I Need Help On How to Deal With My Partner Being Alcoholic

Nano…
i am not a doctor, nor do I have a crystal ball, I am just a recovering alcoholic. For what it’s worth, here is my take on your questions.

I like your partner hit a bit of bad luck in my professional and personal life. And my drinking did get worse for it. In fact, I was sitting in my home office one morning staring at an unopened bottle of jack daniels, and the biggest decision I needed to make that day was when was I going to open it right that moment, or put it off till noon. Either way, I was going to open it, of that I was sure.

Somewhere around that time I realized that I was in deep trouble. I couldn’t or wouldn’t stop drinking. And now that I have gotten sober, I have crossed paths with scores of other drunks just like me. Once we cross that invisible line, we lose control over when or how much we drink, or what we do to people we love when we are loaded. We become powerless over it.

Your partner may be one of us, and he may not, I don’t know. He alone needs to make that diagnosis.

As to if this time is the last time, nano, in the back of your mind you already know that it isn’t. Your partner needs that next drink like you need your next breath. It’s hold is that powerful. I am not surprised that he is depressed and suffers mood swings. He is facing a hellish landscape without the ease and comfort of a few drinks. And once he starts, he can’t stop. It is a vicious cycle.

No drug or new job or change in circumstance will fix what is wrong with us. We drink to preserve our very sanity.

If your partner really wants to stop drinking, he will find an alcoholics anonymous meeting. There are tens of thousands of them all over the world. He can find one.

Then he needs to sit down and listen. He might learn something he does not now know.

One thing I do know for sure, over any length of time, it only gets worse, it never gets better. Never. In a year or two from now, you may call what’s going on right now the good old days.


Your friend
richard

Thanks a lot for your advice richard. He's still not drinking but I will talk to him tonight about contacting aa before he starts again. Maybe i'll advise him to read some of the stories on this site.

I really hope you get through this misery yourself! Hang on!

Thanks again,
nano

Thank you for your kind words nano,

it has been a little more than seven years since I took my last drink. But i, just like every other alcoholic, am just one drink away from where I was seven years ago. Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic.

I hope he takes you up on the offer to take in a meeting. I didn’t know what I didn’t know. But around the rooms of alcoholics anonymous, I learned a lot about my drinking.

I doubt he wants to, but if he wants to talk to a recovering alcoholic, I would be happy to tell him what I know about this disease. We give away what was so freely given us.

My e-mail address is shado walker164@aol.Com

take care of yourself
richard

Thanks for the offer richard! You never know! I haven't have a chance to talk to him though, i'm waiting for a moment when he's relaxed so it doesn't cause a fight. I'm afraid to do anything that would give him a reason to have another drink.

In the mean time, you keep going! I hope 7 days is 9 days by now!!

Let me know how you get on!

Nano

So sorry richard, I misread, I thought you were talking about 7 days but it's actually 7 years. My god! Sorry again.

I just joined nano, but what you are going through with your significant other is what i have been experienceing with my husband. He is now in a impatient rehab center and i talk to him daily, I can already see the changes. I just hope when he comes home i will be able to help him with his recovery. Good Luck

Ok i dont want to butt in, but one thing you said worried me.

"Should I do more then listen to him and trying to help him going through all of this? I'm starting to feel guilty...'m afraid to do anything that would give him a reason to have another drink. "

This is not something you did. Nor is it something that you can really control. He is lucky to have someone that cares about him and just you being there is going to help. I dont know the whole history, so excuse me if im out of line, but you can be a pillar in his life now. Nothing you do with good intentions in mind are going to hurt him. Be strong and always remember that it has nothing to do with you. Help him as much as you can but there may come a time when you need to think about yourself.

Peachy, I agree with WShep. It is important for you to understand that you don’t possess the power to get him sober. I was told early in my sobriety that there is NOTHING you can say or do to get someone drunk if they want to be sober, and there is NOTHING you can say or do to keep them sober if they don’t want to.

Sure support is good. We all need the love and well wishes of our friends and loved ones, but just understand he will stay sober or he will get drunk because that is what he wants to do.

If you want to help him in his recovery, encourage him to involve himself in a recovery program. I am a big fan of Alcoholics Anonymous, it has helped more hopeless alcoholics than all the other programs put together. But there are other options as well. Do some research into it.

If he only does rehab and nothing else, his chances of staying sober are less than if he associates himself with other recovering men. Encouraging him in that direction is in my opinion, your best way of helping.

Richard