My Q is a really wonderful person
I never see anything about nice Qs. They’re always violent or nasty. Mine isn’t. They’re kind and wonderful, but I lose them after they start drinking every day. We have conversations they can’t remember. They forget to do things they promised. They get messy at get togethers. This person feels like my soul mate. But I don’t think I can live with this and be healthy. They have no desire to fix the issue, though they admit they have a problem. We went to therapy once and they don’t want to go again. Has anyone had a good experience living with a Q? Has anyone left but remained in contact in a positive way?
Posted Dec 30, 2018, 3:09 PM UTC
1117
In my experience, The problem is the progressive nature of the disease. My husband is the most amazing person I have ever met. Kind, generous, engaging and loving. He still is, despite years of drug addiction. However, things have gotten worse. If you asked me four years ago if I would ever feel afraid of him, I would have been horrified to even imagine that. And yet that time finally came this year. Still no violence, but for the first time the feeling of a threat. He is in rehab now, again. And things are good at the moment. But as I watch this disease progress, I know that there is no future for us in any future relapse. Every time it gets worse. Watching it take the loving man I know is the most heartbreaking part. My sponsor has educated me many times on the progressive nature of this disease, and I always heard it about it in meetings, but until I started seeing the progression in my spouse I did not understand it. It’s real.
Thank you. I feel so ungrateful sometimes, because they really are wonderful, except for this one (huge) thing. I know they’re trying to work on it on their own, but they don’t want to stop, and I’m horribly anxious even when they’ve cut back, because it never sticks. I have to end the relationship because it’s unhealthy for me, but I want to have some relationship, and I don’t know what’s possible, or advisable. I’m sorry you’re going through this. It is so hard. :/
I completely agree with your progressive comment. My husband had been sober for more than a decade when we met and fell in love. Then a year or two into our relationship he started drinking again, thinking he could just drink in moderation like me and have a glass of wine with dinner once a week or so. Unfortunately that’s not how the disease works. Took another year or two for him to get up to the case of beer/day he was last at.
And all that time he was lovely. He only drank at home, was never hurtful or mean. I actually really liked drunk him; he was always more open and honest and sweet to me. But it progresses and progresses and eventually the alcohol just took him away from us.
Like your Q, he became very forgetful - remembered no conversation he had after 5 pm. I was the one that had to do everything for our family because starting at 4 or 5 everyday his focus was on drinking and not with us. I became incredibly resentful at his selfishness and it’s messed up our kids pretty badly.
He finally quit earlier this month but recovery is clearly going to be a very long road. I’ve stayed because I love him and know what a wonderful person he is beneath all of the bs addiction. But if I could turn back the clock, and know what I know now when we were at the beginning, I’d walk away. As harsh and as awful as that may sound, I would walk away in a heartbeat. Life and marriage is hard enough without dealing with this. Truly it is. Loving an alcoholic is an incredibly difficult life that I wouldn’t wish on anyone.