Wife Not Supportive In Recovery

[JohnC]

Hello Everyone, I am fairly new to sobriety, having been sober for just six months. I am wondering if anyone else has had the problem where their wife is not supportive during their recovery. I have asked several times for her to show me some encouragement and support but have received none. The last six months have been the most difficult time of my life, having dealt with the court system, counselors and therapists. I feel totally alone.
I have been doing fairly will in the AA program and have discussed this with my sponsor. I am wondering if anyone else there has had this problem and how they have worked through it. My wife is not an alcoholic and has really not done anything to explore al anon or research what alcoholism is all about. I am basically at my wits end with this and dont know what to do. I have heard that sometimes in recovery an alcoholics wife does not like it when the alcoholic becomes sober.

[snugsnug]

:77:john, my experience when i got clean was similar to yours. my wife did not want a thing to do with recovery. however she was using, and you say your wife is not using. anyway i got clean for me. i had to or i would die. i was just sick and tired, at the end of the road, with nowhere else to go. today we are together, she is in recovery and we are living a life worht living. i would suggest letting her go through what she has to go through.

[Crankie Yankee]

Hi John,
I'm fairly new to recovery myself. Even though I was never married to the mother of my child, I can relate to recieving no support from the woman in my life. In fact she used to put drugs and alcohol in my face while I was trying to stay clean and sober only to turn around and threaten to have me drug tested via family court. In the past I have begged her to go to Al Anon and have tried to beat her in the head, so to speak, with the AA big book. I believe, like many other people in recovery, that Al Anon, just like AA, is for people who want it not need it. Ever since I stopped trying to impose anything on her and concentrated on what I need to do, we have become much more civil towards eachother. I still think she is a sick and twisted lunatic, but that's really not for me to say or do anything about. My point is that we in recovery have to do what's best for ourselves and keep our own side of the street clean. Whenever I get to the point where I think I'm at my wits end, I say the slogan that I learned in AA. "Let go and let God". I know we aren't in the same exact situation and all I can tell you is my experience, but letting go and doing what's best for me always helps when I get jammed up in any situation I don't like.
Mike

[Bruce T.]

I have learned through bitter experience that what the BB says is true - I can't depend on other people, places, and circumstances (a rough paraphrase) for maintenance of my sobriety. I must depend on God as (I) understand Him.

All my best to you,

-b

[kaistevens]

I'm Kai, I'm an alcoholic.

The BB does talk about the family afterwards. It can be tough, it is a big change taking place in a home. I was a single mother through most of my drinking and at the time I sobered up. My son was 15 at the time. He was fed up with me, and tired of the drinking and me not coming home until early morning, so when I said I was going to check out AA, he hugged me and cried and was all for it.

Problem was, not drinking wasn't the only thing that began to change about me. I got around to being somewhat of a parent, with rules, and boundaries, and the balance of life as he had come to know it was thrown WAY off. He would NEVER say to me that he wished I would go back to drinking, but when I was drinking, there were A LOT of things that were messed up in my life.

Because I was a black out drunk, I just don't remember many of my encounters with my son when I came home blasted. But my last drunk, I remember it clearly.

I had gone out to 'my bar' at around 9 and would be home around 11 or 12. There were friends there and they were buying, and I got ripped. I don't know where I went, or what I did, or with who. I do clearly remember walking through the front door of our little house, my son is pacing around in the living room with the cordless phone in his hand, he looks up at me and says, "It's 5:30 in the ****** morning, where the ***** have you been?!?"

Now, just what is wrong with that picture? Needless to say, as I started moving forward and growing in my sobriety, I started trying to behave more like a parent, which started to pose a REAL problem in the balance of his life. So, just as my drinking profoundly affected his life, so did my sobering up.

As far as the tough times you are going through, well, I have a pretty tough answer to that question. I work with people who are court ordered to attend drug and alcohol classes as an alternative to prison. And this is what I tell them.

Society, in this nation, this state, this city, has run out of and lost all compassion for those of us who have abused ourselves and those around us for drugs and/or alcohol. They are tired of us risking THEIR lives on the roads, and costing THEM money when we take out an electric pole in their neiborhood (?), and steeling from THEIR homes, or businesses, raising THEIR auto insurance, and on and on and on.

Our families are very much the same. By the time I got here, I had received, and taken for granted, and flat out abused, years and miles of support and compassion from my family. This, I was going to have to do without them, because until this actually worked, it was just another something I was trying.

That is one of the many reasons we call this a WE program and we work with other alcoholics. First of all, we understand each other, and second of all, most of us have burned a lot of bridges by the time we get here. So, there is a period of 'proving ourselves' to our families, that we can help one another through.

Try to see it from her point of veiw. These troubles you are going through with your counselors and the courts, well she's going through them too. And I know they are expensive, mayber expenses that she had not budgeted for.

As far as wanting her to go to meeting, WOW, what a slap in the face! Did she ever ask you/ want you/ need you to get help? Did she ever beg you to stop? Did you? The first time, or the first six months, she asked?

Now, it may be your turn to be accepting and tolerant of her. Which is a principle that you are trying to learn anyway. How long has she stood by you? Have the tables turned?

Just a thought.
Kai

[Just42Dave]

its strange how our loved ones concentrate so much on wanting us clean then after the fact feel as though we are cheating them and dont want to support but remember...they dont know what to do either now that the chaos has died down :29:

[Just42Dave]

hang in there pray about it and keep doin the next right thing and itll fall into place....and when the times right maybe talk about it and see her side

[anniemac]

Hi John,

My husband wasn't at all supportive. He was jealous of me being out, getting phone calls, making new friends, and was threatened by the change in me. I had been the "designated patient" and since I was getting better, it shifted the entire dynamics of our relationship. He felt blind-sided; I changed the rules and that scared him.

I stopped pleading with him to support me; I learned quickly that that was a big waste of my energy. "Keep the focus on yourself" was repeated to me over and over again; so was "step over the bodies". I knew that if I didn't stay sober, all bets were off. If I did stay sober, anything was possible. So I put my faith in that, and did what I needed to do.

I won't pretend that my marriage was in it's healthiest state at that time; we barely spoke for quite some time. However, after some sobriety and Step work, I began to see how much of a part I had played in the destruction of the marriage and at that point we began to rebuild it.

Some things take time. In the meantime, keep putting one foot in front of the other and make your sobriety your priority.:97:

[crystal]

Hello, You don't have to worry about your wife supporting you, God supports you and your decisions.All you can do is pray for her,Gods got her He can do much more than we are capable of.:17:

[JohnDaniels]

I realize this is an older topic, but I have not been to this part of the forums until today.

I have often heard of this happening and have heard of the many reasons why it happens. I think that often times the spouse of an alcoholic is also suffering from the "affects" which his/her spouse's alcoholism has had on him/her. The entire family is suffering until they find something that works for them. Many times it is the Alanon Family Programs. Others have found ways that work for them to grow and develop.

When I arrived in AA I had previously been married and divorced 3 times, so I had no wife to try to convince that she needed my help. If I would have had a wife at that time, I suspect she would have likely been filled with anger and resentment over my past actions and she would have very likely been very skeptical of anything I had to say about getting her well. Especially after the Hell I put her through.

There is something that happens to many of us after arriving in AA. We go through pain and torment for a while. At that time for me I would descibe it to people like, "This is not just your ordinary pain and torment! This is the kind of pain that would kill your ordinary man! This is alcoholic pain!" (typed with tongue in cheek as I grin here)

Then many of us eventually have a seemingly overwhelming feeling of joy. We are filled with a new sense of energy that causes us to do things other people outside of AA would not consider, like staying out at coffee houses til' 2 or 3am discussing how great our newfound sobriety is. Many have called it a "pink cloud".

When I first heard that term I was offended by it. I would have preferred it being called "a sense of well being" or something like that. What ever the term is that is used to decribe it, it is something I think we all have had or all will have. But if you haven't had it yet, don't worry, you will. If you are presently in it now, don't worry... it will get better.

I was a very literal person when I arrived in AA. I took everything to heart the oldsters had to say. Somewhere in the beginning I heard one of the oldsters say we should not do anything big in our first year nor should we make any drastic changes that first year. I listened intently and I took that to heart also and to the very literal sense.

I met the most beautiful young woman I had ever seen in my life during my first year and we fell in love. Being the literal person I was at that time, I was not going to do anything big during my first year of sobriety, so we got married the very next day after my 1 year AA birthday. It was an enormous wedding with a few hundred AA members. My best man was a guy who helped me in the beginning to get into AA. My usher was still wet and I was helping him get into AA. He eventually got into AA.

The difference in my marriage this time was this time "in love" I was able to understand that "love" is something for me to "give" and not something for me to "take". Love was about making self sacrifices when I didn't feel like making self sacrifices. It was about making her life better and easier and not telling anyone about what I did. It meant being selfless instead of selfish and that came by way of taking certain selfless actions that over time helped me to become a more selfless husband. These things don't come overnight. They take time, practice, self discipline, understanding, patience and faith.

In my case, my new bride was more than happy to come to AA meetings with me. We made an enjoyable evening out of it as we still do, which starts with a movie or something else we enjoy, an AA meeting, then dinner out. She was skepticle of Alanon though.

I wanted her to try Alanon but like I said, she was skepticle of it. The way I did it was sneaky and scheming. It is a common ploy that many Alanon members play on their alcoholic spouses when they want their spouse to go to AA.

I took all of the reading material out of our bathroom a little at a time and I slowly replaced it with Alanon reading material a little at a time. Whene ever she was in there, I was pretty sure she as reading the Alanon material I sneeked in there. In time he trips to the bathroom became longer as I placed more and more reading material on the back of the toilet. If you are going to try this ploy, it has to be done with thought and planning.

Start slowly by removing a less read magazine of hers on the bottom of the stack on the back of the toilet. Replace it with some Alanon literature. Keep an eye on it to see when it has been moved from the bottom of the pile. Then replace another magazine with some more Alanon literature. This scheme worked in my case and later on brought us many hours of laughter when we talk about those early days.

Another thing that worked in our case was prayer.

Best wishes

[sioux]

It is like us alkies to want to be trusted with the keys to the car the minute we take our first sober breaths. We are so focused on instantaneousness that we can't for a minute recall that time takes time for those around us too.

Our loved ones have had it with the broken promises, court dockets, infidelities, lying, stealing, cheating, budgets blown to hell. Nothing happens in recovery over night.

In truth, gratitude may be in order for the things and people that you have managed not to drive away physically. Emotional and spiritual recovery for those around us requires time for them too.

[Montauktammy]

Ok my mom and dad they hate the fact that I go to "those meetings" and they do support me after 6 years they will take care of my child while I go to "those meetings" that is about it. They have never been to one of my anniversary nor has any other member of my family. What I have to remember they should not be proud of me for going to "those meetings" there feeling is all the things I have learned in meetings and step work is stuff I should have been doing all along. I should not be running around to crack houses while they are taking care of my child or bouncing from bed to bed with who ever. It took me a long time for my parents to trust me to keep my child and know that I was going to come back and pick her up that night, or do any thing I said I was going to do, because I was not doing the right thing for so long I had to do it for a while before they would believe that I would do. "Those meetings saved" my life I can tell you there is a bit of jealousy with my mom on that one she is the one that gave birth to me and she could not save me. Well I go to meeting and work my steps any way I don't want someone else who is not in the rooms to support me in my recovery, that is why I have friends in the rooms of recovery and a sponsor. They know what it is like to be me. My parents have no idea, how could they support something they can never understand?
Tammy

[e7100]

I have brought this issue up in groups. Sometimes a wife gets used to being the hero, cleaning up after the alcoholic's or addict's messes. It gives her a role and provides meaning for her. So you being sober creates a hole in her life.

I went to al anon and bought two books for 20 bucks. You can read the meditations and it helps both people recover. You could also check out nar-anon
(sp.) literature.

[e7100]

I have brought this issue up in groups. Sometimes a wife gets used to being the hero, cleaning up after the alcoholic's or addict's messes. It gives her a role and provides meaning for her. So you being sober creates a hole in her life.

I went to al anon and bought two books for 20 bucks. You can read the meditations and it helps both people recover. You could also check out nar-anon
(sp.) literature.

[Mr.Willing]

well i am a married addict as well
my wife is not using
i always think that if only that woman would change i would feel better
working the steps has taught me that i am powerless over others but i am not powerless over my own actions
most of the time i find myself demanding for more from her
the truth is that there is at least a 50 - 50 possibility that the whole situation relies on what I do ...
so i focus on my own actions...
i totally understand how u feel
whenever i find myself stuck with those thoughts i talk about them and seek help
i sometimes as well speak with my HP and pray
my experience