your spirit, at least it did mine.

So I’ve been with my husband for 10 years. I met him in a really bad part of my life. I was here in the US (not my home country) and started using drugs. But I worked and took care of my life. He soon was homeless and then we moved in together. He would never hold a job, and would drink and come back in the morning. Sometimes I’d go after him desperately because I thought something had happened, and he could barely walk so drunk he was. He was also doing a lot of drugs, while I was backing down. I was working sooo hard because money wasn’t enough. I got pregnant and wanted abortion. I had to ask my boss for an upfront of my salary and had to tell her why, and I had an abortion. He didn’t even go with me there. He lied that he was working, and then one day the rent day came up and he didn’t have his half. We were homeless for over a month. I slept with cockroaches around me, it was the most sad time of my life. But he was always a good man, so sweet, had a nice family, and he had such a big heart… so I went back to my country and he went there after. I quit drinking and using drugs completely. We got married. He was good for a while, but then started the drinking again. Nothing like it was before, this time was like every once in a while he would go out, spend a lot of money, and come back in the morning. He would not answer the phone all night so I couldn’t sleep not knowing where he was. Then the binging started every month. Once he spent all his salary in one night. Another time he lost my credit card. Another time he got in a fight and came back bleeding. My family saw him that way, my dad… it was horrible. Then I kicked him out, but only to see if he would recover being away from me and having to take care of himself. He came to the US, his country. I’m here now as a grad student. I wanted to be with him, and we got together. On the first time I saw him after 1.5 apart he had been drinking. I told him I’d only stay with him if he went through the AA program in a recovery home. He was there for one month and begged to stay with me. He was good for a while, but in the last 2 weeks he went out twice and came back after 3 AM, drunk and high on cocaine. He never has money. We never do anything because he never drove since I’ve met him because of 2 DIUs, and I don’t have a license here yet. He doesn’t drink so much as other alcoholics, so sometimes I think he has moral problems and that’s not the alcohol that can see this. I haven’t loved him in a loooong time but I feel so bad for him. He is such a good looking man, he is smart, comes from a good family, he is very well spoken, but he doesn’t like working and likes drinking a lot. I’m finishing my PhD in a few years and my plan is to stay with him until then and see if things get better for him, so maybe I’ll not feel guilty when I leave him. I made a condition that I’d only let him stay if he went to school, and now he’s going. Maybe that will keep him busy and he will meet people that have normal life, different than the college kids that are his drinking/drug friends. We haven’t had any intimacy for the last 6 months, and I know it’s horrible for a man but I just can’t touch him. But he doesn’t want to leave so… I just feel so bad for him… maybe one day he will like himself enough to be a good sober, hard working man.

Thank you for this Space. Boyfriend 36, I am 26. We have Lived together for two years. I am Desperte. I wAnt to leave him but I love him. He depends on alcohol to relax. I am exhausted. He doesnt think he has a problem. He doesnt go out. He just drinks in his room watching tv. What about me? Our goals? I feel he only thinks of getting high.. someone helpme i know i have to leave but I cant. We just got kicked out from the beautiful house we rented because of oír loud fights. Gavehim another chance bit has drank Twice after just just weeks. Please more mature ladies guide me, ty

I have been in a relationship with a guy I believe to be an alcoholic. He has a strong background of alcoholic relatives, starting with his mom. His mom used to be the type of alcoholic who gets verbally and physically aggressive and abusive. My partner ended up on the streets and started drinking at a very young age. He is now 29 and I am 31. When I met him I knew he drank a lot, from what I saw and under my standards, but I did not know he used to drink almost daily before moving in with me. When he moved in with me I started seeing he drank 2 or 3 times during the week, plus heavier on the weekends. I was troubled because he does not get aggressive neither verbally or physically, at all. He keeps being his lovey dovey self, he just plays his PS4 while drinking, then cooks dinner, then we watch movies and go to sleep. He has never passed out, but has has a couple black outs where he does not clearly remembers certain conversations, but this has been rare. He keeps on going to work and everything seems to function normally. Though, I come from a family where neither my mother or father drank, so I am not used to it. I do drink socially and I am not gonna lie, I have binge drank and passed out on one of those crazy weekend nights, but we are talking of a once a month thing and not even. We have had so many arguments over his drinking, I hate coming home to a man whose breath and skin stinks to alcohol, to a home where I see bottles and bottles of beer, I hate seeing him grog sick next day and going to work like that, I hate how he looks after it, all pale and so old. He has made plenty of compromises after I have threatened to leave him. Though, he breaks those compromises again and again and twisting his words to his convenience. First he said he was going to stop drinking during the week and leave alcohol for the weekends; then, he changed it to have a couple beers once or twice a week night, but then his “couple” beers turned into two or three tall necks, not two or three standard drinks. He says he does not see the problem, that I am overreacting, that he likes his beers after work because he has a hard physical job, that he is not spending all our money nor gambling nor being irresponsible with work or family/friends commitments, that he just wants to enjoy a few beers here and there, that he is an adult and knows what he is doing. Some other times he accepts that he can not stop at two or three standard drinks, because it has no effect on him, he has built a high tolerance. I broke uo with him yesterday, again; he thought I was gonna change my mind, I asked him to come up with a plan on how to stop this situation, he did not, so I left. I am so heart broken, I do not know what to do. I do not really want to leave him and I have never felt this in love, he is supportive, hard worker, extremely caring to my needs and wants, but this one things is killing me even though it is not extreme. I do not know what to do.

Ive been with my husband for over 18 years breaking up for a couple of weeks here and there we have been together for 5 years without major incident but just recently theres been a few occasions where ive wanted out one being that he went out drinking and went banging on the single woman’s door across from where we live , i only found out because she didnt answer and tried ringing him when he had returned home and i asked who was ringing him and of course he lied and i demanded to see his phone !! Then we went on holiday a family holiday with our sons and his parents and he was drunk for 2 weeks since we have been home i said i jad had enough and it was tge drink or our marriage he chose the alcohol but wouldnt leave so now hes still here drinking as soon as he finishes work and sleeping on tge sofa but actually seems ok about it and im going crazy!!!

I just left my alcoholic boyfriend of 1 year and 4 months 2 nights ago.

We broke up 3 times in the beginning because I couldn’t stand the monster he was when he was buzzed. Now, I’m a Tennessee girl, I’ve been drinking whiskey since I was 10. I don’t NEED IT EVERY DAY,,,EVERY 2 HOURS! Sure I have a good time, but that’s only when camping or with friends and that’s it. Not every day!

So, the LAST (4th) time we got back together, he PROMISED he’d stop drinking the “hard stuff” and I sincerely believe he did. He is such a WONDERFUL man when he’s not horrendously drunk. He did, however, have about 2 to 4 beers a day, which didn’t alter his personality at all. So that was fine with me for a year.

I specifically told him during our conversation that day he made that promise……that I will LEAVE if he backtracks. I have him 4 chances so I told him, in solidarity with him…I would stop drinking Whiskey too. And I did.

Okay,now, he DOES have insomnia problems and smokes Marijuana when he gets anxiety. He does NOT want to be a pill popper so he relies on that and beer to get himself to sleep. But with this HORRENDOUS divorce and sharing custody of 2 teenage boys and 1 adult son living at home….he’s stressed. HORRIBLY stressed. Excuse? I don’t know.

Last week, (Friday) I found two 12 OZ bottles of JD “Hidden” in a toolbox. Along with his Marijuana bowls. It’s not the weed I was upset about,since I didn’t have a problem with that, but HIDING the whiskey!

I took pictures of the bottles EXACTLY where they were hidden….and confronted him with this.

He said he just couldn’t take the stress of his divorce anymore and the Melatonin’s I was giving him were NOT working. Even the weed wasn’t working. So he FREELY admitted his did.

I said I’m packing my stuff. He then turned around, went to the nearest Rite Aid drug Store, and came back with TWO big “jugs” of Crown Royal!

Then as the night wore on, he started verbally abusing me, and then it happened……………he THREW ME OUT OF HIS HOUSE AT 1:30 AM!

Called the cops to have a “civil standby” and I got as much things as I could and had a friend drive me to a hotel and I checked in for 4 nights.

He’s been texting me (drunk) and telling me he’s going to pile my stuff in the yard and set it on fire! I called the police again and they said “we WILL NOT come out again whenever he threatens this” MY grandmothers cookware, family photos and my daughter’s awards (she’s 14) were in the house.

So my friend an I want to the house to see if he did pile my stuff in the yard….he didn’t.

Then he kept texting me he did, then he didn’t, then he did, then he didn’t. ALL NIGHT! It became a game to him. He KNEW the cops wouldn’t come out there that many times!

Sorry I’m rambling……….i’m starting to feel I FAILED him and feel it’s partly MY FAULT! I returned his Promise Ring….and he said I ripped his heart out when I returned the ring. He also says I kept him from being himself. WHAT!?? He was the one who said “You made me a bettter man Denny….thank you!” He said I and his kids were his “focus” and giving me all these praises and now he says I was the one holding him back? From what? Being Whiskey Bent?

I’m not sure if I should go through some therapy or something so I can get over this “my fault” feeling.

I’m in a million pieces right now.

I used to think if my husband loved me, he’d quit drinking. Now . . . I realize that he doesn’t have room in his heart to love more than one thing at a time. He loves alcohol. I’m just here. He’d rather spend time alone and drink. He is angry when I ask, beg, threaten and plead for him to be and get sober and he can be verbally abusive when drunk, but he is lucky enough to pass out every night and not remember it the next day. I feel tortured and miserable because I can’t forget the things he says. I can’t speak to him about his mouth because he claims I “over exaggerate” how he treats me when he is drunk. I literally down play a lot of his behaviors because I feel sorry for him. He is embarrassing and I feel bad for him. I just know people have to talk about him when he is drunk and it makes me feel like I have to protect him. He hurts me and I feel like I have to protect him? Crazy what sober people go through living through someone’s alcoholism. He lies about how much he drinks. He believes just because half a bottle of whiskey fits into one very large glass, it constitutes as one drink. I started writing him emails, believing that he would read them while sober and it would be more productive for a stable marriage . . . Sadly I found out he has quit reading them.

When we first got together we drank together and had a ton of fun. He would tell me the next day how I acted and what I said and I remembered none. Not only was I embarrassed, but I began to realize that I loved him enough to give him all of me. Sober me. To actually give our marriage a real chance by being . . . Me. It’s just too bad that he doesn’t feel the same way. What it boils down to is what we had in common was drinking. Now that I don’t drink, it appears we have nothing in common.

I pray that one day he will realize the severity of how thin our marriage is being pulled due to his alcoholism, but I’m beginning to accept that he will be happy alone and drunk. I will soon begin preparing to move and start a life without him.

I have been with my man for 14 years, we lived under the same roof for 11 of those years and currently, we each live with our parents. We lost the last home we had because he lost his job and down-ward spiraled. The last month of our lease, we got into an argument after i’d come home from celebrating a friends birthday and he was drunk after he promised he wouldn’t drink. That night, he left and went to his mother’s house. I didn’t speak to him for 3wks as he did not call or text. That was the first time i had ever felt abandoned by my soul mate. For many years he would only binge. It escalated to him missing many days of work and loosing jobs because of this. My own jobs were at jeopardy because of my attendance due to late nights arguing and not sleeping etc etc.
Now that we have been living separately, his parents do not enforce or even speak of any boundaries with his drinking. Actively for the last 3 years, he has worked his binge drinking into a full blown addiction to the point where he has actually admitted to me that he wonders where he is going to get his next drink as soon as he wakes up. I’ve threatened him, i’ve pleaded and begged, I’ve tried to leave him, for 3wks i cut off all communication, and he did not even reach out to me. He ended up getting a group of drunken manipulative friends and a temporary fill in for me, sharing intimate details about me, about us and about our relationship with this girl. He also let his friends disrespect me in front of him and did nothing. This man that he is now, I don’t know him. this is the worst in him, yet I love him and I find it excruciating to live without him and even more so to continue to go on with him like this in my life.
We had plans, we were engaged, we had a life, in 14 years we haven’t had any children and now i think this is why, God only knows. I don’t want him to feel abandoned, but I feel that I’m loosing myself in his addiction, I’ve changed, and not for the better. I feel weak, I feel enraged and insane, I’ve now been diagnosed with anxiety and borderline high blood pressure, I feel that I’m obligated to see him through this because I know the man he is on the inside and I know that man is not all completely lost. But what can i do? The people in his home turn a blind eye to his addiction, his apartment is upstairs from a liquor store which he gets credit for beer, and works off the credit by stocking in the store. There are so many obstacles and i feel like I’m alone in seeing them and seeing what needs to be done.
This makes me the bad guy, the nagger, the one that “drives him to drink”. I’m not ready to leave, but I can’t bare to stay, I’m lost right along with him.

Pray for us as I will for all of you

I’ve been with my other half and father of my 5 year old , since I was 16. I’m now 29 , he is now leaving in the middle of the night staying gone for 3-4 days ..always so sorry when he gets home . He hides bottles in his car and all around the house . I will not let him drink here.I just don’t know what to do anymore.. I want to leave, I love him but just don’t want this anymore ..but being able to pay everything on my own ..iso easier said then done ..

I have been with my husband for over 23 years and the last 6 years have been a living hell. He has been in and out of rehab 3 times. Pills, cocaine and this last rehab was for drinking. I am at my end of what I can take. I am no longer hurt by all he has done to himself and our family but I am angry. I just don’t know what else to do.I love him with all my heart. I keep holding on to that I know the man I married,the father and son I know he once was is still there. But when will enough be enough. It is destroying me as a person. Sometimes ones I can’t even look at him. Without think how can you do this to people you love you are so selfish. We have even told him if you feel like drinking or taking a pill reach out to us we will be there. He never calls. Never!! I caught him this morning drinking at 5am!! What makes people do this? I just don’t understand.

I’m 32 and my bf is 15 years senior
We have been together a year but have several fights while he was drunk. He has never physically hurt me and I know he won’t. I love him
When he dies not drink his a perfect guy
He works hard takes of me our apartment, but yes he drinks and can’t control it I rarely drink to not drinking at all and I gave him an earful and listed all the hurt he has caused me. I can’t change him but I put my foot down saying alcohol or me and I deserve better . We have plans for our future we talk about us as partners, but this last time he was drinking for got to pick me up from basically and stated he was lost. I don’t believe him and I just want him to stop drinking bc it’s destroying Jim, us and myself and I know I need to worry about me but how do you walk away knowing his a good person and you love him….tell me bc I can t this time and as well as the other times. he says he drinks when he has a stressful week and I told him he needs to find a healthier way to release stress, but my family wants me to walk away but I love him and I know his a good guy. I pray he gets help and for us to be but I know if at one point I just end up being hurt to where I lose myself I need to walk away from him.

My husband of 3 years left me because he chose beer over our marriage. He completely bailed on me, leaving me with all the bills. He never had the courage to tell me to my face he was leaving. He just grabbed all of his stuff while I was at work. I’m now blocked from his FB, his email, and his phone. At 43 years old, he’s living in his parents’ basement. And he’s going to the bar every day.

There had been two attempts at sobriety on his part, both times initiated by him because, after our first six months of marriage together, it had become obvious that he was an alcoholic. He had hidden it well while we were dating. Both times he made the decision to drink again because he swore he could become a “normal” social drinker. Yeah, I’m sure you all know how that ended.

I made all the mistakes in the book like pleading, nagging, threatening, bargaining, crying, and trying to “fix” everything. I compromised and humiliated myself in the process. I knew in my heart the relationship was doomed, but he was a loving and funny and amazing man while sober, so I told myself those moments were worth the pain. And I told myself the biggest lie of all when he was drinking: at least I got a man, and I’m not alone.

Al-Anon has been the biggest blessing to me. I’m now much more confident about myself, and I worry less and less about things that used to eat me up inside. I now understand that I can only change or fix me. And I’m worth it.

I have been married for close to 15 years my husband is always been a big partier but also a responsible person hold a job down helps pay the bills . We have three kids together and his drinking has been an issue multiple times throughout our marriage . In the beginning of our marriage it was hard to tell who would come out when he drank too much sometimes he would be the funny fun guy that everybody liked and sometimes he would just be a complete jerk never physical but just mean . We’ve had several arguments over the years and he’s always said he’s going to stop drinking or slow down or I’m too uptight maybe I need to start having fun . I’ve always noticed when he has one drink it never stops there he can’t stop drinking once he has one . He’s in a high stress job as a police officer and I get that but with three kids in the house I feel like it’s important for them to have a good role model. He will drink so much at night on a random weeknight that he’s falling asleep in his chair doesn’t help with the kids the kids think he’s just tired from work he says dumb things that don’t make any sense and the kids just kind a laugh I think they’re a little young to understand what’s going on but when I see it I actually just get upset . I’ve told him it bothers me when he drinks so much I told him I don’t understand how you can sit by yourself at night and we go to bed and drink all night until you pass out . And he always says he needs to be healthier and to stop drinking so much and watch what he eats . Now he’s older he’s now on blood pressure medicine he’s on and I depressants and yet none of that has been a wake up call for him . He’s a high functioning alcoholic finally last night he admitted to me that once he starts to drink he can’t stop and that it worries him because he’s really made an attempt at least the last few days to stop drinking . He sets these random limits of I’m only going to have one drink and I know that never stays it always turns into just one more just one more Intel a bottle wine or two are gone . He told me just today that our family is more important to him then drinking and that his health is more important and he wants to see his kids grow up and he wants to stop drinking and he’s worried . I’d like to say I’m excited but I’ve heard this before and as I expected while he was at work he called me to talk about his health . And now it’s changed from maybe I won’t drink anymore to maybe I’ll just drink at social settings like when we’re out at a party or something and I’ll limit it . To me that’s just a way for him to negotiate a way to continue to drink . I’m not at a point where I want to say it’s over or you need to make a decision between your family and alcohol because he’s not a bad person he just has an addiction that he needs to own and to get help but I’m at the point where I just don’t feel like there’s anything else I can do or say or write letters to him about or cry about or lecture or anything anymore he has to want to do this on his own . I always worry that I’m going to have to tell my kids that he had a heart attack because he decided to choose his lifestyle over us . I had a mom who deals with stress by drinking wine lots of it growing up his dad while not in the picture why he was younger is a severe alcoholic it runs in the family’s and I worry about my kids I can’t listen to any more negotiating or promises or I need your help then when I tried to help and point out hey you said you weren’t going to drink anymore I get a nasty look and a wire you nagging me . He’s always in a state of justifying why he drinks so much and the next morning he’s always depressed about his weight about how he feels about I can’t believe I drink so much it baffles me how he doesn’t see how this is affecting everything . I’m at a loss for what to do now I don’t want to take his promise and just blow it off I want to be able to help him but it is exhausting on my end to try and continue to support and help when he’s not helping himself . How many times do you say it’s OK you can try again . He does not help me around the house he does not help me with the kids I feel like I’m responsible for everything in this house and it’s starting to catch up I want him to see what a good life he has and what a good person he is but I can’t force that . The whole situation depresses me I don’t even know where to go or what to do . So his latest promise I am holding onto Falls hope you had again that maybe he’ll stick to it and yet I know in a matter of weeks will be right back to where we were at . It’s just depressing I can’t talk to my family about it because they’re so judge mental I have nowhere to go I’m embarrassed to talk to my friends and I’m trying like hell to protect my kids from seeing their father who is a good person and loves him not be able to get a handle on something . God pray for me

I can’t trust my husband anymore. I still love him but am afraid I may be to the point I hate him equally. He lies a the time. We can’t go out socially any more and have no friends. He can’t just have a couple drinks. I am tired of my friends having to help me drag him.to the car because he is so hammered he can barely stand.We have a young son and my husband wants little to do with either of us. He comes home eats, stares at his phone for an hour then locks himself away.for the night. He is very selfish. This isn’t what I wanted out of life or a family. I don’t want to waste my life and it all seems hopless.

I go back and forth between so many different emotions. I feel alone, angry, sad, grateful, all in the same day. I have a wonderful husband who tries constantly to make me happy. He waits on me and plans for every way possible to make my day better. He just can’t stop drinking! He is killing himself and I am watching. He is my husband in the morning, and drunk and annoying in the afternoon. He is very ill. I can’t stand the idea of leaving him, because I know he will become a pitiful falling down drunk all alone. I am a nurse and I deal with alcoholics in my work. There families have left them. He has no one else but me. He has cut all ties with his severely fucked up family. He will not seek counseling because he is afraid they will tell him he is bad (which is what has been pounded into his brain for his whole life). When I get frustrated and mad at him, I shame him more, which reinforces the bad feelings and need to drink. I know I need to let him hit his own bottom again (He quit once for 9 months), but it is so hard to just let him drink and be around him like that. We have no children, so it is just us two. I laugh at myself for saying “Let him drink”, because it is not up to me. I need to Love him, and accept his LOVE. I need to learn to be happy in my life, regardless of where he is. I can do this! WWJD? I ask myself, what would my Mother do. She has passed, but she always gave unconditional LOVE, in spite of ANYTHING her children did. I can do that for John. He certainly needs it.

I’m married to a highly functioning alcoholic. We dated for two and a half years and then got married. I knew he had drinking problems but he always swore he didn’t and tell me he’d stop drinking so much. We both have a child from previous marriages/relationships and now have two children together. We moved from Wisconsin to Florida. I’m so alone down here. He drinks from the moment he gets home from work until he goes to bed. He doesn’t care how it affects any of us because he’s told me it doesn’t affect anyone. He gets extremely angry with me if I try to bring it up at all. He’s had three DUIs in WI and had to go to jail the last time for 3 months. He has hit me three times but that was in the beginning of our relationship, he also used to kick me out all the time. I have no where else to go. He doesn’t hit me or kick me out anymore but tells me to leave if I don’t like how things are. He won’t have adult conversations with me about anything. I’m great fun for all he has done for me, has a highly paid job to take care of us monetarily, help me pay to get my GED, drivers license, car, and corrective surgery to fix my stomach. I feel like I’m being paid off to deal with the drinking though…even though I have a car now, I need money for gas, which means getting a job. Now I have no problem getting a job and working hard to help pay for bills, but this means letting my husband take care of the kids while I’m gone. Every time he takes care of the kids while I try to do something, I come back to him plastered. The kids are young and don’t know but it’s really started to affect them. My husband will scream at them if they act up or he’ll just basically ignore them. He won’t help with potty training or enforcing bedtime, with bathing or cleaning up. He doesn’t do anything productive with them, just turns the tv on for them and sits on the computer or sits outside smoking cigarettes. I feel it’s dangerous to leave the children with him but I’m not going to have much of a choice if I want to save money and try to leave. I have no friends or family to take care of the kids and obviously can’t afford childcare. My family in Wisconsin don’t really seem to care enough to help me at all. They haven’t visited since I moved down here except for one weekend. I’ve lived here over three years now… My family and friends don’t even talk to me anymore. I’ve sacrificed everything for this man and I feel it’s just been thrown back in my face. He’s always telling me how lazy and wrong of a person I am….I’ve kind of given up. I still take care of my kids but I’m depressed and alone, I want to just curl up in a ball and die. I don’t have anyone there for me. I just wanted to complete my goals/dreams of getting a job and going to college, just being happy with myself and enjoying my family. I’m starting to become the nonfunctional person because I don’t know how to cope or do anything anymore….

my husband drinks, sometimes he goes for days and then he will pull a drunk,
I feel as though its my fault because I have gained weight since we first was married,
he lies when he drinks, I find empty beer cans under the sofa or dresser, my father drunk for the first 28 years of my life, and he stopped, he was an ugly drunk, my husband is not but why cant he stop drinking he says , he always says he will stop but never does,i feel alone and unloved ,not happy with life,what is wrong with me.

My partner is a functioning alcoholic and he doesnt even know it. When he is confronted with it he just shrugs it off or says that it isn’t, I’m overly embarrassed to take him anywhere when he’s drinking, he loves going for rides and I do take him majority of the time

Why can he just not stop. I did when we got together

A few times he got so drunk he pissed the bed, he often becomes violent but tells me that I’m being a sensitive princess and that I’m making it up. He drinks Friday night after work right up until 11pm Saturday. & then on the Sunday expects me to wait on him hand and foot

I dated a high functioning alcoholic for a year and a half, on and off. I am 26, she is 42. She is a very successful saleswoman and provides well for herself and her daughter. In the beginning we would go out to casinos every weekend, I never had so much fun with someone. We would drink, constantly but it was the beginning of a new relationship, we were enjoying it so I thought nothing of it. As time went on, I noticed she would pass out on the floor in different areas of her house. She would get NASTY sometimes when unprovoked. I would even meet her at a bar, drive her home in her car as she was passed out, and sure enough in the coffee mug in the drinkholder was the smell of wine. I have no proof but I am convinced she cheated on me. That doesn’t hurt. What did hurt was watching a woman I love slowly destroy herself every night. I didn’t dare try to talk about it with her after the first time, I walked on eggshells for weeks afterwards. We were judged a lot for our age difference, we did not care though. I want to be with her so bad it kills me, but I know she is not going to stop drinking.
I fear her daughter who I became very close with will pick up this habit when she gets older. My ex almost convinces me that she doesn’t have a problem, if she is so convincing to me, does she honestly not realize it herself? I want to go back to what became my family so bad, but no I can’t because the tape will replay. It kills me.

What do you do if the start of your incredible, romantic, crazy romance was all based around alcohol. All those amazing things that are said at the beginning when you’re so naive and you don’t realise the person you are falling for is an alcoholic and all those ‘sincere’ and completely meaningful things they say about you, that make you feel like the goddess you always wanted to feel we’re just them in their buzzing and pissed up state.

It’s been 3 years on. I feel like an enabler. I am an enabler. I grew up in with an alcoholic sister and I know – textbook – everything to do with addiction, this potential hereditary disease that controls one mind and they’ll only stop if THEY want to stop – AA saved her life and thank god for that. They say we seek out and look for the same people in our lives. So I met an alcoholic. A seriously hot one too. I never was able to fix my sister, and like hell I wish I could have. I saw her pain and her self destruction so up close it still gives me shivers today, and what’s arguably worse is how useless I felt. When I met him I thought: oh hello here we go, I can’t act clever because I’ve been through it all and I can help him, fix him… maybe even save him. What a power trip I was on.

I’m fucking stupid. These days I drink so much just to keep up with him. Just to get along with him. Although I’m in so much disgrace with myself I’ve found I am drinking for all the wrong reasons myself and getting upset and lashing out when I’m drunk, because it’s not where I wanted to be. I love him. But perhaps if he sobered up he wouldn’t even sincerely love me like he says he does. Sometimes I want him to drink because it’s the person I now know and who I apparently fell in love with. He only tells me how he feels about anything when he’s drunk. I only know his opinions on me when he’s drunk, pretty much. If sober, he’s so grumpy and hates the world.

I’ve tried everything. For 3 years I genuinely have. From tough love to deep compassion, from encouraging AA to encouraging he takes his own path, to drinking with him and not telling him what to do, to being so drunk myself I manipulatively force him to look after me and make him taste his own medicine.

This is hell. I love him so much. But he loves alcohol more. And alcohol will always come first. I’m just the third wheel.

I have broken up with my boyfriend of 2.5 years about four times this past month. I’m 27 and he is 29
The first time was because he went on a binge drinking for three days, and cheated on me with a stranger one of those days. He says they didn’t have sex, but I’m still scared about it… He has been badly drunk about once or twice every week since that time.

My thought process is very bizarre. I know I don’t need him in my life. I can support myself alone and I also have family and friends that support me when Im down. I know that his drinking is ruining my life. I know I cant trust him anymore, that all he does is lie to me, that I can’t live this way anymore.
So technically I should be able to just leave him….

However, I feel that he needs me to get better. I feel that I love him and that I care about him so much to see him take his life away through the drinking. I feel he is depressed and that me leaving him is just going to make it worse for him and harder for him to get better.

Everytime I have broken up with him I get really depressed and scared about his life. He goes on a bimge drinking andI end up getting back with him a few days after because I convince myself that if I stick around a bit longer, he will get better. And he always begs me to stay and tells me that he needs me and that he will get better and he will go to treatment. But he hasn’t, he is drunk right now. It’s been months of this back and forth in my mind. I feel so terrible. I wish this was just a dream and not reality. Please God help us all.

well i don’t see the point in a long detailed story. My boyfriend of 1 year is an Alcoholic, his drink of choose is a pint of vodka which he drinking straight out of the bottle like it’s water. it’s very hard to watch. I guess I want to know what is wrong with me? I know by now he will never stop, that I will never be number 1 in his life, his vodka is loved by him more than his 2 little girls. Over the past few months things have gonna bad. we lost our home because I was the only one working, he started drinking the pints and pints of vodka. He says he has “blackouts” and he will treat me so badly but be nice to anyone else. he has taken to calling me fucking bitch, he has punched holes in the walls of our new place and calling me names the whole time, he will start putting me down saying things i don’t even want to repeat. he told me yesterday that he will stop drinking on monday but he wont, you know. he just won’t. I just cannot believe any more that this person is able to really love anything. the most passion i see from him is giving to his drinking friends.
I am so hurt and so lonely and depressed. I feel so bad about myself. i try so hard to talk to him but after last night i dont even want to try anymore. his 2 girls live in the house too. I dont knoow how to make this awful feeling i have inside to go away. this whole year he has done so many hurtful things to me and he never changes. It hurts to feel like this over a person who makes you feel like nothing but a replaceable body from the girl before.

I’m in the same predicament. My boyfriend of 3.5 years is a drinker and nothing seems to want to make him stop. The police have been called numerous times because of the arguments. He is the most kind, lovely, loyal man but as soon as he has a drink, he is calling me (and my family) all the nasty names under the sun.
Supportive love won’t work, tough love won’t work. He is depressed and can’t find the motivation to change, so he drinks which sucks the motivation out of him in the first place. It’s the viscous cycle again which so many of you have talked about.
We’ve always wanted kids together, and we’ve talked about marriage but the drinking causes constant arguments, and it’s chipping away at our relationship.
I’m currently at my Mum’s because I can’t take it anymore. I just don’t know what to do, I love him so much. It’s killing me to see him like this 🙁

We drank together when we first met, I grew out of it, and it seemed like he did too. We got married, had 2 children. Then the alcoholic came back. There were nights I didn’t know where he was, I would drive around looking for him. Then the last day of school for my Kindergarten and 1st grader. He took the kids and their grandpa fishing. He got pulled over and was arrested in another town for DUI. SLOWLY he started to pull it together. Attended an outpatient recovery program, 2 of them. He quit drinking and refused to admit he was an alcoholic. On his one year sobriety date I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. I went through treatment, radiation and surgery. WE WENT THROUGH, TOGETHER

Lynne,
I am in the same boat as you. Not engaged and able to run. I don’t know what to do.

I have been with my husband for nearly three years. I have provided everything for our family. I have two children with a previous marriage and we have a 6 month old daughter together. When I met my husband I didn’t think anything about him being an alcoholic. I really didn’t even understand the term. I still have a hard time understanding it even though I see it in him every day. I have no family history of it and I can drink a lot and not even feel anything. My husband on the other hand can drink three 25 oz beers and already be slurring his words. We fight a lot because he can’t control himself. He neglets our daughter and me because of it. We don’t have a love life anymore. He passes out regularly. He lies so much now I am not sure he can tell the truth. He can’t keep a job and I have had to pay our way most of our relationship. He has talked to other women since we have been together because of this issue as well. I don’t know what to do anymore. I’m fed up. I’m about at that point that I just want out of our relationship. I do know alcolism is a sickness and can’t be cured overnight. But if he doesn’t quit soon then I can’t keep this up. I have to worry about what’s best for the kids and me. I do love him and I know he loves me and he has a problem. I’m just so very unhappy and stressed out constantly.

I read these comments and it breaks my heart to know there are so many people suffering much like me. I am currently sitting in a hotel and my “boyfriend” is at the bar getting plastered. Its like I may as well be invisible. He gets. Upset if I. Not sitting near him but never notices when i walk away. Its his birthday today but does that mean he gets a pass to be an asshole to me and treat me as though i dont exist? Its so sad. I feel so alone like why am i here with someone who could care less if i was here or not? I want to just drive off snd leave him here and move on with my life because thus is bullshit. I deserve someone who wants to be near me, and so does everyone else out there dealing with an alcoholic. Its plain to see nothing matters but the drink and thats it. I pray to God to remove me from this situation and bring me better love but I know moving on is completely up to me. Why? Why do I continue to take this? I dont know. I need help breAking away from this situation.

My boyfriend and I have been together for 3 years. He is 21 and I am 19. He has always been a social drinker, and we actually met when we were both drinking at a friends party. I am also a social drinker, but don’t feel I NEED to drink anytime my friends are, I have no problem being the DD when we go out.
When we first started dating, he would ONLY drink on the weekends. Friday OR Saturday night, but not often both days.
Him and his friends now drink every single weekend, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. They are all the types of people who will drink until they are absolutely smashed, and egg each other on to drink more. Him and his friends all work hard labour jobs Monday to Friday, but also now drink throughout the week after work.
Before going to the bar, he will often drink an entire 40L bottle of Crown Royal and then spend $60-80 more at the bar on drinks, getting a beer and a double crown and coke drink each time.
His job requires him to work long hours all summer, spring and fall, but to be unemployed for the winters. This winter was specifically tough for him, he lost his grandmother in January and was extremely close with her.
Ever since his grandma had passed, I realized his drinking has been increasing, A LOT. He used to be a huge gym rat and would workout daily. This winter, he gained about 40 pounds and has stopped going to the gym. Now, whenever I ask to go, he says he’s too tired or instead would rather go out and have drinks at a pub or restaurant.
He chooses drinking over a lot of things now.
Being unemployed, he obviously didn’t have as much money as he had while he was working, yet still ALWAYS had money for the bar.
Now that he’s back to work, he owes his mom, his dad and I hundreds of dollars, but chooses to spend his money on booze and going out, then paying us back.
It has gotten so bad that his mom had to ask another family member for rent money because she couldn’t afford to pay her rent without the money my boyfriend owes her.

I’m really worried about him, and every time I try to talk to him about this drinking situation, he laughs at me and think’s I’m over exaggerating or making things up.
It’s gotten to the point where I’m embarrassed to be out with him, I don’t like who he is anymore, but obviously still love him.
I don’t know what to do, or how to address the situation to him without jumping down his throat calling him an alcoholic.
I don’t know how to make him realize that he has a problem.
I need help.
HE needs help.

I met my now fiance when I was 22 years old. I was a senior in college, had three jobs and a twice-a-week internship. He was 26, had a great job, handsome, tall and was extremely genuine — and he made me laugh. He loved to go to happy hour on Thursdays and out drinking almost every weekend — didn’t seem out of the ordinary — I was the only person I knew, my age, working almost 40 hours a week and a full-time student.

His lifestyle seemed normal and fun. I enjoyed being able to let loose once or twice a week and go drinking/partying with him. I was a senior in college and it seemed so normal. It really wasn’t until I graduated from college, got a full-time management position right away, and we moved into an apartment together, that I noticed something wasn’t right.

I wrongly assumed that once we moved in together, both had great full-time jobs, that the partying would naturally slow down. It did for me! I was no longer interested in drinking nearly as much as he was. I started noticing that he not only drank at dinner when we went out to eat, but also every night with dinner — at that time around 3 or 4 beers. i still didn’t really notice an issue. He is the size of an NFL quarterback, so I thought that my occasional one beer was about equal to his occasional three or four.

I thought our weekend activities would change. They didn’t — not for a very long time — he still wanted to go out every weekend– he was still spending hundreds of dollars of his money on booze instead of saving or paying off his student loans. A functioning alcoholic to the tee. He was a true weekend warrior — he worked every week just so he could get to the weekend and party. He doesn’t know how to stop drinking once he’s started.

Fast-forward almost 3 years later — we are engaged and getting married in less than a month. I am scared. He has promised many times to slow down — and honestly since we first met he has — weekends at the club/bar are rare — but he still has a problem. I find empty nips in the trash and once a half-empty bottle in his car. He can go about 5-14 days max without a drink, but never longer. The lying is what hurts the most.

it’s very hard for me to understand this disease — I drank a lot for a while — but I grew out of it and stopped. I was simply done feeling sick and wanted to have productive weekends and days, rather than wasting them being drunk or hung over. Why claim that you ‘want’ to stop? Why claim that you are ‘trying’ to stop — but you don’t and can’t.

I am starting to wish I ran a long time ago. He told me he would be home from his work function (at a bar) 2.5 hours ago. His phone is off and I feel like a fool. This isn’t the first time this has happened — and today is my birthday. What the hell have I done?

I feel like a fool.

My husband has a bad drinking problem. I pray he would stop. He is a good provider. We’ve been married 23 years and divorced 15, now back together. I love him and realized I didn’t want to be alone, but now I know why I divorced him. He would rather drink than be sober with me. He drinks and passes out! I hate it. I feel so alone. I wish he would stop.

I have been with the love of my life for 2.5 years. We currently have a 15-month-old son and I have a 6-year-old from a previous relationship. I am 29 years old and the very first day I met him he was covered in the smell of an alcoholic. I knew the signs and ignored them, until later that night I called him out and said he was an alcoholic. I did not make it any better, because I ordered a drink for myself.

He has been battling alcoholism for a long time. Both his grandfather and father fought off the disease. The nights we seem to have are like battle zones. We moved in together and for what. He hasn’t helped me with any of the bills, because of his drinking. I have woken up to find him missing. He has stolen from me and our kids. Our sex life is non existent. I have to wake up early to work and it’s very stressful, and I come home and literally do the most. He doesn’t go grocery shopping, so I have chosen to leave him. He has even keyed my car when I finally did throw him out. We have fought and it’s just not good for the kids. I told him if he can’t pay for the damages and then agree to get counseling, we will never be together again.

I am so grateful to hear these stories. I love him, I do — but some way or another I have become exhausted, as if I am the one who is drinking and ruining my life. I stop by occasionally at his job to remind him of what is waiting for him, but I can’t live with him. He needs to feel for me the way he feels for alcohol, the way I feel for him. We are a family and I will continue to love and support him, just not highlighting his negatives and try to be a lil more loving. I guess I could of been more loving if he just was more responsible. Hope our situation gets better, because all these stories are super similar.

I have been dating my boyfriend for 4 months now. He drinks every day, stands me up, lies daily, argues, but can be very sweet and loving when he wants. The problem is I am almost 9 years in recovery from alcohol and drugs, but I am also 6 yrs older than he is and now I have kicked him out, and he is back at the homeless shelter. He doesn’t seem to care if he is homeless, and also no job. Now I am alone again, as I can’t live with someone who drinks every day. What a shame.

My husband and I both drink. Tonight is the third time in two weeks that I have barricaded myself in a room in our house or slept in a car to feel safe. My partner of 22 years, whom I love deeply, is poisoning this relationship and his behavior has me fearful for my safety.

After listening to an onslaught of vile words about my worth, my nothingness, my lack of contributions and warmth, I retaliated — repeatedly slammed a door and screamed at him like an animal. I then retreated with our dog to another part of the house. He followed soon after, kicking the door as I sat against it holding him off — afraid again. He stopped once he kicked the door in half. Splintered shards littered the stair landing.

Afterwards he stood at the bottom of the stairs reminding me that this was all my fault — my actions 12 years ago, when an attempt to find warmth and positive attention from men led to affairs. I came clean and we stayed together in what I thought was a second chance.

Ten years later he had his own affairs, the worst being a sordid, extensive relationship with a married woman. In our home they played house and documented all of their filth on film for me to later find. Two years and many counseling sessions later, I have forgiven his bad behavior and grown as a person.

The continued verbal abusiveness and physical threat is unforgivable. I drink to tolerate it and am an equal contributor in escalating fights. I must leave to salvage my self-worth and remove myself from risk.

I met my boyfriend when I was 15 (I am currently 18). I feel pathetic and perhaps a little over dramatic and inexperienced writing on here.

Anyways, my mother and father are both alcoholics. My mother ran away from my father and he now lives alone and I’ve seen him for a day in the past five years. My mother still drinks — I believe, in fact, more excessively than my father. She currently lives with my little brother. I have completely lost her, and I know every single one of her tricks and I know immediately when she’s had a drink. Every day I think of my brother and how he is doing, as I didn’t cope with it at all. I’ve lived in three different family homes after leaving my mom and will never regret leaving when I did.

This brings in my boyfriend, the love of my life, my only love I’ve had. He literally brings the sun to me and no one has ever made me feel how he does. He is funny and clever, he showers me in love, and I couldn’t be more thankful. I believe I do a lot for him, but often I’m scared I’m no good for him. He started drinking and smoking at a young age, to be honest. He lost his dad (who was an alcoholic) at the age of nine and that clearly traumatised him.

I’ve had immense difficulties in seeing him. My family, whom I first lived with, banned me from seeing him completely (he didn’t even drink much at this point, but smoked). Anyways, that is past. Now I live happily with my grandparents.

After he had a gap year, this September he started a course, didn’t like it, so he moved to a college. However, he had a terrible accident two days later, meaning he couldn’t carry on his course, which included a lot of manual labour. He has had depression for the past 4 years, so 2 years before we got together. He currently self-harms a bit, and he is drinking a lot while being at home, but also he started his new anti-depressive medication about 2 weeks ago, which means he has much lower tolerance (and he isn’t meant to drink at all), which I thought was great at first but he is just getting worse, every occasion a drink is needed. He has bottles all over, hidden in his room, and he has started stealing drinks from my grandparents as well. I love him, I love him so much I can’t bring myself to get angry with him and I know he has to help himself.

I’ve suffered from depression myself. I’ve had an ED (which I believe is very similar to addiction, if not one itself) and I’ve grown up watching alcoholics drown their inner bodies. I could never leave him, so that is out of the question. I cannot tell his mother, as that would just make things worse, and I cannot tell my grandparents as they are terribly judgemental and would destroy his self-esteem even further.

I just no longer know what to do, other than completely unallow myself to drink which I rarely do, or to sacrifice our relationship by telling him how things are, but I’m low on money and if I have any it goes on drink for him. I really do understand more or less what he is going through. I just struggle to understand why he does not get tired of being sad and craving alcohol and why he doesn’t get tired of being sick, and tired of having to hide it all. And tonight I made a big decision that I will help him. I can’t fix him, which is what I often try and do, but I’ve found him three possible jobs. I’ve decided to not drink unless it’s a birthday of someone important and he isn’t present, and also decided that I will try and make our life more active.

I know I am young and know there is a very high chance that I won’t be with this guy for the rest of my life, but he’s done a lot for me and I now must repay for all he’s done.

I hope that all the people who are struggling with a close one feel as strong as I feel in whatever decision they make, but making no decision is making a decision itself. I hope that all the people who read this comment live much happier than they live now. Alcohol will not haunt me for the rest of my life, or those I love.

I had been in my first relationship for 3 years, but met my current boyfriend (of only 6 months) shortly after I broke up with my first and only long-term boyfriend. We met when I was 19 and he was 24. Im currently 20, and he recently turned 25.

The connection I had with him was unexplainable! We were so crazy about each other. It seemed like it was so meant to be between us! Within a few weeks of us dating, he was urging me to move in with him and his roommates, and to get a job in the small town he lived in. I landed a killer job in the community, working for a huge company, which was a really big leap for me and an amazing wage for someone my age! I didn’t want to pass up the opportunity. But right from the beginning, I knew something was off with him.

The first time I met him, he had been drinking. He claimed it was because he was nervous about meeting me, and felt that was his ‘coping mechanism’ to calm his nerves. Then when I got the job and moved in with him, I noticed the drinking was a lot more frequent than I had first thought. He knew it bothered me, because I grew up with a very different way of life than he did. I didn’t know what alcohol was until I was 12 years old (if not older), and it terrified me seeing how it made people act. Granted, I only turned 18 two years ago, so of course I had went out here and there, but I’m not a big drinker! I hate the way it makes me feel.

My boyfriend is an extremely hard worker! He loves his job, and his boss, and his family. But it’s difficult, because he grew up watching his parents struggle with alcohol abuse, and his dad and current boss (whom he admires) are both alcoholics.

Only a month and a half ago we moved out of the place we were in (with roommates), and got our own place together — which was also quite the leap, considering we had only been dating for 4 1/2 months at that time. Within the first two weeks after I moved in with him and his roommates, he had had a bad accident where he almost lost his thumb (alcohol was involved in the accident). He was off work for about three months, and being so fresh in the relationship, it made things difficult for me.

I went from living with my parents my whole life, to living with three guys and a six-year-old girl. All of a sudden I became a nurse, maid, and nanny with no transition time after moving away from home for the first time. We had to make 4-hour trips (2 hours there and back) to the nearest town, every few days for doctors’ appointments, and he became extremely depressed. His drinking had slowed down a lot due to the medication he was on for the pain, but it didn’t last long before he started back up.

He’s been back working for just over a month and things seemed so much better. He seemed a lot happier all the way around and promised me the drinking was going to slow down once we had our own place. Then I noticed his drinking had become much worse. He will come home and finish an 8-12-pack of beer, and take shots by himself any night of the week until he can’t even speak properly or walk straight. I think in the past 2 weeks he’s only been sober maybe 3 or 4 nights (out of 14 days — it’s gotten way out of hand). I told him I don’t care if he has a few beers after a long day at work, but also that there is no reason he needs to finish a 12-pack and a whole thing of vodka by himself on a Monday or Tuesday night.

Just the other night I had asked him to slow down a little since he had already finished a 12-pack, but he looked at me like he was doing nothing wrong, and chugged half a mikki of vodka as I asked him to know his limit. I just shook my head and went into my office, shutting the door behind me, but as little as 5 seconds after I shut the door and started to cry, he came stumbling in and hugged me. I tried to push him off and tell him to leave me alone because I was upset, but when he drinks he gets extremely affectionate –always kissing me, and needing me with him. But when he’s sober, it’s the opposite. He shuts himself out. Hides behind his video game and doesn’t say a single word. It’s gotten to the point where I feel like I’m completely wasting my time here. He sits there and tells me he wants to marry me someday (only after he’s been drinking), and says he’s so happy we got to start our life together, but I just shake my head because I know it’s just because he had been drinking all evening.

I see all these comments from people about being with their husbands for 10-15-30 years, and nothing has changed. And thinking that this is how my life is going to be (if I’m with him forever?), that scares the ever-living stuff out of me. Especially because I’ve had to start keeping track of his drinking (for my own sanity, because it’s getting so out of hand), and can’t even get myself a drink because if I go to work, it’ll be gone by the time I get home. I have actually had to hide liquor because he has no limit. It’s just an endless stream of drinking. He’s like a bottomless pit, and if there’s a bottle somewhere, he’ll finish it before I even have a chance to say anything about it.

I have been married to my husband for nearly 30 years. He was always a drinker, but I never recognized it as a problem until about 4 years into our marriage. I had come from a non-drinking family, so wasn’t overly aware of the problems associated with alcohol. His alcohol consumption increased & along with this his temper & violence increased.

My husband has always been an extremely hard worker & good provider & the good times have been great, but there have also been lots of not-so-good times mixed in. We have days where everything is wonderful, nothing seems to upset my husband & this then followed by a week of the total opposite with nothing being right.

I am beginning to believe my husband has some sort of mood disorder such as bi-polar & his drinking is to mask the ever changing moods. On the good days I have convinced myself I am just being silly & an unreasonable wife. But then the drink gets the better of him & I’m sitting listening to nightly drunken ramblings, constant verbal abuse & total put downs. This always followed in the morning as if nothing has happened.

The 30-odd-years of abusing alcohol has now taken its toll on all the family. The worst part of it all is that we have an adult son who has autism who lives at home. He is also subjected to his father’s alcoholism. It is for this reason that I have now decided enough is enough. Fair enough if I want to subject myself to the constant torture, but I am no longer willing to subject my son to the same.

Many of you have said that the alcoholic in your lives admits they have a problem & is apologetic. Well, my husband has never apologized for his appalling drunken behavior or admitted to having a problem. He drinks an average of 6-8 bottles of beer per week night, 12-18 a night on the weekends. His memory is now shot & he seems slow & confused a lot of the time, yet still won’t admit he has a drinking problem.

As I am now nearly 50 years old, I want to enjoy my life with someone who is loving & caring. My husband is either at work or drunk. We never spend any quality time together. I feel very alone & sad 90 percent of the time. I have decided this new year is my year & I will be leaving my husband & taking my son to start a new life. It will be hard, scary & a huge challenge, but one I am finally brave enough to take.

Reading these comments and wondering why we are doing this to ourselves! I’ve been married to a high-functioning alcoholic for almost 10 years. And I do mean high-functioning! He is a beautiful man, like none other and treats me like his queen. Living with a high-functioning alcoholic makes it very easy to lie to yourself. If it’s not a problem, it’s not a problem, right? Wrong. Eventually you reach crisis point in one way or another.

He developed gout several years ago but refused to accept that his drinking had anything to do with the severity of his condition. His non-alcoholic brother has gout and it was easier to pass it off as hereditary. I now believe that this was the first sign that his body was telling him to stop. However, I continued on in my denial. It wasn’t until about six months ago that I started to pull my head up from under the sand. I had a really hard time with the switch from sex 3 times a week to twice a month. This manifested in awful ways within my mind.

I really cannot explain it but after much soul-searching, I finally put two and two together. 17 plus years of alcoholism has an awful effect on your body, libido included. I resigned myself to a sexless marriage and at times I even considered an affair. I’m ashamed to say that now, and glad that I did not act on it. I of course tried to discuss this with him, to no avail. He said I had too much time on my hands, thinking about things too much, etc.

Two months ago he pinched a nerve to the point of paralysis trying to get out of bed. He was hospitalised, not for the pinched nerve but for excess alcohol intake and polyarticular gout. His joints were riddled with gout and he was being treated for severe alcohol withdrawal syndrome.

I legitimately did not know that was even a thing! But it is and it is serious. I watched my beautiful, gentle giant turn into a monster over those initial few days. It was one of the most traumatic experiences of my life, while his own hung in the balance. This was the first time I said out loud that my husband is an alcoholic. Those words had so much weight to them. So much.

Like many of you, I have been on the merry-go-round. Broken promises, lies, deceit. The drinking wanes, the drinking exacerbates. But something changed in me and I can never go back to the way things were. And also, like many of you, it is the deceit that is destroying us. I no longer trust what he says to be truth. That is a very difficult place to come back from.

He knows that the only acceptable way forward for me is 100% abstinence. If this does not happen then sadly, this will be our last Christmas together. And I have to keep telling myself that the pain my children will go through due to separation is not a blip on the radar compared to the pain of watching their father drink himself to death. We’ve had many relapses so far. Right now we are back to two days sober. I do not hold high hopes for us and am in no way prepared for separation, financially or otherwise. But I know that either way, next year I will not be married to an alcoholic.

I have been with my boyfriend for a year (I’m 21, he’s 27). We met in school, we’re both engineering majors and he spent 6 years in the Navy.

A few months before we started dating, he got his third DUI. He had a bracelet to monitor for alcohol until he went to jail for the DUI. He spent 45 days split between jail and rehab. Had the bracelet again for a couple months after he got out, so all was good. After he got the bracelet off, he immediately started drinking again.

About two months ago his roommate told me he got a hooker and a few days after that brought a girl home from the bar and shot a gun in the house, but didn’t do anything with the girls except try to take the bar chick’s clothes off. I didn’t want to get the roommate in trouble and he was about to move out, so I waited until the day after he moved out (a few days ago) to ask about them.

He said he was super drunk and we were fighting at the time (we were on a “break” for like a day, but didn’t see each other and barely talked for almost a week), said it would never happen again, told me nothing happened with them, offered to take me to the bar to meet her because she works there so she could confirm nothing happened, etc, etc.

We talked about it and he told me on that week we were away from each other he had an eye-opening realization and realized how much I meant to him and how much he missed having me around. He told me he would stop drinking if I wanted him to because I was worth it. I asked him to just cut back.

Yesterday he promised me he would only have one or two beers last night, but this morning when I got to his house I smelled alcohol when I opened his bedroom door, and he told me he played poker until 5am and when I asked how much he drank he just said, “Don’t worry about it.”

He’s missing class all the time because he sleeps all day. I just don’t know what to do. I love him and can’t leave him. I want to help, but I’ve never had experience with an alcoholic before and don’t know what I can do to help.

I sort of knew right on our first date. We had been talking on the phone, and most of the time he seemed okay. One time late at night he called me drunk and I told him to never do that again. I was heading to his apartment and called him, we were going out for dinner and he didn’t drive. Yeah, totally restricted after 3 DUI’s.

He told me to give him a few minutes, that he would call me, so I went to the Wal-Green’s and walked around, and walked around. I called him back and he seemed a bit confused and told me to come over — yes, he was finally ready.

I get there and go to his apartment, he hugs me, we talk, we laugh, he hugs me again, told me he knew we would get along well. It was then I smelled the hard alcohol on his breath. I told myself, we will just be friends. Six years later, many horrible stories, almost all of them involving his drinking. Verbally abusive to my daughter on the phone, abusive to me. Homeless, we have never lived together, he said he wanted to get married and I told him, some things would have to change.

!,000,000 or so lies later, if I try to talk to him about any issue, he brings up my adult daughter who has had severe panic disorder, Asperger’s. She is high functioning and holds a job, and pays her bills, she doesn’t wash her dishes and that makes him rage. I am a horrible mother, she is a horrible daughter. Though he cannot keep a basic store stock/clerk job due to drinking on the clock. Sigh, I will never befriend someone who loves their addiction so much.

I have no respect for myself currently. Coming here to hear the Al-Anon podcasts, going to counseling and a regular doctor.

He lied to me today, starting verbally abusing me and told me he was not drinking, he has no respect for me. I guess that is where it stands for now. Reading this, this is a truly pathetic story. I suppose I know what will need to be done. Is there an easy way? Absolutely not.

I have been with my live-in boyfriend for a year and a half now. He and I knew each other a few years before we started dating. He is a very handsome and charismatic individual. Needless to say, I was in love with him the first time we met, even before we started dating. At the beginning of the relationship, there were no real signs of alcoholism. We drank occasionally while watching sports at home or out to dinner. But our lives did not revolve around it.

About 4 months after we started dating we decided to move in together. We left the area I grew up in, where my family is, and moved back to his home town, about 45 minutes away. I agreed because I love him and because the schools are so much better here, which is great for my two children. My kids were also on board because they love him.

About a month into living together, after I sold my home, I saw a trend. He no longer was interested in doing anything unless it involves alcohol. Even our bike rides turned into bar-hopping bike rides. Before him, I was very active and athletic. Did not drink a lot because my kids have been #1.

Fast forward to today. I have a hard time taking care of myself, because I always have to take care of him. My kids are still number #1, but I feel as though I have a shorter fuse now because I have so much stress in my life due to his drinking. He agrees he drinks too much, but refuses to quit. He and his ex-wife were party animals, and I feel as though he thinks this kind of life is normal. It is not normal. It is the furthest thing from it. Currently, I am stuck because I do love him when he treats me well, which is rare. There is no talking about things, it is his way or no way.

This is a terrible disease that is ruining our lives.

I married my high school sweetheart, literally right out of high school. Been married for 10 years. Dealt with the verbal abuse, the all-nighters. Partying all night, coming home, picking a fight. In and out of jobs. A couple of times leaving for a day, but couldn’t think of living without each other.

What kept us “trying” was the one fact and rule in our church, that once you marry it is a sin to divorce or separate. No marriage was perfect. I think it was my cross to carry. Dealing with this man, with whom I have 3 children, 9, 4, and a 6 months. Suddenly, after 9 years of ups and downs, after one incident I said it, “I want a divorce.”

Since then, we’ve been 10 years strong, moving forward with clear understanding, communication, and most of all patience. Drinking for my husband was the only thing he knew. His family drank, his father drank. To my husband it was like a hobby. Substituting that with events for our kids or working out and work. I am now a happy stay-at-home wife/mother, while hubby works and comes home, happy to spend time with our kids.

I didn’t give up! It was worth it for me. Not every alcoholic needs to be given up on, but needs to be dealt with in their own special way.

I too am living with and married to an alcoholic. My husband is non-abusive, non-violent and a great dad to our 2 children, aged 5 and 1.

I always thought I trusted my husband. He is not a bad man, but has experienced a young life with an alcoholic, abusive father and a family all sharing the same guilt and shame. His own mother is emotionally unavailable. They say they care, but they have turned their backs/gone into denial since discovering he has the same sad illness.

As sad as it is, you have to break the cycle sometimes to save your children. It is a progressive illness. I have lived with my husband for 15 years. I am the provider in the family, have a good job and manage the children. He works, but treats me like his mother when it comes to paying the bills, sorting the children and emotionally, etc.

I have been clinging on to the idea he will change. The hardest thing for me to come to terms with is the lying and the deceit. That has ruined our marriage. Then there is the denial. I am trying to support him and he is having weekly counselling and attending (albeit a reluctantly) AA.

He accepts he has a drinking problem, but also accepts he is struggling with the prospect of a life of sobriety. My fear is that at 35, I am letting life pass me by. I can no longer cope and my own health is suffering. My head is telling me to go, but I wonder why I feel so guilty.

My husband is an alcoholic. I knew it before I married him 4 months ago. He is not abusive or mean or any of the things I’ve read here. He is actually sometimes more affectionate when he drinks.

He was so bad he nearly lost his job. We put him into a 5 day detox and he is better, but still drinks every day. Not while at work and now only beer. But today I found 2 shots of vodka in his pocket and he admitted he has drank at work again.

I am so scared he will lose his job. And I am worried about him. The doc says his liver enzymes are high. He can’t keep going like he is or he will die. I love him, but I wonder if tough love is the best route, or just letting him go.

Four months ago, I began seeing a wonderful man and we fell insanely in love with each other. He has always been so kind and has treated me so well. He showered me with attention, compliments, gifts, wonderful surprises. Our relationship has always been healthy and we communicate well.

We wanted to get married and had planned on meeting his parents. He, however, binge-drinks about twice, maybe three times a week. Sometimes he will have all-night drinking marathons and sleep all day until he has to go to work. If he’s stressed and overwhelmed, he will drink more often.

This was always a concern to me, but I wanted to ignore the problem because everything else was so perfect. Per his idea, we went vegetarian, and he made small changes in his drinking habits. Started smoking less, cut out the liquor and only drank beer.

He got very drunk one night and broke up with me, saying he didn’t feel like he was good enough or could do anything right. He became remorseful and we decided to work it out.

We had a long talk. Laid everything out, and all seemed to be going wonderfully. I gave him the coming-to-Jesus talk about his drinking and how it impacts our relationship and future together. He seemed nervous and uncomfortable, but admitted he drinks too much and that it’s bad for him. He agreed to not do the after-hours drinking anymore, to see a therapist, and cut way back overall. I told him that if he can’t control his drinking, he shouldn’t drink anymore, and get help.

He agreed. We spent the night together. In the morning, he said that he just can’t do it anymore and that he resents me for asking him to stop. He has cut off contact and refuses to tell me what we both know — he can’t stop and he’s backing out.

I feel like I lost the person I was going to spend my life with to drinking. I’m afraid of what it will take for him to make the decision to stop. I’m terrified that he won’t. I miss him so much it tears me to shreds.

I thought I was alone. I am a fairly attractive 24-year-old student teacher. I have options, as many of my friends and family will remind me. Everyone’s answer when I try to talk about the alcoholic in my life is to simply leave him. But it’s never that easy. How can I forget the hope that man gave me when I met him? How can I just abandon my dreams of all that we could share? He used to seem so moral and strong. How can I just forget that?

Well, short answer, I’m sick with his disease now too. But maybe I have finally found the help I need. I’m tired of wanting to jump off the BB&T building because I can’t fix him, and because I always believe the empty promises of proposals and a new sober life that never comes. I just want to be happy and feel secure. I don’t remember what that feels like and I know this is because there are things that I need to work on myself.

I do not want to admit to myself or to my community that my boyfriend has a drinking problem.

I met him at a bar, and at that time I was doing well for myself. I exercised, ate right, barely smoked — had two jobs. I started to party with him, and lost both jobs because I couldn’t juggle partying and working.

He drank almost every night to oblivion. When his daughter was around, he drank less but he still drank.

Almost two years later, I have a great consistent job. He drinks less than he did when I first met him, but he still drinks.

When he drinks, he’s hard to talk to. He repeats questions and I have to repeat myself over and over again.

When we are out, I always worry about him driving home drunk — without a license, because of his DUI that he stopped going to classes for.

When he’s not recovering from the night before, he is having a drink. For him, he always makes excuses for why he’s drinking and I let it slide.

Or I nag him, which he says makes him drink more.

I don’t want to break up with him, but I am so angry and bitter and unhappy. Living a life with him is total chaos. I tell him I am done all the time, and he says that I bitch too much. I question myself all the time: do I have the nagging problem, or does he have a drinking one?

I am very confused and very sad and very lonely. He is out at a bar right now, while I am sitting home alone. I don’t want to be done, but I am so tired.

So glad I found this page. It helps to not feel so alone — because I am. We recently moved away from my family to live in a mining town. The plan is/was to cash in so we can buy our own home in a few years. I am now in the middle of nowhere. With zero support around me. Not a single person I can talk to. I’m currently a stay-at-home mum (getting back into work really soon), so haven’t a cent to my name.

My fiancé has always had a bad relationship with alcohol but has been able to ‘control’ it over the last few years. Since moving last week (big regrets now!), he has gone through 2 boxes of beer, countless bourbon cans, wine etc. He thinks it’s no big deal.

He had promised (ha) me that he was working on his health. Eating healthy, exercising, no more drinking. When he walked in the door last week with a box of beer and a 4-pack of bourbans I said, “I thought you weren’t drinking anymore!” Well, he cracked it. Because he doesn’t have a problem with alcohol. And he works hard so deserves it. And it’s hot. It was a hard day and he just wants to relax. I’m so over it.

He tries to control me and has a way of turning things around on me. Sometimes it works. I’m a well-educated woman, how am I letting this happen? He’s very manipulative.

I guess I always try to see the good in people. I’m a helper. A fixer. Except I can’t fix him. I want to talk to him properly about it. But I won’t do it when he’s drinking — it seems even one drink is enough to change him. Plus, I won’t do it in front of our 1-year-old, but I have no one to mind her.

I’m sure he has depression, I’m sure he’s a narcissist. He complains about our lack of intimacy. Sorry, a slob who burps, farts, swears, stinks of alcohol, who is drunk is not attractive to me at all. But if I explain that, he turns it around on me. It’s my fault that intimacy is no longer present. He works hard all day to pay the bills, you know.

Money is a huge thing. A few years ago we lived in a similar place where our pays were fantastic. He acknowledges that he drank the money away. It wouldn’t be like that this time, though. He’s a dad now, with goals. Bull.

Last night I asked if he’d like me to make a quinoa salad for dinner tonight (a meal he’s said he liked before). “How much is quinoa? We’re trying to save, remember?” So pretty much I can’t spend $10 on something healthy for the family that will last many meals, but he can spend hundreds on alcohol every week.

I feel like I’m just about ready to leave, but have so much to consider. I definitely don’t want this to be my daughter’s ‘normal.’ But what I do, what I say to him, how many chances I give him, I don’t know.

My (ex?)-boyfriend of a year and eight months is a low-bottom alcoholic. He has been drinking for three decades, has lost jobs, been kicked out of school, been homeless, arrested and in jail many times, had health problems — like extremely high liver enzymes and throwing up blood, and when he goes to the hospital to detox every month or so, his blood alcohol level is high enough to kill a person, or at least put them in a coma.

He’s almost been killed because of alcohol on occasions, like chipping a tooth when he fell while drunk, and another time stumbling in front of a speeding fire engine! He’s burned bridges with friends, and now is losing me.

I’m tired of the merry-go-round, tired of dealing with abusive words when he’s too inebriated to have a normal conversation, etc. Yet, he still won’t go to A.A. And he knows that A.A. helps because he’s done it before!

Lately, he thinks that smoking pot will save him from drinking, but he keeps picking up anyway. But I know that there’s nothing I can do about his recovery, only mine. So I will keep going to Al-Anon because it helps me. God help me if I go back to him again! I love him, but I have to love myself more.

My boyfriend is a “functioning” alcoholic. He is kind and funny on one end, but has to have at least 6 beers every single day after work with his buddies at the bar and can’t go the weekend without trips to the bar too. He neglects the emotional needs of his daughter and has started to neglect our relationship too.

Last week I told him how much I don’t like it when he shows up at my apartment drunk and tries to treat me like a booty call. He had promised to come over to my apartment last Wednesday for a nice dinner I cooked him, but never showed up. He had spent four hours after work drinking with his buddies at the bar and forgot about coming over to my place. I cried as I blew out the candles I had so carefully placed on the table and hurt inside as I put the cold uneaten food in the fridge. Of course, being a functional alcoholic, he had tears in his eyes as he told me how sorry he was the next day.

When I’m babysitting his 11-year-old daughter, she tells me how much she doesn’t like it that her dad goes to the bar after work instead of coming home and spending time with her. I’m starting to realize that I do not want him to be a stepfather to my three sons, because of his drinking.

I did not allow him to come over to my apartment tonight, because I knew he had been at the bar with his buddies drinking again. I thought long and hard about it and I think I’m going to break up with him tomorrow. There is no way that I can have a healthy future with an alcoholic who doesn’t want to get help. Just because he has a great personality and a good job doesn’t mean that he doesn’t have a problem. I love him very very much because in a lot of ways he has been kind to me, but I can’t overlook the alcoholism in his life.

I have been in a two-and-a-half year relationship, living together a year and a half. Recently with his last drunk episode he broke up with me. It hasn’t even been a week apart. At his point I did not argue, just left and have been moving my things out as this is not an isolated incident. He has been verbally abusive and has pushed and shoved me.

Our relationship is very loving and functional without alcohol. There is good communication and teamwork. Being that we are in our mid 20s, a lot of our mutual friends drink. For a long time we decided to put distance between his friends, so he could stay on track. Recently they have all made amends and I did not want to keep him from his friends. Since then, he has been on a downward spiral. He struggles with what I believe to be bi-polar disorder. I know he self-medicates.

My problem is I still love this man very much. I want to be a supportive person in his life, but at what cost? He has made empty promises. I have always forgiven him the next day. This has been the first time I have kept no contact. He seems apologetic and doesn’t want me to leave. I just don’t know whether to tell him that I’d consider giving him another chance if he quit drinking, or if it is hopeless altogether.

I’m 30 years old and my boyfriend is 38. We have been together for 3 and a half years and lived together for 1 year and half. I have a 6-year-old girl that lives with us. I am not good with writing, but I need to express what I am going through.

My boyfriend and I have a good time with drinking together and I thought everything is normal. He is really good to my little girl, with or without drinking. My whole life I’ve been with drinking parents — a father who is verbally abusive and a mother that can’t control it or stop. I told myself I would never put my daughter through the life I had.

Recently, my boyfriend has become really bad with the vodka. He’s hiding it and lying to me (I know how to find the bottles). I know when he is toasted, I can see it in his eyes. I know he has a problem, and I want to help him to stop.

I love him to death. I want to take him to AA meetings with me. I want to be there to support him and help him. I want to know why he has his addiction and I want him to talk to me. I did get him to confess that he has a problem and he needs to slow down and limit himself, but that didn’t help.

He wants to quit, but he has a hard time finding a way to quit. Oh, also, when he is drunk he gets really lovable, to where it starts annoying the heck out of me. I am afraid that his liver will fail and he is going to have a lot of health problems. I will be joining my first Al-Anon meeting tomorrow.

I am in love with my soul-mate, who happens to be an alcoholic. I never was raised around or had any idea of what actually alcoholism really was, as far as the toll that it takes on the person that is not an alcoholic in the relationship.

I just thought he was a good person helping his buddies all the time and doing favors to help them out, when the reality of what it really was was drinking, whenever he and they got the chance and had an excuse to do it. For a while he was a lot of fun, having all kinds of friends and hanging out all the time. I never got to experience that kind of life and was very naive. I had fun meeting new people and hearing their funny stories — then it got old when they kept repeating them night after night.

I want to say I was roped into this by love and was blinded until we got married. I guess I thought it would get better once he had someone who honestly cared for him and he could be at ease that I was there to help him and not use him like so many other people. Then once we got married it got way worse and I guess he figured I was trapped and he could just be himself, as when he was single for 13 years prior to me, and reality set in with me. He always had an excuse to go over to visit with a buddy who was also a drinker and did not come home until late at night, through the week or weekend.

As crazy as it seems, I am 57 years old and my husband is 55 years old and I had no clue about this kind of life. I met my soul-mate at 50 and I had been married before, but life was so boring until this outgoing, wonderful man came into my life and showed me how to really live. So I thought, as I look back and what he has put me through — abuse, physical and mental — and all the while I have a full-time job and have managed to excel, because life was much better at work. He is disabled physically and does not work, so he has no care as long as he can drink.

But I love him and want to help him, but I have no idea how I can stop his drinking.

I’ve been with my boyfriend for five years now. I’m so in love with him. I love him with every aching bone in my body. I just don’t know if I can handle him being an alcoholic anymore.

When we talk about our future I get so excited, but I’m also disappointed because a piece of me knows he will never change. Being an alcoholic runs in his family. His grandpa and his mom are both recovering alcoholics. His grandma and his dad are still alcoholics. His brother is an alcoholic and so are his friends.

Every time we try and get him help, it never works out — because everyone who he surrounds himself with are alcoholics. I want him to get better. I’m just waiting for the day he gets better, but a part of me knows that day isn’t going to come.

I don’t know what I should do. I don’t just want to give up on him. I feel like he needs me. Leaving him will not be easy, but maybe it will be the best thing for me. Sad that I lost the love of my life to alcohol.

My fiance and I have been together for a little over a year and are expecting a daughter in a few months. He claims he will quit drinking for me, but he will go a day, another day passes and he asks me if he can buy a drink. He will buy one, which leads to the day after me picking him up at his friend’s house and he is intoxicated.

He has lied to me. I saw a bottle of vodka one night in the refrigerator and then when I mentioned you better be staying sober, I went back to the refrigerator pretending to get some ice cream to find the alcohol gone. I know I am about to have a child and my life is going to change forever, but I want him to be a part of it. I want to get married, to have a happy, whole family. He has been previously divorced, but alcohol wasn’t the only factor in the divorce — his wife had been unfaithful.

I just don’t know what to do anymore. I love him, but I’m afraid that he is going to drink until he dies. He has recently shared with me he has been hearing voices in his head (usually he is drunk when this happens). I have never heard of alcoholics hearing voices before, though. I pray to God he gets better and seeks help for the sake of our relationship and our daughter

How can A.A. help when he goes to meetings drunk — and they don’t say anything that I know of. He can’t get past Step 4, has been a member for a year. I was so blinded in love with him, but the smell of alcohol every night has soured my heart.

Why do we subject ourselves to such pain and hurt?

Married 7 years to my knight in shining armour. He gave so much of himself to me and our boys. Trust, independence and love.

Now it’s the bottle that has him. I am drifting away from him emotionally. Feel alone, no one to talk to.

Cried reading many of these posts and think I am being selfish.
I truly hope many of you find the strength to follow your heart for what is best for you. Because you are important too, for yourself and the ones that depend on you.

I love my boyfriend with every tiny piece of myself. We’ve been together almost 5 years now.

We met at 22 and immediately fell completely in love. He was everything I’d ever hoped for and more. I couldn’t believe I had found someone so amazing.

Somewhere over the years our fun “drinks with friends” and “drinks with dinner” became a necessity to him. Every day. Immediately after work, on lunch breaks during the day, as soon as he wakes up on the weekends, and until we go to sleep, he is drinking.

Also over the years he has become resentful of me and angry and emotionally deficient. I’ve blamed myself and sought therapy for anxiety and depression, even medication to help myself. I never equated his mood swings to alcohol. He never really acts drunk, slurs his speech or appears unbalanced , but he must never be sober. I can’t count how many beers he drinks in a day, and that’s just what I know about.

To be honest this is my first time ever really admitting this (any of it) to myself and it’s sending me into a panic. I’m scared for our future together. I cannot marry this man and have children and love a lifetime with an alcoholic.

This is why I’ve been looking for so long. I really need your help. I’ve read and I’ve seen that you have helped many. Thanks for your big heart. Be blessed!

If I leave him, will he quit?

If I leave him, will the kids be better or worse off, having to go back and forth for shared weekends and holidays?

My husband is an alcoholic. He doesn’t talk to me and practically ignores our kids. He is never home, because he goes out during the week to drink after work. On weekends he takes off as well, comes home extremely late, does not answer his phone and I don’t know where, or who he is with. He comes home drunk and gives me dirty looks if I try to ask where he has been. Then he proceeds to tell me he can’t stand me and that I have issues.

When he doesn’t drink, our marriage is fine. Then when he is on a binge, he can’t stand me and tells me he is tired of me. It’s like living with two different people. He has ruined our relationship and I’m always alone with the kids.

I feel very lonely and always waiting to see what time he comes home, if at all. He cannot keep promises and he cannot drink without getting drunk. He embarrasses me and when we get an invitation to an event, it is very stressful for me because I know problems will arise.

I feel he is extremely selfish and that he does not love us the way he says he does. He only loves himself and his needs. Tomorrow he has his first evaluation meeting at a rehab facility. He said he would go, but he is a liar. He has been out of our house for 9 days. He did not come home and I told him he could not return until he went to get help.

Now he is hating me again because I’m the bad guy who is making him do something he does not want to do. Today we had agreed he was supposed to come home because he had made the appointment and he gave me his word. I waited all day and he did not show. If he doesn’t go tomorrow either to his appointment, I guess it’s the end of my marriage. I am devastated he would do this to our family. He is destroying our lives.

My husband drinks a lot, every day. I live in Mongolia. He drinks a lot and is very selfish, hides money from me, doesn`t care about me. If I say we need some item at home, he refuses strongly and never accepts it, getting angry, doesn`t do anything.

We are together for 5 years. It is hard to divorce. It means I have to destroy my building which we built for our life. I am full of worry for him, even now. I ran away from him 14 days ago. He suddenly showed up. He was quiet, easy to understand before, but now he has negative feeling about the outside world.

I hide all of it, cannot tell to friends. I feel ashamed. Today I cannot concentrate on my job, searching for advice on the internet to make me strong. Today I have the feeling that if I go back to him, what will happen. Of course the drinking alcohol life will be repeated again and again. It might be one day I look back and feel full of sorrow, or I have to cope with life without him.

I am in the middle of life. I feel very lonely, because friends they don’t understand me, say I must divorce, but after divorce being alone will make me sad, but again with him I am losing my happiness and fill myself with depression and stress.

I tried to talk to him about stopping drinking, but he says he will never stop drinking, but he might reduce the drinking. I have no idea. I am Asian but to read all these podcasts, all women in this world have a similar destiny. In my country there is a club for alcoholics, not for their family to support or find advice.

I knew my partner drank and had mental health issues, but with my care and love she is conquering her mental health situation. I love her dearly. My major concern is her drinking. She does not know when to stop.

She drinks a bottle-plus a night and also a few vodkas. Before she has had a drink she is a lovely, pleasant person who is responsive, caring, funny and great to be with. Once it gets to 3 or 4 pm and the drinking starts, coupled with smoking cannabis, it all goes horribly wrong. She becomes self-centered, nasty, forgetful.

There is no intimacy anymore. And if there is, it’s alcohol-fueled. I am suffering from anxiety and panic attacks. And when she starts drinking, my heart sinks. I get that huge weighty feeling around my stomach.

I try talking to her about it, but she won’t listen. I feel I am gonna lose her. Either it kills her or she leaves me, because I want to help her.

We’ve been married 11 years. He’s always had a tendency to drink too much, and by our third year of marriage he was a full blown alcoholic.

Drinking every day, missing work, getting fired, detox and rehab, over and over. I always think it can’t possibly get worse, and then it does. He has been minutes away from death, and after recovering, still drinks. I’m surprised he’s lasted this long.

Now he’s in the hospital for weeks out of the year because he gets so sick from drinking. And then goes back to it a month or two later. It is insane. A sane person wouldn’t do this to himself. I wish he’d be able to find a way to conquer his demons and stop drinking.

For someone so intelligent and strong, he is so stupid and weak. So now, after over eight years of promises, I watch him through the window, bringing in his bottle, and then lying about it, even though I saw him. I wish it were easier to leave.

I was sober for 3 years. I lost my mother in 2012, watched her suffer, and I picked up drinking again. It’s out of control. My fiance’, whom I’ve been with 15 years, is a sober person. I need to find some help before I lose him.

I had been, until recently, with the true love of my life. However, recently his drinking has made him so verbally abusive to me I have had to leave. I know he is an alcoholic and it is an illness. However, the effect on my life has been horrendous. This has been the worst experience of my life. I would have done anything to have put this relationship right, but I now know it is not my responsibility but his.

I dream of everything coming “right,” but I know this will never happen and at least I have kept my sanity. My heart is so heavy. I feel so sad and so sorry for him. I fear for his health and his future.

I met my partner at the age of 62, he was 66. Right from the start he told me he was an alcoholic. Over the next four years he has made huge efforts to stop drinking. Whiskey is the main culprit–he can’t have a beer without a whiskey, and once drinking he doesn’t know when to stop.

Without it, he’s lovely, thoughtful, caring, loving, considerate–but he has no hobbies, does not like reading and finds it really hard to sit and watch any TV unless it’s a documentary, factual, or one of those horrible American Friends series, which I can’t stand. He enjoys crosswords.

When having had too much to drink, he becomes overly sexual, which I don’t want purely because it’s alcohol-fueled. He also says mean things and becomes argumentative. I feel as though I want to pull the plug on this relationship. We don’t live together, I couldn’t–but I do enjoy his company when he’s sober.

I don’t know what do I do. As soon as I see him with a drink in his hand, I feel a large leaden weight settle around my solar plexus and I just want to ask him to go.

My boyfriend promises me daily that this day will be the day he won’t drink–and when he comes home I smell it as soon as he walks through the door. He will continue to lie to me until he knows I won’t take the lies anymore and sees I’m about to leave. My trust issues with him are now so awful that I find myself questioning everything else in our relationship. He lies so easily about drinking–why not other things? This is so sad to me because deep down I know that he really is a wonderful man when alcohol is not present.

Would the drinking stop if he or she loved you? This is a common misconception and an easy state of mind to get into when in a relationship with someone who has addictive behaviours. I work with people who have addictive behaviours and I also have personal experience of being in relationships with men who have problematic relationships with alcohol.

I believe that this behaviour has got very little to do with us and has everything to do with the person drinking. It is not a reflection on how much or less that “they” love us and more to do with how s/he copes with life, emotions, events etc. It’s about resilience skills and finding alternatives to drinking. This, as we know, is not easy but it is their journey, not ours.

The only thing that we can do that is within our control is to ask ourselves if we can live with this behaviour and the not-knowing when the next drink will be. No one can make this choice for us but ourselves, and every person is different as well as every relationship is different.

My partner is a binge drinker and it has only recently become known to me (or maybe I have only recently stopped being in denial, or maybe I’m just getting bored with it now). We can only work on our relationship with ourselves and make sure that we have healthy, balanced and happy lives. We cannot do that for others. Maybe we can act as a role model for our partners and help them to see and live alternative lifestyles.

What I do know is that if we do not keep ourselves healthy and if we become too involved in the emotional whirlwind of the drinker, then our health will suffer, causing stress, anxiety and depression. Talking to people and getting support helps us make sure we are not to blame and we are not the answer. The answer regarding whether we should stay or go from the relationship will come. In the meantime, we need to stay safe and well.

I have just recently (about 7 months ago) started dating the most wonderful man. He was very up front with me in the beginning that he likes his beer. He calls himself a beer-aholic, like that’s better than straight up what this is, alcoholism. We don’t live in the same city, which means that up until this weekend I have not been around when he drinks heavily.

This weekend was horrible. He was rude to my friend and myself, he stunk, was sexually aggressive, and not the guy I fell in love with at all. I feel like if I’m going to get out, now would be the time, before we start talking about moving in together and building a life, but I don’t want to leave him alone.

He’s so wonderful when he’s not drinking, though now I wonder if he’s ever been sober in the last 7 months. I’m scared of what our future will be together and I’m even more scared to ask him to stop, because I’m sure he will choose the beer over me.

He’s also had some health issues in the past few years, with seizures that were never explained, and I’m thinking they were from withdrawal, which scares me too. He thinks nothing of having 5 beers and driving and missing work because he has gone too hard the night before.

I am desperate for some help. I don’t want to end the relationship because he is so amazing and loving and caring and supportive and blah, blah, blah, but what I saw this weekend is more than I think I’m willing to deal with for the rest of my life.

I know the topic is, “If the person loves me, then wouldn’t they stop?” I don’t necessarily think or feel that my boyfriend’s love for me will be enough for him to stop abusing alcohol. I know it has more to do with him needing to love himself. I also know the road to recovery isn’t simple and that it lasts a lifetime. My only heartbreak comes from the lies that result from his drinking problem.

My boyfriend treats me so amazingly and is kind-hearted and beautiful inside and out, yet he doesn’t see it. His drinking causes him physical problems and he hides alcohol now in water bottles, among other places, to try to hide it from me. He’s admitted he has a problem and that he should stop drinking, but on the same hand he likes drinking and doesn’t want to stop.

He’s gone through withdrawals once and then relapsed and started drinking again. He’s lied to me when I’ve asked if he’s been drinking and then I’ve found vodka in his water bottle or in a bag hidden in my car. He throws up and can’t keep food down when he drinks even a small amount now, and he gets the shakes and nightmares and heart palpitations.

I’m scared for him. I want him to help himself and I have a hard time trusting him now in matters where drinking is concerned. I find myself invading his privacy by searching his house or car. I find myself questioning everything he says or does in fear that he’s secretly drinking. Sometimes my fear comes true and he is, and sometimes I’m happily mistaken.

I feel like a bad girlfriend when my first thought is, “I wonder if he drank today,” or, “Is he’s lying to me today?” I know it’s not healthy for me or our relationship for me to think this way. Sometimes he is lying and hiding alcohol and the fact that he lies about it makes me feel insulted and heartbroken. I don’t want to leave him as he’s in need and feeling as if he isn’t worthy of love. I do love him and I wish my loving him was enough, but he has to love himself and I don’t know how to help him do that.

I also don’t know how to deal with the lies and the trust issues I’ve developed as a result of them. Dating an alcoholic is such a fine line of being in a relationship, playing therapist, detective, and doctor. I don’t think it’s healthy for me to be the one to hold him accountable, but if I don’t, he won’t. It’s very stressful and confusing and I just wish I had any guidance as to how to deal with this situation.

I’ve heard many say, “Run,” or, “Get out now.” But I just can’t see leaving someone I love when he’s not a bad person and he doesn’t mistreat me. I just don’t know how to deal with the lies from him, or now my trust issues. I see that causing many problems in the future, unless I can figure out a healthy way to take charge of this–but I also know what he does isn’t within my control. I can only control my own actions and feelings and I don’t know how to trust him now, and I also don’t know how to not let the lies break my heart.

I have been with my alcoholic/drug-addicted boyfriend for almost 4 years. Most of it has been a hellish cycle of drinking and using drugs and stopping for a day or so, to spiraling out of control. He abuses alcohol, pills, pot. I suspect even heroin. I didn’t know he was a drug addict when we were first together and it took me a little while to realize he was an alcoholic. He loves pills too. I think percs are his choice. I have been through so much because of it.

He says it’s my problem. In the beginning we would have these crazy arguments where I couldn’t even figure out why the heck he was so mad, then if I cried, he would laugh at me and make fun of me and tell me he was leaving. He has lied to me, tried getting back with ex-girlfriends and had really inappropriate relationships. Dealers texting him all hours of the night. He would meet his drug connection where we were having date night and slip out the back.

I started defending myself about 6 months into the relationship. When I do, he calls me mean and abusive after he’s said all kinds of rude, nasty things about me. I can’t say a remotely negative word to him or he goes nuts. We could be having a great day and I ask something like why are you doing that. Then he rants, “Geez, I can’t do anything right.” He tells me I just want him to be my puppet and that I need to get cats. He never realizes that all arguments start from the drinking or drugs and his crazy way of thinking. Sometimes he’ll be sitting in the chair with the ugliest, angriest look on his face. I am so tired.

I feel like it has sucked all the joy out of my life. I have nothing to look forward to. We have nothing to look forward to together.

I am new to this site. I am not new to living with an alcoholic. I have known he has been one for years. My husband and I have been married for about 11 1/2 years. We have been thru so much.

At first I really hated his drinking because he would leave me in the car and I would be dumb enough to wait for him. I would go get his beer for him at times, and at times drink along with him. I have been aware of this, wanting him to change, while at the same time getting angry but allowing this to happen. I have kicked him out, begged him to change, poured out his beer, left him at other people’s houses, and still nothing.

By the grace of God, he has not obtained a DUI or any law violations due to his drinking, only because he has not gotten caught. He has driven drunk while I am in the car, had his son drive him, etc. I love him, but yet have recently realized I don’t want to do this anymore. I am tired of being his accomplice by being quiet. I want to help him, but at the same time as he has told me before when sober, “I will stop when I want to stop.” He is a weekend drunk, but yet drinks one or two beers during the week. I get left at home while he goes to his friends’ house, family members’ house or wherever to drink.

Infidelity on his part also happened and he blamed that on drinking. I don’t want to feel sorry for myself anymore. I want to help him, I pray and pray. I don’t want to lose him, but yet I feel I already have lost him to alcohol. Once in a great blue moon I will get a “I know I am an alcoholic.” Then promises to stop come, but those I have been hearing for over 11 years, and all are false.

I have seen him stop completely for 3 months and only because he felt he had to lie to his brothers, or he can’t drink because of this or that. He says he gives in because he doesn’t want to be made fun of. I think he just plain doesn’t want to. He says he does, but then does the opposite and pretends like nothing happens.

Back in 2008 was the last time we got physically violent, so thank God no more of that. However, there is always “lip service” from both of us putting each other down and calling each other bad names.

I am tired of this same cycle, while at the same time I pray for a miracle for him to change. Co-dependent on him? Well, yes, I guess you can say that, because I look for love, attention, etc. from him that I may rarely get a few times a month, if I am lucky. We don’t have kids together. He has children. Don’t want them to have a bad example, thinking it’s ok to do the things he does, drink, and it’s okay as long as you don’t get caught.

Again, pray, pray, pray and hope for a miracle. I say I am done, but yet I don’t have the courage to kick him out. I say it, but yet allow him to stay. Lord, help me. Mother Mary, teach me patience, but at the same time intercede for me so that I can change. Amen.

My friends, I feel for all of you. My wife of 14 years, the mother of our children, the love of my life, the only love of my life, renounced me and our marriage due to alcoholism. I never saw it coming because she has a good heart, but her drinking buddies decided to educate her on how good life would be without me.

She wanted it badly and took a chance and claimed I was abusive. She hit me every weekend for the last two years. She said she hated me when she drank. She carried on with strangers behind my back. I loved her so much I was blinded by/to the truth. Now she calls when she needs money or a babysitter so she can go out with men. We are still married, but separated.

How sad for her. One day she will reach out for a hand to hold and it will not be there. Someday the alcohol will come for its price and no one will be able to stop it. One day she will see the love she lost, but I will be gone.

I gave my life for her and she took it. You know something, I died inside. I am not the same person anymore. I am called Gabriel now. It is the only way I can cope with this betrayal and alcoholic personality change.

I died inside, but yet I must live for my children. To do so is to suffer the rest of my life alone. I am prepared, but scared. I am lonely. Her drinking cost me my home, 20 years of hard work, my wife, my lover, my best friend, my love, but not my heart! My heart belongs to God and my children!

We can survive this, my beloved friends. We can become who we need to be to survive amid the chaos life throws at us. We are people too, and there will never be another one like us.

My husband and I have known each other for about 10 years. We have been married for four months. We have two biological daughters and a daughter from a previous relationship he’s had. My husband was great at first, but now it’s like he’s verbally abusive and manipulative. I’m totally stressed out and I’m so ready for a divorce. But I love him. It’s just he has insecurities within him, and the drinking which takes over his mentality.

I periodically get so sad that I am divorced from my alcoholic ex-husband that I have to read some blogs/comments from others in the same boat–loving an alcoholic.

We dated for 10 years, were married for 10, but separated for 5 of those 10. We have a son who hasn’t lived with his father since he was 5. I loved this man a lot, and when we were young, and carefree we had many fun adventures together.

The drinking never seemed a problem until a few years before we married. I blamed it on a lot of things and assumed it was situational and would get better. But after we married and I became pregnant, it got much, much worse.

He has been in rehab 5 times in 5 years. I am glad he is still trying, but I have lost all hope in us. He was and is periodically verbally abusive, mostly completely irresponsible, and is just a person I don’t even recognize anymore. I guess I still have the memories of the person he used to be, or the people we used to be. We sure had some fun back then. I am sorry it’s over.

I sure hope he can stay sober for our son, who has been destroyed by the loss of his father. When a husband or father dies, you are surrounded by an outpouring of support. When your husband or father falls away into alcoholism, it is like they died but you can’t really talk about it, and people shame you and turn away from you like you have the disease too.

Thank God I have a good job and my parents are helping me raise our son. I don’t know what I would do otherwise. My ex hasn’t worked a day since we got married, and says he never will again. I didn’t even ask for alimony or child support. I just wanted him to support himself. This disease is the pits. It’s ruined 3 lives, and one of them was mine.

I’m 23. My fiancee is 24. We’ve been together 2 years and five months. My man has always been a drinker. In fact, he used to drink and drive. His car was his personal recycle bin. He would drink all day, even sneak it to work til he was caught with his first DUI. He stopped drinking as much for like a week, then like nothing ever happened. He isn’t a mean drunk or anything. In fact, he is super loving, but the problem is he is harming himself physically and hurting us financially.

I’m tired. I am on the verge of telling him to get help or I am leaving. He won’t even go to his court-ordered drug classes. I need help. Lately his drinking is so bad I realize he isn’t in bed and look for him. He will be outside asleep or thrown-up in my chairs, or lays in bed and throws up on the floor and passes out. I don’t know what to do anymore. I am unhappy, but I love him so much. So much, but I can’t take it.

I have been in A.A. for 2.5 years and have been sober for that time. It’s incredibly hard, but I haven’t found anything that works as good as the A.A. program. I met a man in the rooms who I love very much (we were friends first and then he moved in and we ended up getting together), and we click in almost every way. He is sensitive and kind and has a pureness to him that’s so endearing. He doesn’t have a sponsor, though he does 4 meetings a week and has been in A.A. longer than I have (9 years).

Last night he came home late and then got into bed around 1 and seemed very different, using sex talk he doesn’t use. I couldn’t smell anything on him except toothpaste and cologne. I had a bad feeling in my gut and just knew he had been drinking. The worst thing is he won’t tell me the truth! It’s the worst as he is now this morning shaming himself and staying in bed and won’t talk at all. I don’t know if I should stay with him and make conditions that he gets a sponsor, etc. Or I could get out now before I am too involved.

I’ve been with my boyfriend 14 years. When I met him 14 years ago, he never used to drink, but now he drinks every time he goes out. I’ve asked him so many times to please stop that drinking, but he always says to me, ” I do what I want to do.”

The thing is when he’s drunk he treats me like he hates me. He embarrasses me in public by trying to pick fights with me. I feel that I don’t know him anymore and I’m falling out of love with him.

We have three kids together and they are little. I feel too my life is a disaster. And I feel so lonely in this world. I don’t know what to do.

We’ve been married 10 yrs and my husband has been using drugs and alcohol. He has been convicted 3 times. Because of these, we moved to another state, where he got 2 convictions. After all these, the only thing he has changed is drinking and driving, because he has one of those interlock systems. He still drinks in the house and uses drugs.

We have 2 small children and I know he is sick and he needs help. However, he does not see it like that. I’ve been waiting for him to change. He is a good person when he wants to be, but I need to think about our children. When he drinks and does drugs, he gets agressive and this just makes everything worse.

I feel bad for him, but I feel even worse for me and my kids. I am tired and honestly I really don’t feel the same way I used to. I really need to get away from him, and I know this for sure. My only worry is that he will get worse when we leave, but how can we stay with him under this circumstances? I see a lot of people that change, but how much time do I have to wait, and also I don’t see him trying to stop doing this.

I am 23 and my boyfriend is 29. We have been together for a year and 3 months. Getting into this relationship I knew he had baggage, but I liked him so much I accepted it. He is a veteran and with that said he has experienced many things and seen many things. He is affected by PTSD.

I am at the point where I don’t know what to do. Every time I think he’s doing good and that he’s on his way to being sober, I come home to him drunk or him coming home drunk. I’m still with him because I love him. It hurts. He wants help, yet when he gets it he turns around and goes back to square one. I hate it, because he’s a great stepfather to my boys.

I have been involved with my boyfriend for 3 years. He is 44 years old and an alcoholic. He is currently without a driver’s license due to drinking. I tried to help him pay his license fees only to find out he has charges in another state. No license, no job, no credit and no bank account.

There has always been another woman in the picture who he says he wants to leave so he can be with me. I am a widow and he helps me with home repairs. I recently gave him $200 cash, which he claims he lost.

I used my Walmart credit card to buy clothing and items for his son who was getting out of jail – $135. His son got in more trouble and he returned the items for store credit. No idea what he purchased with store credit – probably beer and smokes.

The other woman is a widow and has used her deceased husband’s life insurance to support the man we share. I need to get out of this relationship before he shows up at my door. I have no family close by and have had a few dates which have not worked out very well. He checks my cell phone and computer to see what I am doing. Wish me luck in making a break.

Wow, this is so similar to what I’m going through. I’m 19 years old myself, and I’ve been dating my boyfriend for almost 9 months. He’s 23. He has been drinking since he was 16, and it got really bad. Then there was a period where he had stopped and was only having a casual beer every now and then, and that’s when he met me. But then things started getting really bad in the past two months for him, causing him to become an alcoholic again.

He has a horrible temper, which I’ve seen. He also never laid a hand on me, but these two things together accompanied by his troubled past are really making me think and hurt, because I don’t want to lose him. My parents, who once wanted to get to know him, want nothing to do with him.

I love him, I recognize these red flags. He knows he has an issue and it’s hurting me, but this is a real disease and he truly believes he needs the stuff when even he knows it only makes his and my pain worse. I know he loves me, and as much as I try to blame the disease and not him, a part of me wishes he could just realize how much he’s hurting everyone around him and stop. I’m at a loss of wondering what to do.

I’m floundering for my relationship at this point because we were so perfect before all this came crashing down. Sometimes I even cry myself to sleep wondering where we went wrong.

I dated my boyfriend for 3.5 years. I noticed in the first three months he was always at the bar after six pm, and when he was finished with work that’s where he finished the day–alone, or with friends. As the years went by, I realized he was a high-functioning and savvy alcoholic. No one believed me. I was the jealous, crazy partner who was controlling and ” untrustworthy.” He painted that picture to our friends.

I got pregnant. Out of fear of dealing with it alone, I had an abortion. He couldn’t even support me the week after, he had to go out and drink at night. His drinking escalated to the point where he was not able to be the boyfriend I met. No dinners, no romance, just lies, some cheating with the ex-girlfriend (that he doesn’t remember), and some late nighters with cocaine and runs to the strip club. Our lives became unmanageable. His work went down. He was barely making what he was when I met him, and blaming the clients and circumstances around him.

He had no major issues or embarrassments because of his drinking in front of family, friends, or work, so I still looked completely insane. At home though, after five pm, he was a disaster. His drinking at night appeared in control, never sloppy, but at the same time I knew as others didn’t, that he was in “black-out mode,” and the second we got home, it started. Fights, crazy comments, behavior, and it finally culminated this past March when he peed his pants standing in the living room, then sat on the floor in embarrassment, fell over and passed out. I left him the next week.

He has threatened suicide in the past, lied, cried, begged, wrote letters, involved our parents. At this point I am 200% done. It has been six months now, and I miss him terribly. He hasn’t shaved and is looking like a bum, dating someone who is way too young and obviously clueless.

He admitted it is all his fault, but that this “is bigger than him” and he cannot stop. I miss this man so much, he is my true love. But I am happier in the peace I now have in my life, which makes me sad. Six months later, he finally gets it is over, and has not stopped drinking, looking dead, and showing up to work. No one in his life has said anything to him yet. Still. And I am appalled at the roll family and friends play once the partner steps out.

Good luck to everyone here. this disease is a killer.

I have been with my fiancé for four years this coming January. We met over drinks at a local restaurant and in the first year prided ourselves on how many bars we had visited over the Pacific Northwest, but he always drank more. I knew he liked his cocktails before we took the plunge into love (and the occasional “herb” or pill) and was even very drunk on some dates, but I chalked it up to stress, nervousness, and I like enjoying cocktails and wine or beer also.

He lost his well-paying job May of 2012 because he yelled at a co-worker while intoxicated, although he denies it. It has gone down hill from there. A few months later we moved where he found work with his father. Great! Except he started drinking at lunch and just a “small” cocktail before work–the cycle begins again. He was drinking more than a standard bottle of vodka a day and stopping at bars on the way home. We were in for some very mean fights and he (and I ) said horrible things. He would back me into a corner and try to scare me or punch a hole in the wall or dent the fridge, tell me if I were anyone else he would “eff” me up and so on. I am hot-tempered Irish and don’t like being backed into a corner. Needless to say he lost that job and the next two, where alcohol had played a part.

The most he’s gone without drinking was six days. He denies he’s lost any work due to booze or had any other problems because of it. That’s because I take care of everything. My family thinks we need to part ways, but it’s a hard decision to make. The most recent booze-filled adventure was he fell in the bathroom after drinking heavily for days (wake up, drink, pass out, relieve himself, drink), fractured his ribs (the fourth time, all vodka-related) and I took him to the ER the next day. He had two cocktails before going–I only knew of one–and was drunk before going to the ER. His blood-alcohol was .50, and I was dumbstruck.

He knows he’s an alcoholic, but doesn’t seem to want to go the next step. He was a contractor in Iraq and saw horrific things I can’t imagine. He gets drunk and starts talking about it and becomes very sad and depressed for days, or becomes very angry. I know his drinking is his choice, but I do buy it for him because we have lost so much we can’t afford a DUI. If I don’t get it, he’ll drive and get pulled over.

I am enabling and have become codependent on his alcoholism. I want to leave, but when he’s not obliterated he’s amazing. I just want him back, but if he doesn’t get help I don’t know how to move forward.

I come from a hard-working family, so I can’t tell anyone. I’m 30 and he’s 33. Last year we lost everything. I used to be a strong person, now I’m hanging by a thread. I used to drink sometimes, now my world revolves around it.

I can earn good money working from home, now my work revolves around his drinking. If you can’t beat them, join them–but then the arguments happen. I can’t leave, I can’t live without him. Friends are starting to say they love him sober but can’t deal with him drunk. Neither can I.

He says he’ll stop and get a job, that we’ll have a normal life–holidays, meals out, cinema–but it never happens. I die alone without him.

I feel trapped. I don’t know what to do. We’ve been married 19 years. The love of my life. Ten years ago he started drinking. Three years ago the fights started. Throwing things at me, saying horrible nasty things to me. Problem is, I believe them. I am that horrible blankety blank that makes him drink. If I was just a better wife, more loving or more supportive or more this or more that, but I’m not.

I can’t leave. I can’t afford it. My mom doesn’t know, she can’t handle her own life, I would cause a mental breakdown if I told her. My son, age 2, adores him. Our teenage daughter begs him to stop, but he just gets angry.

He tells me he wouldn’t drink if I was a better person. So my next goal is to be a better person. Never say anything negative. Never say anything or do anything wrong. I wonder if that will stop him. I doubt it. But I feel like I have to try.

I’ve been married 34 years. Husband is an abusive alcoholic, no respect, no conches. He drinks every day/weekend very badly. I went to AA a few times, I was told I was trying/working a dangerous game–to be very careful. I really wasn’t thinking.

I am a fixer/care-giver. I think I can fix everything. I made a big mistake in thinking I could fix him. It back-fired on me. He came after me with full force. As of right now, I have a concussion, 4 broken ribs, don’t remember that morning.

When he’s not drinking, he is the most loving man you could ever want. He is my love of my life. I go to Al-Anon 2/3 times a week, I’m working the Steps. I see so clearly it’s a disease. I wish I had AA/Al-Anon in my life long before. Maybe the outcome would be different. But I realize, “I’m powerless over alcohol.”

We have 2 beautiful adult children. We are now going through the court for a separation/divorce. It’s very hard to look back at the past, not much better looking at the future. I’m alone, confused, don’t know how to live by myself for I never lived alone. I’ve been with him 3/4 of my life.

My wish/hope–I pray every day over and over he will get “help.” I don’t want my children to someday tell me something tragic has happened to their dad.

My boyfriend whom I have been together with for 2 years has launched full force into his alcoholism. However, I can have a few and put it down before I feel drunk. He wants me to quit drinking altogether with him, but I really don’t want to. I enjoy having a beer after work. I don’t drink a fifth of Jack and drive in my car and play the victim card all night. If it came down to choosing him or alcohol, I would chose him in a heartbeat. I just wish he didn’t take it so personally when I have a beer. Gosh!

I’ve been with my boyfriend for three years as of September 2014. We had known each other for several months before we started dating. We met through a mutual friend. We would all hang out and drink together. I, however, grew up and realized it was getting me nowhere except into fights. He, however, still acts as if he’s a teenager (he’s turning 30 next January.)

I didn’t mind the drinking in the beginning, even though it was 4-7 times a week. It became a problem when he quit his job in 2012, we lost our house, and he screwed over my father by not working with him (when my father offered to let him come along for a week so we could make our rent) and of course, he would use every dollar we had to buy beer or Wild Turkey 101. Or that stupid synthetic weed, K2 crap. But that’s not why I’m ranting here. We ended up living at one of his friend’s trailers after we were kicked out, and this place was nasty. No one would do dishes or clean, and there were rats and black mold everywhere. Still don’t know why I stayed.

I left him for a few months in 2013 when he cheated on me because he was so drunk. I should’ve stayed away, everyone tells me that. But I’m a strong believer in second chances. So, here we are on this “second chance.” He quit drinking in November of 2013 and hasn’t touched it but once on New Years (which was my idea.) He ended up getting out of jail on the 9th of this month because of his second DUI/driving with a revoked license which he was convicted of in May of 2013. His first offense was in 2008.

I love him to death, but I don’t know if I can deal with him going back to his old ways. It’s been like 2 weeks since he’s been released from jail and he’s on probation for the next 12 months. He’s been drinking a lot recently, and mostly with his cousin. We got into a fight yesterday because I picked a friend up from work at 7 pm and was gone for about 40 minutes. When I came home, of course, he had been drinking. I drove off without speaking a full sentence to him.

We’re moving in less than a week to the opposite side of the state unless I call it off, which I’m tempted to do. Where we’d be moving he has a bunch of old friends who still drink and smoke pot. I don’t know anyone out there except his mother and his older brother.

I feel so confused. I want us to work, but he’s not willing to make the effort.

I don’t want to waste my entire youth following around and living with an alcoholic.

I’ve tried everything I can think of to make him quit. He won’t quit on his own, he won’t quit for me, and he won’t go to classes for help because he “doesn’t need them,” in his own words. All I know is that he and I are having a serious talk later, if he’s not already drunk, that is. He probably is. But if he won’t quit drinking, I’m not staying. If he loves me, he needs to prove it and start correcting his past mistakes.

Hello, I’m 26 years old and have three girls with my husband. We have been together for almost 8 years now. He has always been a drinker and here lately he’s been drinking a lot, and he’s not him when he’s drunk.

I’ve been thinking about ending our relationship bc he won’t stop and it’s affecting our relationship. For the past three weeks he’s drank every day and drinks a lot and it’s to the point to where he’s just pushin me away. I don’t want my girls to grow up seeing their father drunk all the time. I just don’t know what to do anymore and I don’t want to hurt him, but I feel like that is how it has to be.

Married less than a year, and in the past 3 months my husband vastly increased his drinking. He always loved a drink, but not like this. Sadly with the drink came the fights and tantrums.

When asked to cut down, it all came to a head for me and I told him (while he was drinking) that I wanted out. The following day he returned home after drinking, so wish I had told him to go to his mum (also an alcoholic) and what happened would of been avoided.

I had to call the police and now he has been charged with dangerous and threatening behavior. I have dropped his stuff at his mum’s; he is devastated.

If he would admit that he has no control of the drinking and the drinking brings out the monster in him and agree to attend AA, anger management, perhaps I may decide to take him back as my sober husband is a wonderful man.

Only a mile separating us physically, but an ocean of beer keeping us apart.

I wonder if I am a fool for believing he could stop and save our marriage.

I was so naive I did not realise my partner was an alcoholic. He never had money; he was always moving home; he always turned his mobile off so I could not get in touch; he was full of excuses; he blamed me for most things that happened; he was often angry and took it out on objects by throwing and breaking stuff (never physically violent with me, fortunately); always in a deep sleep during the evenings and seemed to get drunk very quickly.

I stuck with this for 5 years, without even realising what his problem was. I lost a few personal belongings (jewelry) and always thought there was some other explanation, other than the fact that he was stealing them. I know this sounds terribly naive. He always had great excuses as to why he never had any money, and why he had to keep moving home, and it all seemed plausible to me, so I honestly believed that he just had an awful lot of bad luck in life. This made me want to help him and “mop up” all the issues that seemed to conspire against him.

Last week he asked, again, to borrow money so that he could get his mobile phone back from the pawn shop, in order that we could communicate. As soon as he got the money, I did not hear from him. It was at that point that I binned my sim card and decided that enough was enough.

A couple of days later, I received some e-mails saying he would put photos of me on a porn site if I did not give him £250. It was at that point that I cancelled my e-mail account, removed myself from all social hangouts, blocked him on everything else, and have moved on with my life.

Some time ago, I moved home myself and did not tell him where I was moving to, as I had been thinking of a great get-away for some time. I had not stopped contact with him, as I still loved him, and kept thinking that he needed me in his life. I was fooling myself into believing that he loved and needed me, as he would plead and whine every time I tried to get away from him.

This time, he cannot contact me, and I will never ever contact him again. I feel relieved that I have now “seen the light,” after doing a bit of internet research and reading.

I don’t feel cruel, as he really did lead me a dog’s life. I was so kind and so thoughtful and so full of the milk of human kindness, yet I was blamed for everything, and he never once took responsibility for making me so upset, nor for abusing my kindness.

Now he has to pay for his crimes against me. I will not look back.

Married to an alcoholic for 11 years. Need to talk to someone.

My boyfriend lied to me about his drinking. Before I met him he went to rehab because of his drinking problem. Now that we live together, I’ve noticed that when he drinks beer, he’s drinking like it’s water. Like he will drink all the alcohol that is in our apartment. He just drinks once a week, but if he drinks it’s too much. If he’s not working, he drinks almost every day.

I grew up where my dad always drinks, fights with my mum, so if I see my boyfriend drink it reminds me of the past. We always fight, and now I thought of leaving him. I don’t know if I am just over-reacting. His belly gets bigger and bigger and not wanting to exercise too! This affects our sexual relationship!

My boyfriend is going thru detox. He has been thru detox before and in rehab numerous times before I met him.

A great person–I’m afraid of the relationship ending. I do not drink, but wonder if I trigger his drinking.

I have been dealing with a drug and alcohol problem for the last 15 years and I am 30. I have lost both of my children, and half of my family will no longer speak to me. I have been in recovery now for 4 years with a brief, but life changing, relapse in the middle. I have been sober for 2 years now. I am active in AA, I work the steps and have a sponsor.

About six months ago I met a man whom I absolutely adore. I fell very much in love with him. He drinks every weekend, with the exception of the weekends I have off. He never drinks around me, but when he goes out he gets black-out drunk and I never know if he made it home safe or not. We fight when I get off work and he never remembers, but I do. He passes back out and I go to sleep and when we wake we pretend like nothing happened.

I feel horrible being mad at him for something he doesn’t even remember. I worry myself sick and I think I need help. I know from my experience that I cannot change him, he has to want it. I just feel very stuck because everything logical tells me this can never work. But my heart and soul says hang in there this love is worth fighting for. I know that we need consequences to change. I’m just scared that if I leave him that’s it. Maybe losing me won’t be the thing that makes him want to change. I know he loves me, but I also know from painful experience that love is not always enough.

For years I didn’t even know that my husband had a problem. I thought I was just insecure for no reason. He would tell me I’m crazy, but now two kids later I realize I am married to a severe addict. I really don’t even know who he truly is, because in order for you to be a “functioning” addict that means you have to lie to everyone in your life, including yourself. Every time he says he’s going to quit whatever it is he’s doing at that time, he just replaces it with something else and my hopes get shattered all over again.

It really has been an emotional roller coaster ride, and now I see that it is starting to affect my kids emotionally as well. When he’s clean, he’s awesome and really plugged in with the kids and just when they get used to it, he pulls away and that really makes you feel sad! I’m starting to realize with the help of Al-Anon that my happiness cannot depend on anybody else and I need to be responsible for myself and my children’s happiness.

Living in the “what if” stage is a waste of time and energy. Letting go with love means telling my husband I love him and will always be here if he needs to talk, but I cannot live with him anymore and most likely will be filing for divorce. I really do think this is the only way for myself and my kids to be detached from his problem. It doesn’t mean I don’t love him, but I can no longer put his disease first. I have to putt my kids and myself first.

I am 8 months pregnant. Advanced maternal age. I have been with my husband for ten years. He just got out of his third trip to rehab in one month. He has been in rehab and/or the hospital more times than I can even remember. He wrecked our truck, turned violent towards our son (he has been violent towards me many times, but never our son) and now we are being evicted weeks before our baby is due.

He has had numerous run-ins with the law and several dui’s– although not for a while.

One more and he would probably go to prison.

He also almost died from a traumatic brain injury he got during a brief sober time when he was being not nice to me (and my son) and I pushed him. I almost killed him just trying to get him to leave us alone.

He just got out of his last stint in rehab and is staying in a weekly motel (paid for by his mother) while I am at home trying to move everything to storage before I am homeless–and before I go into labor.

I, too, want my life back.

My son went into recovery on January 2nd. After four days of detox in a hospital setting, he underwent six weeks of intensive outpatient therapy. Then, he was let go in a job he loved with a local diesel mechanic–not because of drinking, but because the owner was not making enough money to pay him, too. So, he’s been looking for a job for a week and a half–and started drinking again yesterday.

I have gone to seven Al-Anon meetings. Since January second. I was struck by the question at the top of the page because I am trying to separate the action from the person.

Yes, I have thought that if my son loved me enough he would not drink. I am so trying to calm my anxiety and my hopelessness by breathing deeply and working on accepting the situation as it is.

I did not cause it, can’t control it and can’t cure it. I know the words. I am not owning them yet, apparently. I am afraid. I wonder how far away the bottom is.

My husband and I have been together for 17 years. That is 17 years waiting for him to fulfill his promises that always get broken; wanting to be first in his life; wishing that my love was enough to make him happy. 17 years I’ve given this man to realize that the whole time I could have just loved myself enough. I could have made good on promises that I made for me. I could have put my needs first. I could have been happy with myself.

The next 17 years of my life I am going to do just that and quit waiting for somebody else to be responsible for my happiness. I can find things I enjoy in life that don’t involve hurt, shame or indifference. I can look at the big picture and not wonder if it is broken.

I am not broken; I am rebuilt with new feelings, new chances to change my ways, and a brand new understanding about what life should be.

I have fallen in love with a functional alcoholic, and consider myself to be a very strong, non-judgmental person. I can see the beauty in him, though he cannot see it in himself. The deeper we fell for each other, the more he revealed to me, and now there is transparency, and though I don’t like what I see, I cannot abandon him.

I cling to hope that he will realize his true life is not controlled by anyone or anything. I pray and I stay quiet. But, I am becoming a martyr that I don’t want to be. I want to be authentic and transparent too. I want to tell him how it hurts me to be his second love, though I wear a smile. I want him to know he is killing himself, and I can no longer sleep through the night because of my worry for him. He struggles with so much guilt, that I can’t stand to contribute to any more of it, but I also don’t want to contribute in any way to his alcoholism.

I feel that sharing with anyone about what I know is a betrayal, but I want life for him. Additionally, I am a mother of two, and I know we have no future because I will always protect my children. I won’t allow them to love him too, just to watch him self-destruct. I feel lost, alone, and scared.

I can really relate to the last post from preciouswound. I also feel crazy and am having a hard time reminding myself that I am not to blame! I have been married to my husband for 38 years and we were drinking buddies at one time, but I stopped over 11 years ago when my life became unmanageable.

I go to AA. It saved my life. Now I see him doing all the things I did and it’s really hard to accept. I am trying not to enable him. That is hard for me to do. I will take it one day at a time.

I live with a man who drinks every time he has his cash. He won’t think of bills or rent. He drinks it all. When I hide the money, the guy goes crazy, starts breaking everything and gets violent with me just to get to the cash, just to buy alcohol. If I don’t give it to him, he starts insulting me a 100x, and hits me.

I try and try and try, but I can’t take it anymore. I try to be sweet, nice, so he can just stay with me, no dude has some place to be, with friends, calls me anti-social and all sort of names. I really don’t know what to do. Sometimes I’m like I don’t need this. But he just won’t leave.

Tonight sucks. I am so much at a breaking point. I have been trying so hard to work on the Al-Anon Steps. Not today. I am feeling dumb and betrayed. Thought my husband meant what he said again, but again not so much. I just wish I was not feeling like the crazy person. The mad person. I hate the person I am becoming.

I gained a lot of insight from Melody Beattie’s book. Here are words that made sense to me when I thought if my husband really loved me he would stop drinking. When someone, especially someone we love, behaves inappropriately or treats us badly, we don’t see the behavior connected to a person’s problem or addiction. We don’t understand that it’s their issue. Our only frame of reference is, “It must be me, there must be something wrong with me.” Children do this as well as adults.

Messages control or generate our behaviors. It’s the destructive messages we want to change, the “I’m not lovable” or “It’s not okay to be who I am” that we want to change. These generate self-destructive behaviors.

We don’t have to take another person’s behaviors personally. If they have no love or approval to give us, it isn’t our fault. They may not have had any to give to anyone, including themselves. Here’s an example: “Why didn’t ____ love me? You mean it wasn’t me? It’s not my fault, I’m not unlovable?” The doctor said, “No, you weren’t unlovable. You were just deprived of love. Either they weren’t capable of it or they didn’t know how to show love.”

I want to be sure I am not negotiating with myself when I am discussing conflict resolution. If I ask a person three times to do something and they agree and don’t do it, I am negotiating with myself. They are using the occasion to manipulate, use and sabotage me. And finally, I believe alcoholics are unavailable for relationships because they are already in one. Only if they are in recovery can they be in another relationship.

I’m currently on probation and attending a recovery programme. I would not like to discuss the reasons why, but had something to do with assault on my partner. I would never of done this if I hadn’t of been drinking. I can go weeks if not months without drinking and when I do have a drink I can go on a 3-day binge.

I am on the verge of losing the love of my life and want to not drink ever again. I want to be able to give my partner a night out and not get drunk and only have a soft drink. I love my partner and daughter with all my heart and could not imagine losing them.

Working a program of recovery (aka healing) was and is the best decision I ever had the courage to make. I now live a life of contentment with periods of joy interspersed. I want to share that my baby’s colic (which was significant in its severity) has all but vanished. My relationships have improved, with family, coworkers, friends, etc. I am ever grateful for the 12 Steps.

I was very, very resistant to go to Al-Anon, for several years. I didn’t want to believe in a higher power. I didn’t want to tolerate time, ie have patience. I wanted my life fixed immediately! I heard someone say in Al-Anon, “Give our group a try for six to twelve months; if you haven’t noticed improvements in your life, we can gladly refund your misery.” Ha! A challenge! So, like a good daughter & a good wife of people with addictions/alcoholism, I took my Al-Anon group up on the challenge.

I found a wonderful woman to be my sponsor–boy, she really told me how it was, which could be tough to hear, but I loved and trusted her and I was willing to go to any length to improve my life. And what she said was often true! Al-Anon works if we work it. My child’s colic seems to have been, at least in part, a response to my own distress, my own wounds, that I was carrying around pretty well hidden, or so I thought. What I couldn’t see at the time was that babies and kids are very sensitive to the emotions of the people they depend on for survival. Especially before they can speak or understand language. And no matter how much I denied my woundedness, my child absorbed it like a sponge in water.

Today, after a while in Al-Anon, I feel like a capable mom, and my child finally has a healthier role model and no GI disturbances. Some of us know about “gut feelings.” We carry a lot of emotions in our gut. No wonder babies have colic–if they absorb our pain, their guts can be affected, even causing physical findings like inflammation.

Well, I could go on and on about the wonderful ways in which my life has changed. And to anyone who resists the group because of the higher power thing, what about Love being your higher power? I have a pretty good idea that love is something that most of us want more of, and love can be so healing.

I have been married for two years. My wife is a drunk and drug abuser. I am broke, she is tearing me apart, and she doesn’t care. She hid her drinking from me until we were married. She has hit me, broken my finger, spit on me and I just take it. We have lost everything and now she is in rehab and says she doesn’t know if she can get sober with me. Lol. What a crock. She is just plain selfish.

These stories sound so familiar. My husband and I would be married 21 years this June but alchohol has killed our relationship. On top of it all he began reconnecting with school friends through facebook so there’s that betrayal on top of the alchohol. I blame myself a lot of the time and I also spend way too much time wondering what I could have done differently. I hurt for my kids but I also love this man so, so much. Every time he came to me to apologize and promise to change I’d melt but things didn’t change. He lost a job b/c of his problems and we moved across the country for another one. He just now lost that one, We’re lucky we didn’t buy a house here but he left the place we were staying at together and I don’t know where he is. Al-anon teaches you to take care of yourself but I can’t stop worrying about him, For all I know he could be homeless and that is a knife through my heart! When my kids’ school year ends I’m taking them back to my hometown. I will have to start over. I am sad and I am depressed, It is hard to put on a front anymore.

Hi. I’m a 29-year-old female. I’ve been with the same man for 5 years, who has a lot of problems with drinking and drug use. I knew about this before I got in the relationship, but over time it seemed like it wasn’t that bad, til later I noticed he got worse and started to act violent and then act depressed. One minute he will shout and yell from happiness, then the next thing he’s crying and then he gets angry.

Once he starts to drink, he really pounds them back. I am talking about at least over 40 beers a day, or almost a 24-pack. It’s scary and every day it’s a battle. He destroys our things and always blacks out. I get so terrified I leave and don’t come back for days. I really love him, but I don’t know how much longer I can take this anymore.

He’s always putting me down, always moody, not sexually active and just thinks blasting music and partying are the good friends you need. No matter how much I break down and tell him to go get help for himself, he won’t listen. He also has a big criminal record, which was due to drinking, and his father was the same way–and he’s dead now because of drinking.

I don’t know how to deal with it or talk sense. I know I can’t force him, but I just wish I could punch him to knock his senses and make him see what he is doing to his body. He already went to the doctors before and they said if he doesn’t stop he will die soon. He says he wants to die and doesn’t care. He uses his messed-up leg as the cause and how it helps with the pain.

I know he’s full of it, but it’s so lame and I hate it. We do not have children, thank God, because he wouldn’t do good as a dad–but in time I want children and drinking like this and doing drugs will cause damage and we won’t be able to have children at all.

How and what I can do about this, I don’t know. I mean, if I should just leave him for good, or give him a chance. All I know is some way, somehow, I need help for that man. I wanna save us, but if he doesn’t stop I’m gone forever, and it’s hard. People tell me I should leave him, but it’s easy to say that to a person, but not an easy way out when you really care and love someone.

My boyfriend and I have been together two years. I know it’s not as long as some of you, but I still feel the same. He used to be really bad a month after I first met him. It went on for about a year. He’s so smart and has a lot of potential. I think his friends peer pressure him into drinking when he does so good! Every now and then he will stop for a while, but when he hangs out with those friends of his that’s when he changes. And when he drinks he’s a different man.

I can usually tell when he has drank. I get an uneasy feeling. He lies to me that he hasn’t drank but I know better. I don’t want to be in this situation! My parents are still going through things because my dad is an alcoholic. I don’t want to end up being hurt the way it has hurt my mother so many years. I can’t stand my father for hurting my mom. It’s like he doesn’t love her! He says he is sorry and won’t do it again or will try to slow down. I wish I could help her.

And as for me. I know my boyfriend is a great guy. I talk to him when he sobers up and he kinda sees what his drinking does. But when he gets together with his friends all that feeling sorry for how much of a jerk he is when he is drunk goes down the drain and I’m left feeling miserable. Depressed. And my mother is feeling worse than me. I wish there was a way to make them realize what they do and how bad it hurts!

I am almost 42 years old and have been separated for the last three weeks from my husband of twenty-two years, because of alcohol. He has been a full-blown alcoholic for the last twelve years. He has been arrested for DUI two times, and wrecked several cars.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was on the Alabama-LSU game. He was so high he didn’t even watch it or even remember that night. My eighteen-year-old son hid the beer that his father had hidden in his truck, so he assumed he drank all of it and had to go buy more. So he wrecked his truck so bad he was bleeding from his head and had to hitch a ride back with someone. When he woke the next morning, he didn’t even remember what had happened. He asked where his truck was.

I thought I could help him, so bad that I put up with being verbally abused every single day, and sometimes physically abused. He could never hold down a job so I was forced to support a family of three for a lot of years. His buying beer every day sucked me dry. On that final night my son told me that he was going to live with his papaw, that he would not put up with it anymore.

That is when I knew it was all right with my son if I left his dad. I hadn’t been his wife for a very long time. I had been his maid, cook and sex partner. but no more. I have so much to offer a man, not that I want one any time soon.

I have been with my husband since 2008. We were married in 2010. When we started dating, we both were drinkers and then I stopped. He told me he didn’t drink like that every day, which was a lie. It just keeps getting worse.

The thing is, I don’t want to leave him. I just want him to get better. He knows he has a problem, but he won’t do anything to fix it. We have two boys that live with us. He adopted my younger son. He is a good dad to the kids for the most part.

At times when he is drunk he can be a real jerk. Our sex life really sucks. He keeps telling me we can try to have another baby, but that is a lie too. He wants to be financially stable when we do. Which we will never be, because he spends all of our money on beer. I work too, but I am still expected to be the perfect little housewife. I do all the laundry, clean the house, do the dishs. I am just really tired.

He is so mean to me when he gets so drunk. I hate when he is off work because it is really bad. He belittles me every single day. I can’t do anything right. I don’t cook good, I don’t clean house good. I am so depressed, I just cry all of the time. I have gained so much weight. My face is always broken out. I look like a crackhead, except fat.

I just don’t know what to do. Even if I wanted to leave, I can’t. He keeps my bank account 300 dollars in the negative. God, I just don’t want to be alone, yet I feel so alone. I wish I would just die. No, he wouldn’t stop for me or his kids.

Me and mine met a year ago, drinking together. We both were ok with it. but for me it became too much. He was in AA during jail time and passed. And liked it, but now he can’t go a week without screaming about wanting a beer or a case, or liquor or anything.

He was supposed to stop when we found out we were pregnant, but it lasted 3 days. We miscarried becasue he exploded at me when I told him my feelings, and I had a panic attack and lost the baby the next day. He felt bad and quit–for 4 days. Now he is right back to the man I met. Only thinking about using money for drinking and we both owe 10600 in bills and garnishments. I don’t know what else to do. I thought if we loved each other we could quit. Well, I did. I wonder if it means he doesn’t care, or if he is just a true alcoholic.

I’ve been with my husband for 12 years and married for 5. We have a 4-year-old son who loves to see us happy together.

He drinks a lot of beer and smokes a lot of marijuana. He has recently cheated on me because we were drifting apart. I believe it all stemmed from the abuse. He’s always lying and hiding things from me. I try to get him to communicate, but he locks up. Sometimes I don’t even know if I really know him. I feel if he at least tried to stop the alcohol and drugs it would clear up some of our problems.

I’m starting to realize that he’s addicted and is not ready. 50% of me wants to give up, but the other half doesn’t. I get really scared when I think of it. I can live financially by myself, but I don’t want anything worse to happen to him. None of our family live near us and I don’t know were he would live.

I need God to help me, show me the way.

The alcohol demon has taken my loved one from me as well. Married 5 years to the love of my life. I was so strong and supportive in the beginning. But the abusive words and behavior when he drinks has really started to change me.

I feel like I don’t know what’s real anymore. Is he the guy who loves me when he’s sober, or is he the guy who hates me when he’s drunk? I really can relate to everyone’s comments.

My spouse is a drinker who loves to drink. I have been going to Al-Anon meetings and it is helping. How can a person fully detach and free themselves? I wait patiently for a sign.

I could have cried most of the day today, if I had had someone to listen. I don’t know who to talk to. I don’t feel comfortable talking to my friends or in-laws. I don’t feel as though they would hold our conversation in confidence.

I am tired of my husband coming home at midnight or later, barely able to walk, hungry and dirty. Why is this happening to me? He is unable to find satisfaction in our home and wants to sell out. He is very confrontational to anyone in authority. I really don’t know what to do.

If I ask to stay and not sell, he gets angry at me. Do I deserve this? I wasn’t raised this way. I had good parents. But I have nowhere to go now. I am trapped. I feel trapped.

He gets very angry at times and it scares me. I am passive outwardly, but inside I am angry at him. So, here I am at Al-Anon. Thank God for Al-Anon.

I’ve been with my boyfriend for a little over 3 years. He’s a teacher and I was working 2nd shift, so never home until midnight. So, we never saw each other. We got engaged in February of this year. For the last 5 months I have changed my work schedule and have been seeing him every night. I had an idea that he was drinking, but I didn’t realize how much and how many days a week. I would estimate around 8-12 beers 3-7 days a week.

We started fighting a lot. We canceled the wedding in August. He kept giving me excuses as to why he drank. Stress from work, boredom, helps motivate him to get house work done. The last month has been more consistent with 9-12 beers 6 nights a week. The last 3 weeks have been the worst. Because something snapped in him.

He had so many stresses from work, as well as our fighting, he told me he wanted time apart. He now blames me for his drinking the last month. He says I constantly yell and fight with him and he needs time apart to make sure I am truly the cause of his unhappiness.

He says he knows he has no problem with alcohol. That it’s because of his unhappiness with me. He was supposed to move out (his own choosing), but hasn’t yet and keeps giving me excuses why he hasn’t.

I’m exhausted and confused. First of all, is he really an alcoholic? Or am I making a big deal about it? Secondly, my biggest question is if he were to come back, should I take him back, because I do love him very much–or should I run as fast as I can and never look back.

My husband of 3 years drinks 12 beers a night. I have been with him for 8 years and never knew he was this bad. I love him but I don’t love him when he’s drinking. I have two kids under the age of two and he’s a great father, but not after 7:00 PM. I work 2nd shift and I don’t want to leave the kids with him, but I don’t want to leave him. I have to put my kids first and I know that this drinking is not good for them. I just don’t know what to do because he won’t let anyone help him, and spends all of our money on beer. I’m at the end of the line.

My fiance has been drinking since he was 13. He is now 42. He’s been in and out of rehab, treatment, jail, etc. his whole life.

When we first got together in 2007, I had no idea what it was about, how he really was. I had never been around an alcoholic. We moved in together in 2008 and it became an everyday thing. Then came the violence. I won’t go into that, as it only happened like twice, not that I’m saying it was ok.

But then he got arrested on a parole violation. I broke up with him 9 months after he went to jail. He was in jail for about 2 1/2 years and then he got out. I wouldn’t get back with him for several months and when I did, we had a long-distance relationship. He stayed sober on the weekends we had together, and then he was drunk when I wasn’t around. I kidded myself that as long as I didn’t have to deal with it, it was fine.

In April of 2012, we moved in together on the one condition he would not drink. That lasted about 3 months and it started a few beers here and there, then every day, then his mom died and it got worse, then the drugs started, then we found out I was pregnant. The drinking and drugs got worse and he moved out.

He was never violent, he has not raised a hand to me in 4 years. But I hated the person he became–the lies, the drinking, the drugs, and he stole money from me and that was it. I stood up for myself and our unborn daughter. A few days later he checked in to a 60-day treatment.

So, here I am, almost 7 months pregnant, with a baby daddy in rehab. I’m turning to Al-Anon for help and per the advice of his sponsor.

My husband I feel is an alcoholic. He stopped drinking 8 weeks ago because I was going to kick him out, secondary to his abusive drinking. He said all the right things. He started to go to AA, sought counseling, and we started to go to marriage counseling together.

He has now stopped going to AA and has asked me for the last 3 weeks if I would mind if he just had a beer. I am so frustrated. I’m not his mother. I did tell him that we had an aggreement and if he breaks it and drinks he needs to move out.

I know he will slip, so I have to be strong enough to keep my word. I have a 6-year-old boy who adores his father. He is a good father. It breaks my heart.

This may sound crazy, but I’m the one with the drinking problem, and I know I can’t blame anyone but myself and only I can change it. I have done rehab, after-care and AA. After 4 months dry, my husband took me out for my birthday and said you should be able to have a few drinks and like a fool I did and I haven’t stopped. I tell him I need his help, to please go to Al-Anon, to please stop bringing beers home. He tells me he’s not the one with the problem. I find myself in a war.

I hate when I get drunk and don’t understand why I do it. Sometimes I feel like I can’t take it anymore. I stay home alone a lot and don’t go to his family get-togethers just to stay away from him and his family drinking. He tells me he can drink because he doesn’t get drunk. He tells me he will do anything for me and maybe a week or two goes by and he doesn’t bring anything home to drink, but before you know it he’ll have a six-pack to go with his cigar. I sometimes wonder if he has a drinking problem. It’s so hard not to drink when it’s always in your face.

I have been with my boyfriend 5 months. All my friends really dont like him because the way he acts. He drinks from 10 am–whenever he decides to stop that night. This is every single day and he doesnt work and says he will get a job but there is always an excuse on why he didnt go apply for jobs when he says he is going to.

He told me he doesnt know himself when he isnt drinking. I told him he needs to find himself then and cool it on the drinking. I dont really want him to quit completely because I enjoy drinking socially occasionally but I realize there really is no in between for an alcoholic and if he quits cold turkey he will probably have a seizure or have horrible withdrawals.

He says he loves me and my kids but I guess he loves the beer more. I dont know what to do about this situation.

I am married to an alcoholic and have been for 10 years. We have 3 beautiful children who are beginning to become aware of the drinking that their daddy is doing. My husband has always been a drinker. However, it has only gotten worse over the years. I always hated that he would have to already have a buzz or be drunk to even go out to any social event where there would be a group of people. I accepted this, feeling it was his own insecurities.

Then the drinking was not only if we were going out to an activity or event, but every weekend. It would always be done in hiding. He would run an errand or hide his alcohol in the garage, under the sink, etc. The next thing I know he’s drunk and the kids and I would continue our day without him. I begged and begged him not to drink at home. I thought if he only drank if we went out with friends that would limit his drinking to monthly or biweekly at times. He couldn’t stop. The constant weekend drinking led to my feeling bitterness and hate towards him. I hated feeling this way.

At times I wanted to leave, but didn’t because I do love this man. I love our family and my kids truely are happy kids for the most part. I then made a huge mistake, the biggest mistake of my life. I hurt my husband. I hurt my family. I had an affair 1 1/2 years ago. It was very short and like I say it was the biggest mistake I’ve made and am very sorry.

My husband is aware of the affair, I have told him everything. Now the drinking is 10 times worse. He drinks every single chance he gets, anytime I turn my back. I am afraid to leave my children with him for fear he won’t care for them as they need, due to his intoxication. My husband works a job every day and is quite successful despite the drinking. We have lost most of our friends due to his drunken behaviors, and I am afraid to go out with him at all for fear he will make a scene, get kicked out, etc.

We have tried counseling and he has seen a drug and alcohol counselor, but refusing to try any of the things that they suggest we do for our marriage or his drinking. He thinks he can stop whenever he wants. I hate what this is doing to our family. As I said before my children, the older two especially, are starting to figure out there is a problem with daddy and alcohol. I feel like the only thing left to do is leave this marriage, but I am so scared to do that to my children and am afraid to live without his support and help.

When he is sober he can be a loving man and wonderful father, but for months now has chosen not to be. I heard about Al-Anon from the drug and alcohol counselor my husband saw, but have yet to attend a meeting. Maybe that is just what I need to do.

I’m so distraught I don’t know where to start. I grew up in an alcoholic environment. Dad then Mom, because he made her drink or get beat, so she did. I married my first alcoholic when I was 20. It was a nighmare for 10 years. Divorced him. After meetings, I learned I deserved better and so did the children (they never forgave me for that).

Married my second drug and alcohol and womanizer(multiple affairs) a year later. Nightmare # two. We too had a child. Totally unforgiveably bad!! Marriage, 17 years here.

Now, dealing with three children that have drug, drinking problems, stealing from me. I was a social drinker. One drink was all I could handle, then the children were born and never touched another after that. Till this day I can’t even stand the smell.

Am so overwhelmed, am disabled from an accident, living on a poverty level income, no job to be found. My disability limits what I can do. My sister offered to help me with living arrangements for awhile. She has the alcoholic syndrome too. I was homeless, and I feel like she offered not out of kindness but to have someone to abuse. I have nowhere to go.

I started meetings again, hoping for answers. My health is bad, no money to support myself, and a total mess of a family. Am as sick as they are. I have isolated myself, sister is constantly putting me down.

Need soooo much help. Don’t want to be on this planet anymore over this, thinking a lot about it.

I have been listening to the podcasts, found them by fluke. I was needing a meeting one hour ago and found this web site. I’m a grateful member of Al-Anon.

I am 54, and a beautiful man came into my life 4 years ago. I did not know he was an alcoholic and was naive to alcoholism being a disease. My life was in tatal chaos, yelling, screaming, pouring booze down the sink, throwing booz outside, swearing like a mountain trooper. You name it, I was it.

Then I found Al-Anon. It’s early days for me. I have kicked the alcoholic out. I’m now dealing with my life struggles from the damage been done to me by the alcoholic, mentally and financially, as he drained my money, expected me to keep him when he threw his jobs in, and I did. I don’t understand myself for putting up with this life-robbing disease.

All you beautiful Al-Anon members around the world, I feel the warmth, love, understanding as soon as I see a member, and in the rooms so safe for me especially when I’m fragile. JUST KEEP COMING BACK is what the beautiful people in Al-Anon say.

Love to you all around the world–an oz friend, xxxooo.

My boyfriend is currently sober, although he recently had a slip after being sober for 6 months. (I had kicked him out before those 6 months). He was going to meetings regularly until he started working a new job. Then he stopped and I became extremely worried. My worrying began to grow into something else. It was stress, anxiety and anger at him, and I began to fight with him because of this frustration.

It was after a big fight that he went out and drank. He tried to come back drunk, telling me he didn’t drink, but I knew he was, and I told him to leave. He left and tried to come back one more time. I told him to go somewhere and sleep it off, and we would talk later. In the morning, after sleeping in a cemetery, he returned, and I did not put up a fight about him coming in the apartment. He went to bed. After that, he told me he had only drank 4 beers and said that it was not fun anymore and he felt horrible. But I still feel unsure.

He has only been to one meeting since then, and I still fear that he will slip again. I live with this fear on a daily basis, and I am trying to take it one day at a time, sometimes even a minute at a time. I have been in and out of Al-Anon as my father is also a recovering alcoholic, and I was in Alateen as well. I really need to be back and do this for myself.

Over the years my situation has gradually gotten worse. My husband hides his drinking by waiting until I am in bed.

I was raised by alcoholic parents and wanted so badly not to have my children around it. At one time he wanted that too. But his demons are too large for him to fight alone. He does not seek help with this afliction. He says, “Oh, I have it under control.”

I really want to attend meetings in my area for myself and my children.

I am angry and hurt from things my family/sister has done and continues to do to to my family. I have dealt or not dealt with my anger and resentments with alcohol. I have been told many times about help from Al-Anon. My desperation tells me to go but my fear of emotions holds me back. I am anxious to go. I need answers, help and healing.

I didn’t really care if my husband loved me enough to quit or even slow down his drinking, but I have been absolutely certain that he loved his children enough to. I was/am wrong. I have always logically known that u cannot change anyone, they have to WANT to change and u cannot force that willingness upon them.

I’m coming to a lot of new realizations this evening and one of them is that my life is unmanageable, that I need Al-Anon, my children deserve a better and happier home life, and whether I cannot fix or help my husband I can and will help myself and my children. My first step is to attend the first meeting I can find.

I have been in and around Al-Anon for many of the right reasons–but I didn’t get what my part of these equations were–how I encouraged or discouraged or practiced my behavior–and improvements thereafter.

I wanted love so badly that I have gone so far as to beg a man on my knees not to leave me–people used to say I needed to learn to love myself, but that just made me even more angry.

I married emotionally unavailable people and then tried to help them to be loving–and they are today.

I sometimes wonder why I have the father of my children dying after a liver transplant, and hysterical but very together sons–and the step father died last year–so although I am not very fond of change, in fact I resist it, it happens. People die and they do not listen unless you really speak from the heart–and they might not that day, but later on they will think about it.

All the people in the rooms that helped me to love myself are so many. I had to decide for myself what was right for me. The Steps are a process which includes anyone who is damaged or wounded–anyone who needs a new direction, and tools for socializing with people we may not like or agree with–that are the same as we are.

My sadness is that out of four husbands, three are dead to alcoholism–so how do I in Al-Anon detach with love–they are teaching me how. Aloha.