Spouse driving on a suspended license! UGH!

[momtogrif]

Originally Posted by MotleyCrew

I feel so bad for you and hope you get the help needed. My son works in a bar and is always telling us horror stories about some of the regulars that actually fall over on diners tables or just face plant. I can't understand why the bartenders keep feeding them booze over and over when they know these regulars are going to kill someone someday. Sad stuff. Best of luck to you.

Thank you! My dad was one of those guys. I remember getting a call from the bar. My dad blacked out and slumped to the floor. Makes me so angry that bartenders keep serving when it's clear the patron has had way too much. Unfortunately in this case, it's a free country.

So, yes, my dad was an alcoholic and I married(from what I can tell) an alcoholic. UGH!

[Jukesgrrl]

I'm glad to hear you're going to Florida in July and I agree with those who think you should issue the ultimatum that you're not coming back if he doesn't get help. I don't mean him stopping drinking like he did before ... I mean an actual treatment program. Call it alcoholism, call it binge drinking, call it a dry drunk, he's still in addiction (even if the underlying cause is clinical depression) and you and your son are in serious jeopardy at the present time.

I also agree with the people who told you to GET A LAWYER. Before you go away. You do, indeed, need to protect yourself and the craziness of this trip to San Diego means you have serious financial repercussions hanging over YOUR head. You're living with a man who is currently financially solvent and employed. You may not be tomorrow. Also, I feel for your need to mediate between your son and your husband's rants, but that story you told just demonstrates that you've been living as an enabler and a protector for so long it seems normal to you to want to stay in that house and keep trying to fix the unfixable. Making him be an appropriate father to your son is not your job and probably impossible anyway at this time.

The way you explained his work situation leads me to believe he will be severed from employment the day his company becomes aware of his driving history. Which could happen for many reasons even if he isn't arrested again. Is it possible that you could find out what his company's policy is toward them paying for his rehab? I had a dear friend whose wife and boss got together and told him in the boss's office that he would be fired (he was a corporate attorney) if he didn't agree to go THAT DAY to a rehab they had chosen for him. He had had a very bad fall at home while drunk and with his head bandaged and arm broken he couldn't really argue. They left the office and his wife drove him straight to a 30-day resident treatment program. He got sober there and stayed sober through AA. Thank heaven he did. After 10 years of sobriety and a wonderful, repaired relationship with both his employer and his family, he died of cancer. What would have been more tragic? Had he died before he had those 10 years of self-examination and rejuvenation. Because he died with the love of his family and friends and the respect of his colleagues and neighbors instead of their disappointment and scorn.

I really hope the best for your husband. I KNOW from personal experience that people can get sober and change their lives. But as many people here have said, that's his decision. In the meantime, it's incumbent upon you to save yourself and your son from a very dangerous situation. You obviously know that, but some of the things you say suggest that at times you grasp at straws that this isn't as bad as it seems. IT IS. You would leave if he were waving a loaded gun around, wouldn't you? Driving drunk on a suspended license really isn't that different.

Please see a lawyer before you go to Florida. Please keep going to Al-Anon — those people have walked where you are walking. And if I were you, I'd be printing out this thread and handing it to your husband just as you and your son leave the house in July. And I'd say, "Here is something you might want to read and discuss with your psychiatrist while I'm gone." He needs to know how terrified you are.

I wish you the very best for a better future. I'll be thinking about you. You have a lot of people here who care about you and your son.

[mjd2k]

No advice, just an opinion.

I agree with the lawyer part. Too many people make rash moves that cost them for years.

I, like everyone in today's world, have experience with addiction. Sorry, but from what I have read, I just don't believe that what you do will make the diff with your partner. He's on a path for his own reasons and he'll continue until something stops him... and its seldom a cold turkey cure.

Your ultimatium may not do much for him but at least it gets you out of the situation

Keep your chin up!!!! It always seems to work out somehow!!!

[breakingbad]

Jukesgrrl - insightful. Very good post! Take the advice and get your son out of dodge - at least long enough to think about things without being totally emotionally drained.

[Trackwatch]

Drunks(that is what he is) are like Abusers, they will cry about what they did and promise to stop, they promise to seek treatment for it, this promise lasts until they do it again, that WILL be in short order.

I do have personal experience with this, I was a family member of a drunk.

You will most likely lose any ultimatums.

[JayManne]

Wow.

I know this is just the internet. Talk is cheap here, and I put a whole two minutes into typing this up, but don't dismiss some of the good advice you have gotten here.

So, all of those people who are advising you to get a lawyer? DO WHAT THEY SAY. Get a lawyer. There are people who will help you out there and they won't cost too much.

[momtogrif]

Jukesgrrl, thank you for taking the time to respond. I have a consultation with a lawyer this AM so I'm working on that one. And, as others have said here, my ultimatum might just get ignored so I have to be ready to ask him to leave or get myself out safely.

I spoke to him on the phone last night briefly and he was very happy on the phone and interested in the fact that I got my hair done. Umm, since when? When he left yesterday in the AM he couldn't even look me in the eyes when he told me he loved me and it seemed he couldn't wait to get out of my presence. So, of course, the first thing I thought was that he was drinking in his hotel room.

I really do need this break to FL. I don't trust anything he says anymore. He told me that when he got to SD that he made a bunch of phone calls for work and was really busy on the phone. Out of curiosity I checked his phone records. He made 1 call to a customer. Wow, that's really busy, LOL! It's getting more and more unhealthy for me and so I'm looking forward to removing myself from his influence next month.

[Jukesgrrl]

Originally Posted by momtogrif

Jukesgrrl, thank you for taking the time to respond. I have a consultation with a lawyer this AM so I'm working on that one. And, as others have said here, my ultimatum might just get ignored so I have to be ready to ask him to leave or get myself out safely.

Momtogrif, I'm very happy to know you are taking some proactive steps to protect yourself and your son. It's very sad that alcoholics follow such a trite and predictable path to their bottoms, but they do. He might not be making much money on this trip, but perhaps it's better that he's staying in his hotel room rather than driving all around San Diego County trying to drum up business.

I have a friend in AA who tells newcomers, "You don't have to fall all the way off the ladder before you start climbing up it again," but very few of them listen. Addictive persons usually have to suffer some dramatically serious consequences (sometimes irreversible ones) before they admit they are powerless over their drug of choice. How many people do we know who still smoke after cancer, still overeat after a diabetes diagnosis, still gamble after a bankruptcy? That's powerlessness! That's why even when people have the tenacity to turn their backs on an addiction (as your husband apparently once did), without a support program or without changing the people-places-things that can set them off, they're still troubled individuals. What people in AA refer to as "dry drunks." And their loved ones pay the price.

Drinkers have it especially hard because there are so many messages sent out by society that their behavior is normal, or even cool. It's only been in my lifetime that there are severe penalties for drinking and driving and in some locations those are still inadequate. We can thank Mothers Against Drunk Driving for the improvements that have been made in the statutes. I just read in the news that one of the idiots from Jersey Shore has stopped drinking/drugging and now when he goes to clubs to do his DJing (apparently that's his job), he gets booed and jeered because to that audience he used to be a fun party guy but now he's behaving ... and they don't like it.

That illustrates dramatically why so many drinkers cut off their relationships with people who don't act as they do. They either surround themselves with people who drink daily or binge as they do (so they won't get the message that they're not "normal") or they isolate as your husband is apparently doing (drinking alone in a hotel room out of town). It may not even be an accident that he has a job where he doesn't have to appear at an office every day and doesn't have to see his managers face-to-face. I'll bet he has some pretty creative ways of explaining why that job is great for everyone, but I suspect he chose it mainly for the fact he can work "around" his binge drinking. Intelligent alcoholics are VERY creative thinkers and sometimes they do their diligent planning without even being conscious that's what they're doing.

The story you mentioned about his family funeral was very telling. Alcoholics usually are getting something from their behavior (aside from the temporary oblivion they seek), even if those benefits don't make sense to others. Perhaps your husband's history of devil-may-care behavior stems from his desire to be different from the "boring" people he is related to. He can tell himself that even though he has a family, a job, a mortgage, etc., he's still the cool risk-taker who's superior to other people. That might even be one of the reasons you were attracted to him. He was a productive member of society, but he was also a blast to be around. That's usually pretty attractive to women. We can have the steak AND the dessert (been there, done that ... bottom line, it's not healthy).

I'm glad your husband is seeing a psychiatrist, but sometimes mental health professionals are woefully undereducated on the subject of alcoholism. I've known more than a few people who sought therapy for their problems but instead of addressing the drinking, the therapist thought if s/he addressed the underlying causes of the drinking the alcoholism would magically go away. The problem is, people who drink regularly are very seldom in the mind-set to actually benefit from talk therapy. They're always gaming and getting the message that they have an "excuse" for their drinking doesn't usually help them. Rather it just makes them more creative gamers.

"I'm actually clinically depressed. What I really need to do is address my mental health issue and once I get that taken care of I can drink normally." How do I know that oh-so-common sentence? I said it myself. In fact, people who do that are just medicated alcoholics. The more successful response is, "I need to get sober. And when I achieve that, I can also address my depression ... if I even still have it." But that's a lot harder. It doesn't fit "there's a pill that will fix me" attitude of many Americans.

You have a tough row to hoe, but you can do it. You have to accept that you might not have any pretty results for a long time. It might feel worse before it feels better. But from what you write, you appear to be assessing your problem honestly. Having a hard look at the truth and realizing the inevitable progression of this path you're on is the first step to getting on a new path.

Good luck!

[donkeykong]

Wow, everyone here is worried about the fact that he is "breaking the law." Seriously, who cares about that? If he gets caught again, then consider him one very lucky guy.

The real scare is that sooner or later he will hurt or kill someone else. The drinking is hurting himself and your family only, but drinking and DRIVING is a complete reckless danger to society. If that happens, you will have some serious guilt about letting him "fall on his face" without intervening.

If you can't help him with the drinking, you must absolutely step up about the driving or else you are just as liable for anything bad happening (morally, at least).

Don't sit by idly waiting for something horrible to happen, there are innocent lives at stake. And the innocent are usually the ones who perish in situations like this. It's not rocket science, you hear the same story every week.

Prison is the best possible outcome here, by far.

[breakingbad]

Donkey...if you read through the entire thread, I think you will find most of us are in agreement with you. Drinking kills and they should do serious time if they get caught.