Welcome to RMB’s Naked Pictures of Faceless People, a series of guest posts from diverse anonymous bloggers. (Read more about NPFP’s origins.) These are the posts that are jumping to get out of us, but for whatever reason — safety, embarrassment, conflict of interest, protection of loved ones’ reputations or feelings, or so on — we don’t or won’t or can’t post at our own blogs. Anyone is welcome to submit or discuss a potential post by emailing me at arwyn at raisingmyboychick dot com.
Relapse
I woke up this morning ready to receive clients for my work day only to find chip dip strewn across the living room hardwood floor because you left off the lid and the cat got into it, an opened bottle of vodka sitting in your shoe, cigarettes and your lighter next to the fireplace and a half drunk can of beer. I had five minutes to clean it up. Luckily it was enough time to remove the evidence of your relapse, but I didn’t end up doing what I should have done to prepare to receive my clients. My clients who are all under the age of five.
One morning, not too long ago, the children arrived and an hour later I found your opened bottle of vodka sitting next to where they were playing. You hadn’t drank in months. I didn’t feel the need to look. I had learned to stop looking for evidence. There were no accidents that day, but everything I had learned to do to “let go and let God” went up in smoke. For awhile. Then you stopped again and it has been another month or so of sobriety. Luckily not long enough that I have stopped looking for evidence to keep the children safe. Already I have grown used to looking for the cigarettes and lighter by the fireplace. Although we’ve spoken fifty times about how much I hate that you smoke up the chimney at night when we are all in bed, you will not stop. You will not respect me. You do not respect yourself.
I’m so pissed off. I went to AlAnon for four months solid while you struggled to get better. I stopped going because I’ve seen so much progress and things have been so good between us. Yesterday you told me your doctor and counselor said you hit a turning point, a pinnacle in your recovery. I agreed. I congratulated you. Now I wish we hadn’t said that. As much as it made you feel good to be praised for all your hard work, I see now that it also made you afraid. You are scared of success. You don’t know how to maintain it. I don’t know how to maintain this relationship if you can’t stop.
But my fear in leaving you is not being here for the children. Not being around in the morning to pick up the bottle of vodka you forgot to close and put away because you were too wasted to remember you have small children who get up earlier than you. Not being around to put away the cigarettes and lighter. Worse, not being around to help them in the night when they wake from a nightmare and need help going back to sleep. YOU can’t do it. I’ve seen you “try.” Turning on their light and yelling at a child for crying and keeping you awake is not conducive to helping them settle again. And those were the nights you were still awake and able to hear them. Once you’ve passed out nothing wakes you.
I remember the early days of our relationship, when we were dating and keeping separate residences. I remember letting myself into your apartment one morning to find you passed out on your living room floor. Your eight year old son was thankfully still sleeping in his room. I woke you up and put you to bed. I should have known what I was getting into. Sometimes I wish I’d just left the key on your table, turned around and never looked back.
I would love for everyone to know about your addiction, if only to propel you to stop out of humiliation. But I have a business to run and a shred of dignity that I’m trying to maintain. Plus, I respect your desire for privacy from our family. Anyway, no one would ever say anything to you if they knew. And those of our friends who know never say anything. Because you don’t fit the alcoholic stereotype. (Damn those!) You’re a nice guy. You don’t hit me. You have a job. As an addictions counselor no less! You don’t drink socially or publicly. You drink late at night after everyone has gone to bed. Then I erase the evidence in the morning. I would not be a co-dependent wife if I did not work from home. This is not who I am, but I have to make my workplace and my children’s home safe.
Tonight there is an AlAnon meeting. I had planned to hang out with friends, but tonight I think I might make an excuse.
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My father was an addict, and this really hits home for me. My mother was able to do her part to keep things safe and happy. And she did that well. No one knew the truth, not even us kids, really. Not until much later, anyway. But how hard it must have been for her. It makes me sad to think about it.
I hope that you can find some peace for yourself.
This hits me for personal reasons too (no, not my partner, thank God). There are so many hidden and destructive addictions…
I hope your situation improves. Thank you for writing about it.
This resonated for me, also. I too was once in a relationship with a person who didn’t fit the stereotypes of an alcoholic (in whole other ways than your partner), but who (I finally faced up to it) was. Thank God or god or goddess or whatever there were no children involved. I gained no wisdom from the experience, but I did figure out that, for me, it came down to, as long as I’m in this relationship, I have no choice but to be both co-dependent and enabling. Stay, and be co-dependent and enabling, or go, those were my choices. Eventually, I went. That was my solution.
May you find your way. Whatever that might be.
I am an active member of Al-Anon, and have been for over 20 years. At first I thought I’d just go for 6 months, learn what I needed, and go on with my life. But I found a new family and a new way of life, so I keep coming back to the rooms and the program.
I grew up with alcoholic parents. I put my mom to bed every night after she had passed out. They were very functional people, very capable and well-respected professionals, who drank at home. They yelled at each other, but there was no violence other than that. I grew up to think there was some kind of monster inside of me, because otherwise my mother would care about how I felt, right?
Even though my parents are now dead, and I gained some compassion and forgiveness for them before they died, I keep going back because it is so easy to replay the old tapes: “you’re not good enough”; “you have to do everything perfectly”; “you are a human doing, not a human being”; “you are judged only by what you do and how you look”; “what right do you have to happiness?” When I keep going back to my Al-Anon family I learn the truth: Progress not Perfection; you are a precious child of the Higher Power; we love you as you are; you get to be a human BEing; nothing you have done is unforgivable. I have also learned not to let my happiness depend on what someone else does or says.
I now live with mental and emotional illness, not with alcoholism. What I have learned in Al-Anon is immeasurably helpful in my current circumstances.
I wish you detachment from your alcoholic, love for yourself, and a long life with your new family in Al-Anon. We have hope to share.
Auntie ~ I hear what you’re saying about the choices we end up needing to make. I just wish I wasn’t the one who needed to make the choice. I wish it was him. Although I suppose he’s chosen! Maybe one day I will choose to leave. For now, I keep on having hope instead. He has come a long way and he says he wants to change, and I do believe him. While I do not like enabling him (I refuse to lie for him anymore) I guess it beats tearing apart our family (for now).
JohannaM ~ I like Al-Anon. But in the six or so months I have been going I haven’t met anyone I click with. The one person I would like to be my sponsor is never home when I call, and while I feel comfortable enough to share in the meetings, I’m also not able to stick around afterwards to chat and get to know people better. I need to get home and put my kids to bed instead. I’ve learned a lot from the program – things I can and do use in other areas of my life too. Although I never heard “Progress not Perfection.” Thanks for bringing that up. I can definitely take something away from that one. One thing I have learned in attending Al-Anon is that I expect perfection, i.e., sobriety. He thinks he can and should be able to drink moderately or at least have one per day. We’ve been here before and while it may go well for a few months, that’s as long as it ever lasts. The only difference these days is that he is also getting treated for depression, and he is trying his best not to mix substances *too* much.
We’ll see. Thanks so much for your comment.
FWIW–I also figured out that part of what makes addiction what it is, is that it’s a pathology of choice. My guy would insist he was choosing to drink; in my perception he was unable to choose not to drink, which meant he wasn’t choosing at all. The addicted part of his brain was in charge, and very good at manipulating him.
But I do get how hard the “you can’t have any, not even a little, ever again” makes quitting for an addict, especially for alcohol, which is so universally around us and socially acceptable in moderation. I tried giving up tea once in some kind of a health kick (I’d gotten past the caffeine withdrawal willy-nilly due to an illness that wouldn’t let me ingest anything but water for several days, and figured I might as well take advantage of that to make a lifestyle change.) After a couple of weeks, I realized I was looking down a corridor of years with no tea ever again, and didn’t like the view. And after a couple more days, I resumed my morning tea. Moderation was an option for me. (And of course, caffeine doesn’t have the ill effects of alcohol.) Unfortunately, for your guy–he doesn’t have that option. Which he’s having a hard time facing up to.
Good luck to you both.