If anyone knows what it's like to live with an alcoholic
wife it would be my husband, who for several years, battled with my addiction
with me. That's right, he battled alcoholism with me. Alcoholism is a
family affair and without knowing how to handle addiction, being married to an
alcoholic is an ongoing battle. It does not matter who is the alcoholic, wife
or husband – what matters is how you handle the affects. If your wife is an
alcoholic there is great hope in her recovery by how you manage the addiction.
Through Al-Anon my husband finally learned how to stop
enabling me and to move on with his life. "Moving on" with his own life does
not mean that he left me, but that he learned to detach from my emotional
outbursts brought on by alcoholism. We still lived in the same home, its just
now my husband was not allowing my verbal abuse to affect him. It is not the
end of your marriage because your wife is an alcoholic; it is through your
strength to overcome the insidiousness of addiction that may bring the
beginning of a new life for your wife and yourself.
It wasn't always easy for my husband, but for him just
having the ability to understand that my condition was not a reflection of him
but a reflection of my own inner problems that needed healing, made a big
difference in his attitude towards my addiction. What I'm saying is even though
your wife may blame you for her drinking, you don't have to believe that
nonsense. Anything that comes out of a drinking alcoholics mouth is devoid of
making much sense.
The alcoholic will always need to find someone to blame and
you happen to be living with her. If she lived with her aunt she would probably
blame her aunt. Alcoholics are good at trying to find someone or something to
blame for their behavior. That's because anytime they can find justification
for their drunken behavior they will certainly jump on the chance to validate
in their mind that it's all your fault. When she blames you, simply ignore it,
don't fuss or fight with her because that makes you look like the one with the
problem, and not her.
Your wife's emotional problems do not have to be your
emotional problems. Be of support and encouragement to her when she is NOT
drinking but do not enable her negative emotions and verbal spurts of abuse.
Distance yourself from her mentally, emotionally, and spiritually by telling
yourself that your wife is sick and needs healing. By walking away you
don't take the emotional abuse. Tell yourself over and over again that by not
arguing, blaming, yelling, fighting, and being verbally abusive back at your
wife you are actually helping your wife to look at her drinking as a problem.
When a husband carries the burden of the negative emotions
of his wife, the addiction will suck him in with it, and he will become just as
emotionally and mentally sick as his wife. The more you allow the addiction to
overshadow your own thought processes, the least likely your wife will get
better or want to get better. A spouse can either be a detriment to the
alcoholic or advantageous – it's all up to how you handle the alcoholic.
A husband may love his wife with all of his heart and feel
it is his responsibility to help her, and that is mostly very true, but it's
not a husband's duty to help his wife to kill herself by enabling and rescuing
her addictive behaviors – there is a huge difference here. He should not enable
her antic behaviors or console her emotional impulses. It is a husband's job to
love and care for his wife, even when she is sick, but it is not his job to
allow his wife to drain him of his own life in the process.
A husband must learn to detach with love before the
addiction strangles him too! This is the only way he will be helping his wife
to come to grips with her addiction and seek the inner healing she needs. A
husband surely does not have to feed into his wife's guilt trips – remember she
will blame you for her problems. Be assertive about your feelings and let her
know that you love her but not the addiction. Tell her you will not help her to
kill herself. That means don't give her money to buy alcohol with. Don't drive
her anywhere, even if she pleads with you. Do not carry her to bed, even if she
passes out on the living room floor – leave her where she passes out.
Don't allow emotional abuse to control what you do, or how
you feel. If your wife feels like arguing, blaming, or screaming, simply walk
away, or if that doesn't work, take the children out for ice cream. Don't stand around taking the abuse, do
something about it, for your and the children's sake. The more garbage you take
in by the alcoholic the more you will begin to believe and even behave like the
alcoholic.
Do let your wife know that you are praying for her to seek
the healing she needs. Do let her know that you love her but you don't love
what the addiction does to her. You can love your alcoholic wife when you
separate the addiction from her. God did not create alcoholics – alcoholics
chose addiction. Do let your wife know that you appreciate her and need her but
also let her know that you will not help her to abuse her body and mind. Do let
your wife know that when she is ready to get the help she needs you will be
there to support her every step of the way.
***
Angie is the author of The ALCOHOLISM TRAP. A book offering excellent advice and encouragement about dealing with the affects of alcohol addiction on the alcoholic and family. Angie counsels and encourages couples in their marriage. For more information check out her marriage ministry website at http://www.heavenministries.com -- Angie has recently started a blog on addiction where you can find useful tips and informative articles for helping others with addiction and the people who love them. http://conqueraddiction.blogspot.com
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