A sad story... love, sex, addiction and... divorce?

I’m new here, so be patient. This is going to be a bit long. Married 20 years, 3 kids (oldest 18, youngest 9). I’m 45. After the birth of our second child, the wife started taking anti-depressants for anxiety, without telling me. Before that, our sex life was ok. After that, it went down the drain, because of the lack of libido. Anxiety stemmed from her not enjoying her job. She was also quite tired, given the children and the full-time job. She finally told me about the anti-depressants. I started putting pressure on her for sex and she hated it. I never dealt with someone on A-D and didn’t really know what to do. I was lost. I started drinking, moderately at first and then quite intensively, maybe 5 or 6 glasses of wine every evening. Despite being highly functional, I can say, in hindsight, that I lost the plot, as far as my marriage was concerned.

Obviously she despised me for not being man enough and deal with the situation. Instead I drowned my sorrow in the bottle, feeling sorry for myself and being spineless, the victim. I definitely had a drinking problem, but I did not consider myself an alcoholic (my consolidated average was about 6 glasses of wine every evening). I was still working full time and making quite a lot of money, supporting the family. Life seemed quite “normal” to me, despite the underlying problems.

Fast forward to 6 months ago. I finally decided I had to stop drinking and I did. I also stopped smoking. I thought this would be the solution, the bee’s knees. How wrong I was! The damage was done. Things weren't quite going swimmingly and we went to MC. Didn't work out. We realized that the gap was maybe too big. Talked about separation and divorce, but we decided to stay together, for the sake of the kids.

Don’t get me wrong, we do get along ok, but I’m sure she doesn’t love me anymore. We have sex maybe 3 times a month and that’s ok. My problem is: after all those years of numbing myself with alcohol, I've just come to the conclusion that I dislike my wife! The blindfold is off my eyes and I can see! I dislike many things she does and especially her style of educating the children.

This has been a great great shock to me. I thought that, by giving up alcohol, everything would be ok and now I find myself in a family world I can’t stand! I adore the children and I don’t want to leave, really. But I’m seriously unhappy. I know I ruined everything with alcohol, but I was naive at the time and didn’t know how to deal with the situation. I got caught in a spiral. I didn’t have friends or family I could talk to. I checked out. I cound't take it. I got my priorities incredibly wrong. But what can I do now? Leave? I don’t think I can inflict more pain to the children after all these years of being an absent father...

Thank you for listening...

so, you've been sober for 6 months... and now you hate your family life? I suppose alcohol was the crutch that kept you going? I really don't know what to suggest. Can you talk to your wife?

SSRIs - anti-depressant medications - can play havoc with a person's sex drive. Is she still on them? When a couple's sex life starts to tank, the rest of the relationship usually follows. The booze wasn't much of a help either.

So, if understand correctly, you figured that once you dried out things would automatically improve?

The thing about addictions is that there's often this assumption made that defeating the addiction (as it seems you've done, and props to you on that) will somehow make the rest of one's life rosy.

But it very seldom works like that.

Once the cloud of alcohol is lifted, one sees the situation they're in more clearly. And what you're seeing isn't in line with what you'd like.

The way I see it, there are three choices:

1. Keep going the way you are now, resign yourself to the fact that you're stuck with this woman and just try to make the best of it;
   
2. Go into counselling, preferably with your wife (though if she refuses, go on your own) to re-frame your situation
   
3. Ask her to leave.
   

Undoubtedly there are permutations of these three choices that you could consider, but I think they're all based in these here.

you've been sober 6 months,even though you were a highly fuctuning drunk,you sober up and realise you dislike your wife. all i can tell you to that is,when i first started aa they told me "don't make any life alternating desisions for 2 years". alchol leaves a fog that's not gone just because you're not drinking. it takes time for your brain to adjust and think clearly w/o the booze(or wine in your case).what you do is ultimately up to you but hate to see you make some"life alternating desisions" that you might regret.

congrats on the no drinking!

when the alcohol is eliminated - the reality can be brutal. do you go to AA meetings? if you are willing to participate in your recovery you can gain a new perspective and a new appreciation with clarity for what your life has in store for you.

whether or not this may include staying married will become more clear if you work a strong program through AA and do your step work with a sponsor. good luck... keep doing "one day at a time."

thank you. Well, I gott off the booze and cigarettes on my own. It wasn't that difficult, maybe I wasn't as addicted as I thought I was, but I doubt it.

It's funny how after all these years I created an image of my wife which wasn't true. It was all in my head. I always felt incredibly guilty about my drinking, in fact, so guilty that I stopped arguing about stuff. What was the point? All I got back was "your drinking, your smoking"... despite I worked my guts out to keep the family afloat.

I suppose the communication ended many years ago, when I gave up. My wife was never a big talker, expert in bottling things up. I chose the wine. It was "only" a few drinks in the evening. Never drank during the day (I could not, with my job). But family routine was unberable. I did know I had a problem, but I was highly functioning. I enjoyed drinking, but I gave up because I felt so incredibly guilty. I just could not take it anymore. And now it's even worse! I never felt "foggy", only a bit lost after I stopped, you know like when you lose a dear friend...

I don't know if we can go back to MC. I can only ask, but I don't know if I love my wife anymore...

P.S. I don't believe in God and therefore I never went to an AA meeting...

She is still taking SSRI

aa meeting are not about god. they are about a higher power.

and in AA you get to decide what exactly you choose for your higher power... it can be anything at all - as long as it is more powerful than you.

this in itself opens up endless possibilities if you approach it with an open mind.

it is a program that has given me so much freedom from myself... and the capability of understanding how i can be the best me - i can be. and more importantly how i can help others along the way too.

Okay so you sobered up and the world isn't the way you thought it was..yeah. That's usually how it goes.

I agree with the other posters that say AA is not about believe in God, it's about a higher power. You said you stopped drinking on your own, that's great!

I think you and your wife have some heavy duty talking to do if you have any hope of being happy again. Addicts usually don't consider what they are going to be left with once they are clean/sober and not tuned out of the world anymore. I think you should tell your wife everything you told us about how you felt about your addiction. See what she says.

You're sober 6 months and have concluded you don't like your wife, don't like the way she educates and cares for the children?

You need AA, to help you get an idea of how your checking out via the bottle has impacted on your family. At the point when your wife probably needed you most, you decided that because she wasn't sexing you up enough that you'd pick up a bottle and check out, leaving her to wrestle with her own depression and anxiety alone, as well as everything else going on with the kids.

Get to an AA meeting, don't sit way in the back, raise your hand and say "I'm new" take the sheaf of phone numbers that will be offered to you, call some of those people, go with them to meetings, get a sponsor, join a step group.

You might be sober but it's not the kind of comfortable, good life that recovery can bring. Get to a meeting.. tonight.

thank you. I'm still not sure about the "higher power" thing, but I'm prepared to give AA a shot. The thing is, I'm totally agnostic, but I suppose I can find my own type of spirituality. It won't be easy. I have done a lot of thinking and self-analysis and I think my next step will be IC.

As far as my marriage is concerned, you are totally right, soserious. When my wife needed me most, I chose the easy way out. I wasn't strong enough. But she is not depressed, she is adamant about this. She is anxious. I suppose it doesn't really make any difference, although with the tablets she is absolutely fine. In fact, she was - and is - so fine that she doesn't seem ill at all, hence my request - in the past - to meet some of my needs as well.

I really feel guilty about this and I can't believe I've messed up so much. I can't believe it's happened to me. I'm on the way to recovery, after being an absent father for such a long time. I was there physically, but not mentally.

I know I need to talk to her about this, but the thought of a confrontation, or even just a discussion, a conversation, terrifies me. I want to dig a hole in the ground and disappear...

I am not sure whether AA is right for you or whether an alternative is better. I was surprised by the references to god did a quick google. Here are the 12 steps:

 

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable.
   
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
   
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
   
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
   
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
   
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
   
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
   
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
   
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
   
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
    
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
    
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
    

As copied from http://www.alcoholics-anonymous.org.uk/geninfo/05steps.htm and found elsewhere on the web.

Just a few references to god in there so if you are agnostic, pretty hard for you to sign up to in my opinion. I am not trying to knock you or the AA but don't want you going down a route that may not suit your beliefs.

well, I do understand that you can substitute God with your own higher power/spirituality, etc. The problem is - as far as I know and I'm told - that many meetings are populated by people who do talk about God all the time and if you are not religious it's very tough. Also. there are many aspects of the 12 steps I don't agree with. I'm not discounting AA totally, but I know that it will be very difficult to find a meeting where the emphasis is not totally on religion... maybe a more "secular" one.

My problem right now is not as much my addiction, but how to deal with my life now that the addiction is gone... I suppose it's the recovery bit and it's difficult. It's not the bed of roses I imagined... I want to be there again for the children, but I don't know how to tackle all the problems in the relationship with my wife...

HAve you and your wife talked about what separation or divorce would look like? Maybe the two of you would be much happier. I know it's not an easy exercise, but it can sometimes be helpful to playout what divorce would actually look like, emotionally, financially logistically. Writing out a pro-con list.

You should feel great about cutting out the booze, but like other have said, it just makes your situation clearer, not necessarily better. But, you have a clearer head to make better decisions.

I too am stuck in that marital middle place purgatory where I am not in love with my husband anymore but have a small child and our logistics work on many levels. But I wonder if I am destined to have a lonely heart. Never thought I would fine myself in a marriage of convenience.

I wish you luck.

a separation/divorce would be a financial disaster for us. We would have to sell the house (I couldn't afford to rent a place and still pay the mortgage) and therefore eradicate the children from the place they grew up in and that's not what I want. I removed what was blinding me (alcohol) and now I can see why I was drinking!

Unfortunately, we lost each other... in our problems. We couldn't or wouldn't talk and I felt so rejected all the time. I was just too resentful and too busy licking my wounds. We got to a place where we don't know each other anymore and we lost all the affection and intimacy. I know my wife is having sex with me to keep me here.

It's all so sad and overwhelming that sometimes I'm tempted to go back to the alcohol. I know that I won't, but I can't see a way out of this...

Yes. I think IC would be a great idea for you. More personalized than the AA would be. I'm also agnostic and while I don't have a problem with a "higher power" or "God," I imagine that those meetings would be difficult. With IC, you'd have a place to vent without judgment, but also could have some assistance to find more constructive ways to deal with life rather than alcohol.

I commend you for the recovery. Keep up the good work. Each day is a new day. You're doing great.

thank you for the kind words... I know that the addiction side of it can be seen as such a destructive aspect of my problem - and it obviously was in the past - but I never doubted that I could recover. I knew I had it in me. Same with the smoking... it is indeed not very easy to find the right balance after all these years. I'm a bit reluctant to speak to my wife, since we are so distant. Everything is very superficial or gravitate around the children. We haven't hugged for months and the only closeness I get is from the seldom sex... I'm actually terrified of having to talk to her, knowing all the hurt I caused. I'm just really scared...

Looking for a good psychotherapist at the moment...

Were you ever in love with your wife, what was it that attracted you to her in the beginning of your relationship?

Were you ever in love with your wife, what was it that attracted you to her in the beginning of your relationship?

yes, I've been in love with her for many years.... she was strong, independent, self-assured and funny... but the endless rejections just hurt me too much and I slowly fell out of love with her. I know, we should have talked, but I tried and got nowhere. I underestimated her burden and her problems and selfishly chose to drink instead. I gave up on her. And I'm sure she stopped loving me as well. Who wants to love a pathetic little man, with no spine? Who wants to love a drunk? I chose the wrong path, but I didn't know anything at the time. I was lost...

I think you really need IC. After you work yourself out, maybe revisit the MC.

I'd also recommend starting a new hobby or revisiting an old one that you used to have. You put a lot of time, energy and money into drinking and smoking. Try putting it somewhere else. Your life and your family life may recover and become more pleasant.

The fact that you say you're terrified of talking to your wife at all is a frightening concept. If you're even going to live with your wife as roommates and not lovers, you're going to need to do better than that eventually.

First, I want to congratulate you on quitting alcohol by yourself. Despite what many think, this is not all that uncommon. And IMO you do NOT need AA if you can stay off alcohol by yourself. A little research will tell you what you are now dealing with...you have an emptiness where you once had an addiction. The question is...what will you fill it with?

As for your wife and ADs, I understand what you mean, but it did not/has not driven me to alcohol or any other addiction. I wonder whether there were other things that drove you to alcohol.

Maybe I missed it, but what was the state of your marriage prior to your wife taking ADs? Could it be that it was not the ADs that caused the sex to diminish but the lack of communication between the two of you?

I think there is more than the ADs causing you to drink and the lack of alcohol causing you to not like your family.

in the AA book - it has a whole chapter to the agnostics.

each person there has their on idea of what their higher power is TO THEM.

this can be anything - or nothing. it's up to you. many people choose the group as a whole... since this tends to be " a power greater than myself."

when people in a meeting refer to their God - all i do is turn that in my head to be MY OWN idea of My higher power. it's as simple as that. it is not a group where anyone needs to believe in the same higher power. as long as it works for YOU and YOU believe in it - that's all that matters. it is also up to you whether or NOT you may want to ever reveal what or who your HP is to you.

no one is there to tell you how your recovery will look to you - everyone gets to have their own experience.

usually, the group discusses everyday matters and how to handle staying sober and share your experience, strength and hope with others.

 

As for your wife and ADs, I understand what you mean, but it did not/has not driven me to alcohol or any other addiction. I wonder whether there were other things that drove you to alcohol.

 

Maybe I missed it, but what was the state of your marriage prior to your wife taking ADs? Could it be that it was not the ADs that caused the sex to diminish but the lack of communication between the two of you?

 

I think there is more than the ADs causing you to drink and the lack of alcohol causing you to not like your family.

we were absolutely fine... but after the second baby, she started taking the ADs and that's when it "went wrong". You know, a woman's libido is already close to nil after a baby (tiredness and so on) and if you add the ADs to the equation, you can understand that hers was non-existant.

What did I do? Instead of being patient, I started putting pressure on her. The whole thing became really ugly. I felt rejected - she didn't even want to "help" in other ways, it was a total blackout. She hated being under pressure. Having sex was such an ordeal that many times I planned to leave. But I couldn't, because I wanted to be there for the children.

I was having the odd glass of wine at the time. And those became a few every night, to drown the pain. It's funny, because on the surface we were getting along, but sex was a nightmare. Basically, by putting pressure on her, I ruined our marriage. Was it my fault? Probably. But I didn't know how to deal with it at the time. I just felt so rejected. It was even more hurtful because with the meds she was absolutely fine. But if she felt any pressure, sex was off. If I didn't put any pressure, sex would never happen. And she would not discuss it.

Over the years I suppose I stopped loving my wife and she stopped loving me. I'm not surprised she stopped loving me. I was pathetic, all words and no action. Miserable and spineless. I felt trapped. I wanted my wife back and I could not. I wanted out, and I could not leave.

So, now that the fog has lifted, I find myself in a dreadful situation, where I have no crutch helping me go through this torture. I'm still scared to even hug my wife, because I've been rejected so many times before. She is giving me sex to keep me here, to keep the family united. I don't know what to do. I hate myself for what I have done and I can't see a way out without hurting my family even more. I've been selfish enough in my life and I suppose it's my turn to help my family.

Is it possible for you to give physical affection (i.e., kiss, hug, backrub) without it being sexual? Perhaps she rejects the hugs because she thinks it's about sex. I don't imagine she'd keep giving you sex if she was completely done with you. I sure wouldn't. Once I'm "done" with a guy, having sex with him is so not cool. She wouldn't be trying to "keep" you with sex if she didn't care at all. Since you chose a selfish way to deal with the problem at hand, she's choosing to push you away. Now it's time to bend over backwards to show her that you care about the marriage and want to fix what you did. It'll take time. It'll be hard. There'll be days you just want to quit. But every single day is a new commitment to be made, a new chance to show her that you ARE in this 100%. It'll be a long journey, but you can do it. I'm sure she'll be skeptical of any changes for awhile. Just keep at it. If the changes are genuine, they'll last no matter what happens externally.

But again - IC would help TREMENDOUSLY. So you have somebody you can vent to and get yourself right with YOU. Once you feel stronger, then you can perhaps find a relationship counselor or MC and go by yourself to get help with what you can do to rebuild your marriage.

And forgot to mention above...do little things to show her you appreciate her without sex in mind AT ALL. Do not expect anything in return - just give. Honestly, when you serve somebody, you start loving them. And I'm not talking all romantical, butterfly love. I'm talking the deeper love. The kind of love that you should have had built up at this point in your marriage.

Is it possible for you to give physical affection (i.e., kiss, hug, backrub) without it being sexual? Perhaps she rejects the hugs because she thinks it's about sex. I don't imagine she'd keep giving you sex if she was completely done with you. I sure wouldn't. Once I'm "done" with a guy, having sex with him is so not cool. She wouldn't be trying to "keep" you with sex if she didn't care at all. Since you chose a selfish way to deal with the problem at hand, she's choosing to push you away. Now it's time to bend over backwards to show her that you care about the marriage and want to fix what you did. It'll take time. It'll be hard. There'll be days you just want to quit. But every single day is a new commitment to be made, a new chance to show her that you ARE in this 100%. It'll be a long journey, but you can do it. I'm sure she'll be skeptical of any changes for awhile. Just keep at it. If the changes are genuine, they'll last no matter what happens externally.

 

But again - IC would help TREMENDOUSLY. So you have somebody you can vent to and get yourself right with YOU. Once you feel stronger, then you can perhaps find a relationship counselor or MC and go by yourself to get help with what you can do to rebuild your marriage.

 

And forgot to mention above...do little things to show her you appreciate her without sex in mind AT ALL. Do not expect anything in return - just give. Honestly, when you serve somebody, you start loving them. And I'm not talking all romantical, butterfly love. I'm talking the deeper love. The kind of love that you should have had built up at this point in your marriage.

I stopped giving her hugs ages ago, exactly because I know that she thinks that I'm being nice for sex... and I don't think she's done with me. She has told me that she still cares very much for me, she just doesn't love me as she used to...

The problem with all this is that I don't know whether I want to "re-new" my relationship with my wife. I don't know if I still love her. I don't think so, after all we've been through. Hence my dilemma. I've come to the conclusion that I'd like a new life, really, but I can't go through with it because I've been selfish enough in my life. I don't want to cause even more pain..

Also, I know that you all probably have an image of me like someone who used to be permanently drunk, but it wasn't like that. I do admit I had a problem and that I had to stop, but I only drank in the evening and seldom more than a bottle of wine. I do admit though that I was selfish and put myself before everything and I disconnected from the family. I was there, but I wasn't...

So, it looks like IC is the answer at the moment. Maybe I'll be able to learn more about myself and what I really want, although I believe my person should take second spot at the moment.... I'll see if I can muster the courage to talk to my wife...