“No matter whether the alcoholic in my life is drunk or sober, the time to put energy into my own recovery is right now”
‘Today’s Reminder’ June 28th, Al-Anon II book – ‘Courage to Change’.
This sentiment really summarises how I am feeling at the moment. I have reflected on this sentence a lot over the past couple of days and it has really made me think more carefully about the here and now.
I have spent over seven years of my life, thinking about and trying to change the fact that my partner has an addiction to alcohol. It has become an obsession for me. It took me 3 years to recognise what the problem was, another few years to accept that this was now a permanent feature in our lives and that it was not going to simply go away – an addiction is for life, a ‘gift’ that keeps on giving. But it took even longer for me to stop trying to change it and I do not think I am fully there yet as I will still chip in and try and encourage him to be stay sober. I will still ask him if he has had a drink_________ today, yesterday, last week (you can fill in the time period as it changes).
And it did suck out a lot of my energy. I was running very low on energy in this period of my life. I had just become a Mum and was trying to get my head around bringing up a new baby and hold down my job on very little sleep and also manage the house. I then had to deal with my partner who just wanted to drink and drink and drink. We had been seeing a therapist who would say to me ‘Jiyu, alcoholics drink- it’s what they do’. I could not understand this. I could not accept that it could not be changed somehow. I spent hours and hours finding out about rehab and therapy and medical treatments to somehow stop the problem and of course none of this worked because my partner did not want to stop drinking. I would try cajole, and bribe and scream and shout at him to stop, but of course he did not. So much wasted time, so much wasted energy and it did not give me the result I wanted.
It was my therapist who suggested Al-Anon. This is a support group linked to Alcoholics Anonymous that was set up for families and friends of people who are affected by someone else’s drinking. My reaction was ‘how ridiculous!! – this is insane!! – I am not the one with the problem! – he has the problem – I am not going to waste my time on a support group – he needs the help not me!’
Eventually I did go to a meeting and did not like it at all. For a start I was angry that I had to attend a meeting because he had the problem. There were around 16 people in that group, some of whom shared their personal stories. Some of the stories were so extreme and bleak that I came away feeling that maybe I was overacting, maybe the drinking was not a problem and and that it was all in my head. I came away feeling a lot worse than when I first went in and swore never to go again. I was going to have to put my head down, stop complaining, this was my lot in life and I would just have to get on with things. Poor Me!
But then more stressful life events occur – another baby, moving house. Should we have done those things – I don’t know, probably not, but these are things that can’t be changed and wishing that we had not done them was not helping. The drinking did not stop.
And here is the difficulty – he was never violent, he was able to go to work every day and earn a good income, he is always very presentable and polite to everyone he meets, so what’s the problem?
But it was a problem, because he would drink to ease his stress, to make life more bearable, to reward himself for working so hard and for providing for the family. And when he drank, he was physically there, but he had ‘checked out’ of being emotionally present. I felt that I was battling through life on my own and that the spinning plates were starting to drop and smash. More years went by and I realised that I could not live the rest of my life like this and something needed to change.
Out of desperation I tried a different group, which was smaller. There were a couple of people who described their alcoholics and they seemed to behave very similar to my partner. They recommended that I try reading ‘Courage to Change’. It has a page for each day and it starts with a story, then a daily reminder and finally a short quote. This is where I read the quote about finding time to put energy into my recovery.
My recovery – my recovery? I had not thought about this, but it did slowly start to resonate that I was sucked into the drama of this illness and it had made me ill too. Recovery is something I needed to do to take back control of my life and base it around me and do things that I want to do.
This is going to take time and energy and I do not think it will be quick, but it has to start somewhere. I need to find somewhere to put my thoughts and release some aggression so that it stops affecting how I am with my children. My tolerance for dealing with the highs and lows of little children was often brought to the edge, in part, due to my preoccupation with my partner’s drinking and this was not the children’s’ fault.
I want to be better, I want to enjoy life again, I want to see the positives and not ruminate on the gloom of ‘what could have been if it were not for the drinking’. This is going to take all my reserves of energy, and I do not think I will always move forwards, but I understand that this is now about my recovery and I want to say to myself, the past has happened – it cannot be changed, but I can change how I feel right now and I can choose to be active in my own recovery.