Messageboard
The Village Hall permalink
Alcohol Concerns March 2010
This discussion has been closed.
-
Message 1.Â
Posted by Tir_Eoghain (U1541087) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Hi Everyone!
°Õðù Eoghain here, Recovering Alcoholic.
Welcome to March’s Alcohol Concerns. This thread is for everyone - those struggling with alcohol, those in recovery or trying to get there, those who are coping with other people’s alcohol issues, and those who may simply want to learn more.
Although recently the emphasis has been on alcohol, this is also a place to share about other addiction issues – whether drugs, food, exercise, gambling, sex, relationships, shopping or anything else.
The following links are all sources of support. If anyone knows other support sites, please feel free to post them. Some of us, like me, are members of AA and some have found recovery through other means. Some of us still drink in moderation and some of us are abstinent.
Link to last month’s thread
Support Sites
AA Worldwide
www.aa.org/?Media=Pl...
AA UK
www.smartrecovery.or...
www.drinkaware.co.uk/
www.alcoholconcern.o...
www.alcoholandfamili...
servicesdirectory.al...
www.giveupdrinking.c...
°Õðù -
Message 2
Posted by MV Whitby May Rose (U6862284) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Ok, I will go next.
8 years ago today I finally realised the hold that alcohol had on me and that I couldn't just have a couple of drinks and then stop.
I stopped drinking and started afresh. I never struggled with not drinking but I struggled with having to face life naked so to speak. -
Message 3
Posted by Oz (U6102444) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Thank you Tir for opening this months thread and congratulations on the 4 years.
Good onya (in my very best Strain accent)
Just returned from my rather tiny meeting. Ceed I cannot imagine a meeting of 60-80 people. The biggest meeting I had was about 50 and that was to celebrate someones sobriety birthday.
Ours are on average 12 to 15 but it isn't uncommon to find just 4 or 5 of us. Teas etc are a DIY affair but tbh one rarely makes a cup for just oneself. I think that your committing to catering for such a large number for a year is seriously impressive and makes my attempts at service look a bit limp .
Like Fee I am glad you didn't have a drink too.
Well I have funny feelings about the 1st March. Talk about copping resentments...
Had I not had a major relapse in May this would have been my 1 year sobriety birthday . ironic that I chose to give up on the first of March what with all it allusions to madness. It now seems prophetic to me but hindsight is a wonderful thing and since I don't have a crystal ball I will just have to wait a see what comes tomorrow like the rest of us.
The resentment about my "busting" (Aussie term for relapse) passed very quickly really because one year ago today I still thought that my self will was all I really needed. After the first month I thought I had cracked it and the second well my empty cup runneth over until I filled the bloody thing with wine again!
So no-ones fault but my own. I can cop a resentment with myself and give myself another excuse to beat myself with self recrimination.
Or i can shift my @rse to a meeting shut my gob and listen. Now perhaps if I had just done that in the first place it really would be a special day.
Whatever, I am glad to be sober today .
Ceed, give us the recipe for your resentment scones again
Oz
Formerly *issed -
Message 4
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Congratulations Tir and WR! Two anniversaries this month how fab. And thanks for opening up Tir. Too lazy to fix your broken links, but er perhaps someone else will rally. I will happily do it tomorrow if not.
Basia here, 8 years and 8 months sober through AA with the help of my sponsor, my sponsees, some amazing friends in the programme and these threads. Bit of a surprise that I made it through my drinking and drug-taking years quite frankly, which were great fun until they stopped being great fun and became a living nightmare. I wouldn't swap my sober life with all its current difficulties for my drinking one for all the chocolate in Birmingham. Or Belgium.
Just started going to AlAnon again on a weekly basis and my God, I'm loving it. I get it this time round so much better than I did before, just after my agent died of an overdose, and it's patently clear to me why you do not have to have had an alcoholic in your life to benefit from this amazing blueprint for better living. Rubbish sentence, but tant pis.
In the intro, where the chairperson normally says "Al-Anon has but one purpose: to help families of alcoholics", the one I attend says something more along the lines of "to help families and friends of alcoholics or simply those from disfunctional families" so that someone who, for example, feels the damaging repercussions of a madly controlling mother decades later, can feel they have a place there.
Just thought that that was worth mentioning and how little alcohol is actually discussed, which I know Fee has mentioned in here countless times.
Basia -
Message 5
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Aw Mrs O, but then...you know, it would have been a different journey and think of the valuable lesson you learnt about your stuff, one no-one else could possibly have taught you. I had to learn mine twice too.
I always pause on Oct 4th, which was my first sober date, until I relapsed 9 months later in August, and feel a connection with that date too. Just really glad it was just the one. Mind you, there was years of fannying about trying to stop DIY, which were obviously massively successful. Hahaha. -
Message 6
Posted by Oz (U6102444) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Hey up Bash
Was part of my share today about "Wanting to want to stop"
Tried to train myself to be a responsible drinker didn't I.
Drinking later, drinking less (well a wee bit less) but never just stopping .
The only responsible think I could ever do as an alcoholic was accept what I was and abstain. Took me years to get there.
As you say it changed the journey albeit subtlety and has indeed been a worthwhile one and perhaps prompted a more thorough inventory than I had thought. Actually I didn't think or anticipate what this last year was to be like. I may have lost my nerve in the early days if I had. However now I wouldn't change a thing not even the really carp bits.
You know some mornings a barely recognise the person looking back at me as I brush my teeth.
I do so prefer her to the wrecked harridan that used to peer back at me.
Oz -
Message 7
Posted by stew black (U3146970) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Just bookmarking.
Hope everyone is Ok. -
Message 8
Posted by madjohnfinn (U11268477) on Monday, 1st March 2010
morning soberinos, not much time so i'll keep it brief...hope everybody's well, welcome to march, brrr it's still chilly down here in cornwall! grateful for continuing sobriety, and all that brings
much love to you all my alky brothers and sisters
mjf
xxx -
Message 9
Posted by Bizzie Lizzie (U2255808) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Mon, 01 Mar 2010 08:33 GMT, in reply to Basia
Hello, people - I'm Liz and I'm a lurker on these threads. I started lurking because of my residual feelings of guilt that I couldn't do more to stop my A (who died over ten years ago) from drinking, and then heard about the Three C's - you didn't cause it, you can't control it, and you can't cure it.
That, and a number of other revelations over the years have taught me some life lessons that apply in a number of situations: to quote Basia above
it's patently clear to me why you do not have to have had an alcoholic in your life to benefit from this amazing blueprint for better livingÂ
Best wishes to all who lurk and post here, and congratulations to Tir and whitbyrose. -
Message 10
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Morning all. Thanks Tir.
I'm too idle to fix all the links as well but anyone wanting them can click on the link to last month and go down about three posts to find them.
Here's a couple of factual ones for anyone just beginning to think about all this:
Many happy returns to those celebrating anniversaries. Oz - odd how long a year seems in some ways and in other ways how short a period of time. I think newcomers in Al Anon probably think we are all quite mad when they hear people say thinks like "I've only been in Al Anon a couple of years" (about three in my case).
I heard someone recently say that when you get into Al Anon first it gets better, then it gets worse, then it gets real, then it gets different, then it gets really different. I'm somewhere between real and different after three years I think.
Yes, we had a newcomer walk out about half an hour into a meeting recently - they'd obviously been getting increasingly restive during the opening talk (which was very interesting to those of us for whom the speaker was familiar but had never said much about their family background - but did not mention their alcoholic ex-partner once) - and then after two further shares which didn't mention alcohol they left - someone who'd been talking to them at the beginnng slipped out after them and they did come back. People sharing after that were careful to stick into their share something explaining their link to alcoholism but still didn't say anything much about it.
I'm Fee - I lived with my ex-ish (ex in reality but not as a matter of fact) husband's active and increasingly bad although always still functioning alcoholism for a decade or so. I have recently discovered that I think my real qualifier may be a great-grandmother whose behaviour has clearly resounded down the generations - it's partly the consequences of that that I ended up the sort of person likely to marry someone who ended up in active alcoholism. My husband did get sober after years of not quite wanting it enough - he then left (two years ago this month, in fact) and I've found Al Anon very helpful in dealing with life generally - and particularly in trying to break the patterns with my children. I find that most situations become more manageable when addressed using the elements of the serenity prayer - accepting the things outside my power to change, changing the things I can and finding the wisdom to work out the difference.
I can never start the month without saying that alcoholism (or whatever you want to call problematic drinking) does not require the tramp on a park bench syndrome - almost no one in his working environment and only a few people in his social environment were aware of the problems that landed my husband up in a residential treatment centre and did irreparable damage to his family relationships. If it's a problem, it's a problem.
And to those whose lives are affected by someone else's drinking - you did not cause it (although you can help it by enabling it), you cannot control it (so don't bother pouring the bottles down the sink) and you cannot cure it. Keep the focus on yourself.
Have a good month all - it would be nice to hear from some of those who have gone rather quiet - or from anyone who has been lurking - even if it's only hello.
Just previewed - sorry about the length - no time to make it shorter.
Fee -
Message 11
Posted by yulzerzo (U10301639) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Hi Fee
As one of those who has gone a bit quiet, you've reminded me to check in here. My excuse is, I've been a bit busy. Returned to work about 3 weeks ago (part time) and consequently been a bit tired. The weather here has been awful as well, so I've been putting my energy into getting to and fro work safely and attending my AA meetings. However, it's a lovely sunny day here now, tho very cold. I've got a physio appointment later today and then my meeting all before I start my work week tomorrow. It's funny how I've managed to get to most of my meetings, even with a broken ankle and some really bad weather. Proves, I really wanted/needed the meetings for my sobriety and it has worked. It is just over a year now - I know I would not have got through the last year without the help and wisdom of AA. Some of the things that happened to me over the past 12 months would have been a handy excuse to drink (as if any were needed), but with the help of the meetings and the people attending them, I've not had to do that and for that I am very grateful. Gratitude - it is something I need to remind myself of every day I get through without drinking. It is so easy to take sobriety for granted and to get complacent which is, for me a very dangerouse mind set to be in. I try to start each day with a few minutes just to be grateful for a sober yesterday and to concentrate my mind on the day in hand.
Hope everyone is well and I'm going to try to contribute more regularly.
Yulzerzo -
Message 12
Posted by U14339323 (U14339323) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Dydd Gwyl Dewi Dedwydd! Happy St David's Day!
My name is CEED and I'm an Alcoholic. I am 5 years and 1 1/2 months sober, with the help and support of AA. And my sponsor.
My drinking made my life just miserable and vile.
Death warmed up. No real desire to continue, looked like hell....
I am very grateful to be sober this morning and to be able to make choices about how I behave today. I have learnt a lot.
One thing is very appropriate for my vicious reactions to things.
"I am not responsible for my first thought, but I am for my second"
So. I will post the recipe for my Serenity/Resentment cake at some stage.
It really is Bara Brith. (Welsh tea bread) with added ingredients.
Seething resentments. hatred. venomous vitriolic essence. And a dash of indignation. And BSE (blame some-one else)
Have a spiffing day. Have a sober day. Stay in the moment.
One Love.x -
Message 13
Posted by Tir_Eoghain (U1541087) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:10 GMT, in reply to Tir_Eoghain in message 1
Hi Everyone!
Just fixing some of the links
AA Worldwide
Other Links
°Õðù -
Message 14
Posted by PepperTree (U10855001) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Bookmarking, as per usual.
Don't know for how much longer I will be posting as my employer has decided it can do without my services so I'm going to be out. I'm hoping that there will not be any unexpected consequences attached to this. -
Message 15
Posted by Tattyhead (U2777247) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Hi I'm Tattyhead (a childhood nickname bestowed on me by my kid brother who still uses it now and again!)
I post here sometimes - usually just to have a vent. I feel quite damaged by alcohol. I don't drink (well, apart from the occasional glass of wine) My mother, who was always prone to depression, descended into alcoholism when I was in my late teens. Now, my husband of 40 years has been alcohol dependent for the last 5 years. He is a shadow of his former self and spends 90% of the time in his bedroom - drinking neat brandy from the bottle and smoking. His physical condition is poor but he refuses medical help.
I stay bouyant most of the time - I have detached emotionally and have wonderful friends with whom I can go out, have a laugh, etc. I work which gets me out and I care for a learning-disabled son who is lovely - with a great sense of humour and who keeps me going.
Also - when things get me down, I come here and get cheered by the posts and have an occasional vent.
So - welcome to newcomers and Hi to old friends.
Tatty xxx -
Message 16
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Blimey, I think I was on holiday longer than Peter Whatshischops off Corrie was in rehab.....
-
Message 17
Posted by Ellie May (U2222618) on Monday, 1st March 2010
I’m Ellie May, seven years and two and a half months’ sober, with the help of my sponsor, sponsee, co-sponsee, AA, therapy and my lovely friends and family. I’m also a sporadic poster here, although I do read most of it (I listen more than talk in meetings too). I’ve been a bit grumpy the past couple of months and my brother, a primary school head teacher, always tells his children to think of three things before they speak: (1) is it true? (2) is it kind? (3) is it important? If two out of three apply, it’s ok to say it. Often I find that one applies, usually that it’s true, but it’s neither kind nor important, so I try to keep my mouth shut. And probably it’s only true in my own eyes anyway. And my father always told us when we were little to keep our eyes and ears open and our mouths shut.
I’ve been dreaming a lot about drinking recently, I have a recurrent dream that I am pretending to be sober and actually I drink secretly – never a huge amount, never enough to actually get drunk, maybe two or three glasses of wine. It makes me really anxious and I think it’s masking something else going on that I can’t quite put my finger on. It’s a horrible feeling, in the dream, that I am deceiving everyone I know, letting everyone down when they all think I am doing so well. Or I’ll drink a few nights a week, and go to AA meetings the other nights and pretend that I’ve got seven years’ sobriety and talk wisely to everyone while knowing that it’s all a lie. Horrible.
I have been musing about something Laura posted on February’s thread, about getting her A to admit that they were wrong. Unless the A admits that They Were Wrong (in uppercase) then nothing is possible. This makes me feel uncomfortable… I have struggled with the concept that I am not a terrible awful hideous person for letting myself become an alcoholic/addict/problem drinker. I felt bad enough about it anyway, without having someone standing over me with a whip making me admit I was wrong. I knew it well enough; it wasn’t that I didn’t want to stop, I simply couldn’t find a way of doing so. I knew how much I was hurting my children, my employers, my family, my friends… And anyway, who cares about wrong or right, it’s just about getting well again, choosing life. I feel lucky that I found a way out, and lucky that I found this thread too.
Congratulations to Tir and Whitbyrose on their anniversaries, great stuff. -
Message 18
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Monday, 1st March 2010
Ellie May, that's why I asked Laura whether she meant mistaken or culpable - anyone might be mistaken, what matters is what you do about the mistake. Wrong in the sense of recognising that something needs to change is OK, perhaps.
That's an unpleasant sounding dream - is it something to do with self-belief, perhaps? Unsettling, anyway.
Fee -
Message 19
Posted by TeaLady (U9077092) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Hi, thanks Tir for opening up this month and congratulations on your anniversary - and to whitbyrose too.
I am TeaLady, a recovering alcoholic, 9 months sober. After years of trying to stop on my own, I finally stopped doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results (definition of insanity). I got myself to an AA meeting, thanks to the encouragement of people on this thread, and I finally discovered other people like me (I wasn't the only one), met sober alcoholics, saw that it was possible to break free of the prison that my drinking had become. I wanted what those people had, and now I am finding a way to live without alcohol, live a real life, not just an existence. I couldn't have done it without the support of my sponsor Ellie May, other friends from this thread, friends from AA and my family.
Drinking dreams, EM. I hate them. I wake up shaking, trying to work out in those few moments between sleep and wakefulness, whether it's real, whether I really have had a drink. I also never seem to drink much in these dreams - usually two glasses and it's as I am pouring the second one, that I think 'Oh no, what am I doing? I can't do this. I can't go back to that madness - and - do I really have to tell my sponsor?'! Still, the feeling of relief when I realise it was only a dream is immense and it makes me see how easy it would be to fall back into the darkness again.
TL x -
Message 20
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Personally I don't think the content of the dream is as significant as how it can make us feel, and I think the 'self belief' bit is important - as Bash and I were musing as we swanned around Bloomingdales (for how long am I allowed to bang on about how much I loved my NY trip...?) I would be surprised if most people didnt feel like a fraud at some time, like they were going to be 'found out' for something vague and undiscernable they doubt about themselves. I sometimes dream I have eaten chicken or forgotten to feed some animals!?! eg things that are the opposite of important parts of my personality (not that I would choose chicken if I decided to have a vegan meltdown..... possibly pickled herring, since you ask....)
Also, I suppose I wouldn't concentrate so much on the Right or Wrongness of a decision, but what is important to me is whether someone can get to the point of seeing their dissonance- the difference between what they are saying they want and what they are actually doing. When the delusion becomes at least visible, if not yet tangible and maliable. Without that, it's probably lip service? -
Message 21
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Oh and hello Ellie May,btw
-
Message 22
Posted by Oz (U6102444) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Morning all
I never really introduced myself this month.
Oz nearly 10 months sober and simply wouldn't be without my sponsor , co sponsee ,AA and this thread.
I wake most mornings and after packing the family out the door I come in here and recalibrate myself for another day.
I am attempting to attend 90 meeting in 90 days at the moment. Some days it can be quite a strain and yesterday I felt a bit jaded by what seems like the 24/7 nature of therapy I am undergoing. Which is currently two sessions a week of therapy, daily AA and another group session . I feel that if I am not at one of these places I am on my way there or returning from and I sometimes struggle to get the simplest things done for lack of time.
My feelings about this are a bit mixed. I know this process is necessary and has yielded a much saner me but I am haunted by the fact that so much of my time is spent upon just me. I think what I am trying to say is that I feel a bit guilty. Funny thing is that if I didn't go to my meetings and sessions I would probably find myself where I was last year and drinking again and I so don't want that to happen.
I think that I a brewing a bit of a resentment TBH and I am trying so hard not to.
I have to tell myself that this investment of time is helping me get well and that in the long term is the most important thing not just for me but my family and those that have invested time in getting me here.
As part of my 90 in 90 I started to read some of the diary I started last year and it was dismal reading indeed. The scribblings of a very sick woman living a confused and utterly empty life. I seemed so helpless and without keeping this diary I would have forgotten that.I don't feel helpless any longer. I don't profess to have the answers however but I do have the ability to see and anticipate when things are going bad and to make the adjustments needed to avoid or cope with whatever life throws at me. I still make whooping great gaffs of course but deal with them not dwell on them.
Previously I would simply drink and let the unfairness of whatever fester within.
On re reading this it all looks a bit negative but I think that is the nature of any healing process that there will always be moments of discouragement or doubt and that these wobbly moment do pass and indeed this one will for me.
Perhaps I am just frustrated or simply tired and the time I need to mend my muddled alch head is long overdue and probably the most worthwhile of my entire life.
I loved what Fee said earlier about attending Al Anon
"first it gets better, then it gets worse, then it gets real, then it gets different, then it gets really different."
Oz
In transition again. -
Message 23
Posted by Oz (U6102444) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
OH Morning to you Mr T we crossed.
So glad you enjoyed your trip to NY.
I am deeply jealous.. -
Message 24
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Tue, 02 Mar 2010 08:55 GMT, in reply to Ellie May in message 17
I have been musing about something Laura posted on February’s thread, about getting her A to admit that they were wrong. Unless the A admits that They Were Wrong (in uppercase) then nothing is possible. This makes me feel uncomfortable… I have struggled with the concept that I am not a terrible awful hideous person for letting myself become an alcoholic/addict/problem drinker. I felt bad enough about it anyway, without having someone standing over me with a whip making me admit I was wrong.Â
All I meant was that one has to say "you know what, this isn't working" in order to succesffully stop. I, and 'my' A, and various others posting here all spent ages convincing ourselves and others that things were fine, and it's that moment of "actually, no, things aren't fine, this is a mess and I don't want my life like this" that I meant. "I thought I knew everything but I don't".
Mistaken, like Fee says - not any moral judgement AT ALL.
Words, eh?
News from this side is that I'm pondering growing a waxed moustache and getting a red tailcoat and breeches, so I get to be the Ring Master. Or maybe spangles and tights on the high trapeze would be fun. Or I could deffo see myself standing on a horse's back in dainty arabesque pose...
Roll up! Roll up! Welcome to the Circus, Ladles and Jellyspoons. Here you can see the amazing spectacle of everyone going round in circles! See the A sob down the phone to others! See the others get very agitated! See everyone run round in little circles, complete with custard pies and buckets of whitewash in an amusing fashion.
Okay, I made up the custard pies and buckets of whitewash.
Me, I'm staying all the way over here, outside the Big Top. Round the back with the off-stage horses, in a real world of muck and sweat, away from the smoke and mirrors and spangles and sequins and image and illusion.
laura -
Message 25
Posted by Tattyhead (U2777247) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Hi Laura. Loved the analogy of the circus - really struck a chord. Think I'll join you, if you don't mind, "in a real world of muck and sweat, away from the smoke and mirrors and spangles and sequins and image and illusion".
-
Message 26
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
Tue, 02 Mar 2010 20:44 GMT, in reply to Tattyhead in message 25
You're more than welcome here, Tatts. Here, have this broom. I'll take the shovel. The wheelbarrow's over there.
Sometimes, when you're surrounded by it, there are only three ways out - shovel, sink or swallow!!
I'm shovelling...
laura -
Message 27
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
I've never liked circuses.
Fee -
Message 28
Posted by Tattyhead (U2777247) on Tuesday, 2nd March 2010
<>
Me, too! -
Message 29
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Just reminded by something elsethread (not related in any way to alcohol) of something that irritated me the other day - there's someone (it's someone who already irritates me by talking about people being "clean") who will talk about alcoholics as "they" as in "they manipulate, they lie" etc etc - which I daresay is frequently the case but I really dislike the implicit statement that suggests that the speaker, and others in the room, can have nothing in common with "they".
Mini-rant over. Must go to work. Have a good day everyone.
Fee -
Message 30
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Oh that's one of my constant rants too, Fee, winds me right up the 'they' business. People can lie, people can manipulate, people can say stupid things, people can be selfish (sometimes all at once!)........
-
Message 31
Posted by Tattyhead (U2777247) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Sorry - on a downer so anyone hoping to be cheered up - please skip this post!
At work today I received a phone call from next door neighbour. A friend of OH had been hammering on our front door unable to get an answer - even though he was expected to call for a coffee. Another neighbour was also joining in banging on door and ringing house phone as well. They were worried (having been witness to many occasions when ambulances have been called to house). Yet again, I had to give excuses at work and drive home. (thankfully only 10-15 minutes away) I let myself into house to find OH sitting on bed, reading newspaper! I yelled did he know people had been banging on door, ringing phone, etc and were so worried I had to come home from work. He just said "I was asleep"
Apart from this - OH is really ill. He looks dreadful - grey (although I keep looking for signs of yellow!)He is skin and bone and very weak. I fear he is dying before my eyes. When I came home this evening I said again he must go back to GP. He won't let me make appointment but maybe I will anyway. BUT what can GP do? How ill does he have to be before the NHS kicks in and actually does anything other than sneer at what is, after all, a self-inflicted illness?
Sorry - I did tell you to skip over this post. -
Message 32
Posted by LemonTree (U14305071) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Absolutely agree, Fee and MrT, I believe my A was a manipulative person first and an alcoholic second (using alcohol as part of his way of manipulating people).
It was pretty confusing to work it all out, as the sessions of drinking clouded my judgement and I thought at one point that the lies, abuse and manipulation only happened during the times of drinking .. but when I was able to reach a point of being able to see the wood from the trees, I realised the behaviour was happening without drink even being involved .. that (the drinking) always came later, and it would be used as the excuse for the behaviour, which I took me some while to realise that was what was happening.
I think a lot of people like this become alcoholics to excuse their behaviour, but I don't think it works the other way to say that all alcoholics are like my A was, if that makes sense (haven't worded it very well). -
Message 33
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Wed, 03 Mar 2010 19:38 GMT, in reply to Tattyhead in message 31
Tatty
{{{{{{hugs}}}}}
When I came home this evening I said again he must go back to GP. He won't let me make appointment but maybe I will anyway. BUT what can GP do? How ill does he have to be before the NHS kicks in and actually does anything other than sneer at what is, after all, a self-inflicted illness?Â
Or maybe the NHS has resources ready to be used, but can't use them until he asks for them?
Nobody can make him better except himself, my dear. I do know, only too well, what it does to people to watch their beloved nearest family dying by inches and refusing to go to a doctor, refusing to take the help that's being offered on all sides.
Only he can do anything to change his behaviour and... well... if he does not, will not, can not, then he is an adult, sane in legal and medical terms, and he has the right to live his life how he wants, and to die that way if he doesn't find a way forward.
But, my dear Tatty, nobody can make him see the light. You've said yourself, it isn't that he is ignorant of the dangers and risks. Who knows why some can seek help and others not?
You have done all you can, and you still are caring for him as well as caring about him. You love the man you married, I remember you saying.
You just remember in all this to look after yourself and your son as well. Are you able to eat properly this evening? If you feel too upset, try to have something, even if it's a healthier snack rather than a full meal.
Take care, my dear
laura -
Message 34
Posted by LemonTree (U14305071) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
No way, Tatty! To be honest, I really don't know what to suggest (mainly because everything I tried never worked), but I really do feel for you and empathise completely having experienced almost the self same things you've just mentioned (pretty much all of them). I honestly don't think there is anything more frustrating that to be in this situation .. and much as Alanon helps in so many ways, we can't suppress our human emotions to such an extent it doesn't affect us. -
Message 35
Posted by LemonTree (U14305071) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
But isn't it like watching someone walking out in front of a bus and just standing back and letting them do it? That is how I felt about my A, and the guilt I felt the last few months has been horrific. Ad although Alanon made me feel stronger and was able to help me feel less confused about everything, the human emotion to want to help is so strong, I do find the thing of detachment and waiting for the A to realise they need help is an extremely difficult one to get my head around. -
Message 36
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
I'm sorry you've had such a difficult day, Tatty. Could you leave a key with a neighbour or well-hidden somewhere so that on another occasion you could tell people how to let themselves in rather than having to disrupt your day? It wouldn't make it much better emotionally but at least it wouldn't have such practical consequences.
Lemontree, I don't think it's quite the same as stopping someone walking out in front of a bus - at least not unless they are deliberately walking under the bus - and if they are deliberately walking under the bus you can stop them on that occasion but unless you set a 24 hour guard on them, they'll find another bus.
Fee -
Message 37
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Wed, 03 Mar 2010 20:26 GMT, in reply to LemonTree in message 35
But isn't it like watching someone walking out in front of a bus and just standing back and letting them do it?Â
Maybe more like watching someone drive off, knowing that *they**are* *aware* that the vehicle has no brakes, the steering is broken and the road they are accelerating away on has had a landslip and now terminates abruptly in a precipice.
I do find the thing of detachment and waiting for the A to realise they need help is an extremely difficult one to get my head around.Â
I keep saying I'm the one who has it easy as my concerns are those torn apart by the A's behaviour, not the actual A, although that is helped by the fact that my sole encounteres with the A over years have been with a violent aggressive vicious manipulative bully, to a level I've seriously wondered about psychosis.
My emotion to want to help is for the ones who can be... save what you can, and those ones can be helped. The A is admitting drinking again now and everyone's running around exactly as they did in the past, again, again, again [cont. p.94].
It's different for everyone and I probably am more detached in many ways than most. I consider myself lucky for not being torn apart by the A's impending doom as others around the A and around me are torn apart.
But... guilt or misery or wanting to help don't change the fact. Nobody can 'make' my A stop drinking except themselves. They know how ill it made them, how desperately ill, how close it came. They also know they can make it through three weeks without a drop.
And they have chosen to drink once more, hiding it for weeks. Now they've admitted it but only because younger Teen found the A on Monday night incredibly paralytic and was going to phone round everyone on Tuesday evening to tell us, so the A got in first with penitent confessions... Teen has now decided to be the grown-up in the flat and has moved her boyfriend in. They are a stable long-term, albeit young, couple and having him there helps her a lot. It is total reversal of roles. Teen is now calmly organising cleaning rotas for the flat, which her boyfriend helps her ensure the A does their bit in. Shopping, cooking, the lot. I can't say it's what I'd have chosen, but it's working... good for her. Both still at school with exams looming. Fingers crossed.
laura
laura -
Message 38
Posted by LemonTree (U14305071) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Yes, I meant if they were deliberately walking out in front of a bus, because that is effectively what an alcoholic is doing, isn't it? They don't do it by accident. I agree that you would need to put a 24 hour guard on them, but then people do that don't they, say in prisons where people are put on suicide watch, etc, etc. Or if someone is standing on top of a building ready to jump, people/police/trained negotiators spend time trying to persuade them down .. they don't just let the get on with it. -
Message 39
Posted by LemonTree (U14305071) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
I'm just wondering how far the detachment thing goes, I mean, if one's A is paraletic and takes the car out, do we just detach ourselves from the situation and let them go out in the car, even in the knowledge that they might mow down a few people in the process?
-
Message 40
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Wed, 03 Mar 2010 21:04 GMT, in reply to LemonTree in message 39
No of course not.
What I mean is just the acceptance that there isn't anything that anyone can do to force someone to stop drinking, if they know how ill they are, if they know the risks of continuing, if they have all the available help offered but refuse it.
It doesn't mean you have to stop caring about them, or even caring for them if you choose.
It just means I have to accept, and so do others around my A, that the only person who can stop the A drinking is the A.
Teen used to rant "why hasn't something been done???" and now even she is understanding (GP excellent once more) that there isn't anything that can "be done" TO the A if the A chooses not to stop.
laura -
Message 41
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Actually, that was what tipped me over the edge -the occasion when my husband rang me from the M3 (admittedly at a standstill in a traffic jam) quite clearly drunk (he doesn't actually remember this). When he got home I took the car keys away and told him the following day that he was either going into the residential treatment centre he had been tentatively investigating or going to his mother's (or anywhere else, really) but that I could not live with it any longer - and my overwhelming sense when he decided on the treatment centre was one of relief that I could have a rest from it all - I wasn't even really thinking at that point about whether it would do anything for him.
I have since heard it suggested that another approach is to ring the police.
There are those who say that they would simply let things take their course - but I could not take that risk for third parties. But that was for me, not for him.
You could do the 24 hour bus guard watch but what would be the point really?
Fee -
Message 42
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Laura, I'm glad she's reached that sort of understanding and that the GP is providing good support for her.
Fee -
Message 43
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
No, Lemon Tree, I don't think that is expected. learning how to stop protecting the drinker from the negative consequences of their behaviour is a hard old game, but I don't think that anyone should feel they have to place others or themselves at risk to do that.
If you know someone has gone out driving whilst under the influence, and it is not safe to take the keys away, you can call the police. That is the consequence to the drinker of that behaviour.
I also think that boundaries have to be put in place that are comfortable for the person imposing them, there is no point saying you are going to do, or following through on, something that you feel uncomfortable with or you think is unsafe. No-one needs to torture themselves unduly. I think, though, the important thing is probably then to accept and live with the decision you have made, not use it in an argument to make a point or 'martyr' oneself over (as a general point, not directed at anyone!) as I think integrity gets a bit lost -
Message 44
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Sorry, got distracted in the middle of writing that so it seems a bit out of sync now......
-
Message 45
Posted by PepperTree But No Petard (U13945752) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
This is my montly visit to keep me in touch. Not part of this conversation, so just ignore me!!
-
Message 46
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Hello, Marilyn - how are you?
You didn't look out of sync to me, Mr T - we'd seemed to be saying very similar things one after the other.
I wonder how Boots is - seems a long time since I saw her in here.
Fee -
Message 47
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Thursday, 4th March 2010
I was unaware of the NHS sneering at alcoholics, far from it from what I've seen in ERs in Nottm.
Well quite. -
Message 48
Posted by Oz (U6102444) on Thursday, 4th March 2010
"I was unaware of the NHS sneering at alcoholics, far from it from what I've seen in ERs in Nottm."
Absolutely Bash and I have very first hand experience of ER's in Notts and throughout the UK.*
Again it all boils down to acceptance doesn't it.
You cannot treat an illness without the co-operation of the individual.
*BTW not from personal need I am glad to say but from professional experience
Oz -
Message 49
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Thursday, 4th March 2010
Thu, 04 Mar 2010 08:32 GMT, in reply to Fee in message 42
Laura, I'm glad she's reached that sort of understanding and that the GP is providing good support for her.Â
Thanks Fee. I switched on my mobile this morning to long text sent at midnight - she's got a new mobile and is not giving the A the number (both did this, due to the A's every-five-minutes - literally - calls to check up on them and assure them of the A's love). But also she said that she had gone into the GP's yesterday with the A, and despite everything the A had said, the A was drunk again, so Teen is now just giving up. She says we can carry on if we want to, but she is not going to try any longer to stop the A drinking. She has her own life to live and is going to focus on that.
I'm just trying to find a tactful way to say "hoo-bluddy-ray, pet, you're doing the only thing you can - save yourself 'cause your parent is up the Khyber without a paddle these days"...
laura -
Message 50
Posted by Claribel (U2264645) on Thursday, 4th March 2010
Just bookmarking. Hello & best wishes to everyone.
About this Board
Welcome to the Archers Messageboard.
or  to take part in a discussion.
The message board is currently closed for posting.
This messageboard is now closed.
This messageboard is .
Find out more about this board's
Search this Board
Ö÷²¥´óÐã iD
Ö÷²¥´óÐã navigation
Ö÷²¥´óÐã links
Ö÷²¥´óÐã © 2014 The Ö÷²¥´óÐã is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read more.
This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.