What can a young woman find in Al-Anon?
Welcome to First Steps to Al-Anon Recovery from Al-Anon Family Groups. This is a series of podcasts to discuss some common concerns for people who have been affected by someone else’s drinking.
Today we have Erika with us. Erika is a member who was dating a young man who had a drinking problem before she came to her first Al-Anon Family Group meeting.
14 Comments on “What can a young woman find in Al-Anon?”
Erika is very fortunate to find Al-Anon so that she can learn that a healthy relationship is important to her well-being and her life. An addicted person who is not willing to seek help cannot share a healthy relationship with their loved one. Not because they don’t wish to, but the active addiction makes it impossible.
Your story gives me some sort of hope. I live with a functioning alcoholic. I have never been to an Al-Anon meeting. It was suggested by my counselor to attend a meeting. It will help me deal with living with an alcoholic.
I’ve focused on everything else but myself. Now it is time to focus on “ME.”
Your story is truly inspirational.
My sister and her son, age 8, have just moved into our home. It was impossible for her to pay her bills, so my husband, 3 girls, and I concented to her moving in with us. I knew her son needed to be in a safe, stable, and consistent environment, but whether or not she was able to relinquish independence, privacy, and secrecy, he was and will be with me. She did move in, but dealing with and detatching from her is a tremendous task. I will be attending an Al-Anon meeting for the first time. God will help me to walk by faith and not by sight.
I have fallen in love with an alcoholic who is nine years into his sobriety. He protects his sobriety very well and I admire his strength. Most people would run for the hills as soon as they learned of the alcoholism. We do not reside together. I live in another state. He is the leader of the A.A. meetings and I go with him to listen and learn what I can when we are together. Although I cannot wear his shoes, I am willing to walk this path with him.
We have been seeing each other for three months now. I asked him if he had developed any “feelings” for me, he replied “yes” and said these feelings were very confusing and it would take time for him to sort them out. I don’t understand.
For five years I have been married to a man who has a serious drinking problem. He is mentally abusive on a daily basis–when he is drinking. He is a “functioning alcoholic” and still makes about $160,000 a year. When I met him we liked to drink beer and have a good time. Now, every time he has more than three drinks (he drinks whiskey now) he gets very mean and tells me I’m not worthy of him. I admit I haven’t been the best “housewife” the last few years, but I just don’t have the energy to do anything after dealing with him.
I have three children (not his)that I feel like I am constantly having to apoligize to for his behavior. I feel like (and so does his family) that if I leave him he will drink himself to death. Not over a period of time, but maybe all in one or two nights.
I love him dearly, so I’m at a total loss about what to do. My children have had to listen to him on his drunken rages and I don’t feel like I can help them recover if I keep putting up with this disease. I still like to have a beer or two now and then, but every time I do he throws it in my face that I shouldn’t be preaching. I quit drinking at all for a while and he was just as mean, so I don’t know where to go from here.
I have been in Al-Anon for a while. I am having issues with my family.
I have been in Al-Anon for almost three years. I can definitely see changes in my behavior, but still have issues with letting go. My husband is an addict and has had his share of relapses in the last three years, which is how long we have been married also. This last time I was convinced I had enough and wanted to get a divorce.
The problem is that when he comes back and tells me it’s going to be all better, I believe him–as much as I don’t want to, I do. I’m not sure if he has been faithful to me when he goes on these drunken and drug binges, and it’s starting to drive me insane. I want to know some examples of letting go and letting God. I say it over and over but it doesn’t seem to help because it’s only words. I’m not actually putting that slogan into use. I’d like some ideas on how to work this slogan.
I find myself very frustrated. I have a “functional alcoholic” husband who seems to be becoming less functional. I would say for about three years things have been progressively getting worse. It seems to take more and more vodka to kill his pain.
My daughter is a senior in high school and doesn’t even live with us, because she is tired of putting up with it. This situation has really torn me apart. I feel like maybe, one day, he will change. So far, it seems to be a lot of empty promises. It started out like someone else said above, they promise to change and not drink, but it doesn’t seem to work.
I also have another child who is a teenager and very tired of all of this! I feel like I am stuck in this rut with so many decisions to make and don’t know what to do!
I feel like I have given my husband every opportunity to change. I have warned him and warned him.
I just want him to get help and change. He tried going through a behavioral-health program and ended up quitting.
I am very frustrated and just want a better way of life! But I don’t feel like I want to leave him, because if I do I feel like he couldn’t be trusted to be faithful to me.
I come to this website today, because I have many people saying, “If you’re not going to leave, you need to at least go to the Al-Anon meetings.”
I’m with my ex who I know goes and drinks every chance she gets. I’m not sure she is even faithful, and it hurts so much–the things she says to me when she gets in her moods. I’m working my program harder to see where I could change me to let go and let God. I let her effect me in too many ways and I even blew up at her. I’m starting to have my own impulsive urges to spend and drink, and I just want to forget all the hurt and pain. I can’t believe the person I let myself be without my program. Thanks to the serenity prayer and my program, I’m functioning one day at a time, slowly sometimes, even one second at a time. Hopefully.
My husband is a functioning alcoholic and we have been married for 5 years and have a 4-year-old daughter. He is in total denial about his drinking. Our marriage has gone further and further down hill with every year. I have threatened to leave and I have asked him nicely to stop, and he makes excuses for everything he does. He does not do anything that does not involve drinking. He actually believes that drinking beer does not count as alcohol.
There is no intimacy in our marriage, and no communication. I truly believe he is a good man, but with a sickness. But I have come to a point that I can’t save someone who doesn’t want to be saved. Parts of me want to leave and just erase this mistake I have made. I have tremendous guilt for entering into a marriage and having a child with someone I knew to be an alcoholic. The more he drinks, the more hurtful he is towards me. He says things like, “Well, you’re fat. Just stop eating and I’ll stop drinking.”
I feel trapped, confused, sad, angry, hurt and alone most of the time. I thought that maybe if I just ignored it, the problem would go away. A friend thought maybe I should attend an Al-Anon meeting. I am scared to go because that means this whole thing is real, but after listening to this podcast maybe there is some hope for me to learn how to deal with this and find the strength to stand up for myself and my daughter.
I feel the same like everybody else. My husband is a functioning alcoholic. He does not get mean when is drunk but it does hurt me so bad to see him like this. I don’t have kids and I don’t even know if I want to have kids w/ him when I see him drunk. I feel lonely because I can’t tell anyone. I can’t tell my family, friends.
I’ve been in a relationship for a little over 3 yrs with a guy that is a drug addict. If he doesn’t have drugs he will replace that with alcohol. He OD about a week ago and almost died. He has lied so much to me about his habits. I knew he was using but I didn’t know the extent of it until he OD.
I am not myself , and haven’t been for a long time. I know this is a very unheathly relationship for me. I know my life is consumed by worrying about him and his addiction. He now has nowhere to live. Almost all of his family n friends are shutting him out. Besides the people that have the same addiction.
He is severely sick and wouldn’t take the help the hospital offered. He signed himself out and wouldn’t stay to get better. He thinks he can do this on his own. He has been battling his addiction for maybe 15yrs. It’s just completely out of control. I love him and care for him so much.
I want out but always seem to go back because he promises to get help and stop. But how many times do I have to deal with the fact of him dangering himself or others around him. I’m afraid of him when he is wanting to get high. I’m afraid to leave, thinking he might get even more depressed and OD again. It has affected my life to where I barely talk to my friends or family, have called off work because I’m so depressed. I pray every day for the strength to move on and get my life back!
I have been dating my boyfriend for about 6 months. When I met him, he had just completed 3 months of sobriety (which he thought he could never do). For the first 3 months of our relationship he was sober and I completely fell in love with the man that no one had ever seen in him. He is an ABSOLUTELY amazing person. The problem is about three months ago he began drinking again, slowly at first and now I suspect it’s almost every night.
At first, he told me that he didn’t want to go down this path again, but now he thinks it’s all OK. He carries a lot of baggage from the horrible life he’s had and is such an incredibly sweet man despite all of that. I hate his drinking and I worry about him, but most of all I hate the time that he doesn’t spend with me because he is preoccupied. I refuse to give up, I love him too much. I think that perhaps I should try an Al-Anon meeting, but I guess I’m kind of hesitant and don’t know if it will help.
I have been with my boyfriend for 2 years. When I met him his great grandma would constantly give me talks on how I should tell him he can’t be with me if he drinks. At the time I blew it off, I didn’t want to see the signs. At first I didn’t realize he was drinking and driving with me in the car. I think the day I finally understood the severity of the problem was when he drank from 10 am one after another till 7 at night while we were at the the Long Beach Grand Prix.
I was crying to him to stop and he didn’t care. I finally realized that my safety, my feelings, did not matter. He stopped for a month and started again. Every time I see him with a beer in hand I start to loathe him. I feel like I’m not good enough for him to stop. I don’t know if Al-Anon can help. I guess I’m just scared.