7 years gone...

[caroline78]

First of I would like thanks everyone whose posts I have read and which have given me the confidence to post my own problems.

 

This will be long but please bear with me and try and help me out.

 

I have been with Chris for just over 7 years and we have lived together from day one in my flat. I signed for the flat the same day I met him and he was living with his sister at the time so it seemed to make sense for us to move in together. We got engaged four years ago and have not made any firm plans to get married yet. We have no children together but Chris has three from a previous relationship.

 

For the first few years everything was fine and we got on great although Chris didn't work due to some injuries he suffered from and he also had depression. After about 18 months I realised that Chris always drank too much when we went out, and he sometimes went to his sisters for a drink and never came home for up to a week.

 

At the start when he went missing like this I used to panic and phone everyone, only to be told he wasn't there. I know now that the entire family have a drink problem, including Chris.

 

He has been to the doctors loads of time for help and we have tried all sorts of solutions to the drinking but nothing seems to work for long.

 

Then when we had rows he started to hit me, and I know everyone here is now shouting at their pcs telling me I should have left him years ago, but he was always so sorry and never did it when sober. When he is sober you couldn't meet a nicer quieter man. His family have always told him that he is no good and will never amount to anything so instead of trying to prove them wrong he seems to accept that what they say is true.

 

The last few years have been extreme highs and extreme lows. Chris has had a few jobs and never seems to hold any of them down due to taking so much time of with hangovers and still being drunk.

 

Two years ago we wouldn't get up to go to work and we had a row and he hit me again so I phoned the police and had him arrested. He was in court for that about 12 months ago and got a suspended sentence for 18 months, so still has 6 months to go on that.

 

In order for him to get a drink he sells things that I have bought him, I normally make the mistake of going round the shops and buying him the things back again. As soon as he gets money he goes away for days at a time and I hear nothing from him till the money runs done and his family don't want him hanging around unless he has money or drink.

 

So far this year it has been awful. We had a row on New Years Eve which ended with me being hit, and then the next morning he said he was so sorry. I told him that this was it and he was never to hit me again. He agreed with me that he wouldnt drink again. Then on the Saturdaym 2 days later, when I got in from work he had already gone out walking 10 miles into town to sell a PSP and games which I had bought him for Christmas. He came home on the Sunday night and took the Mon, Tues off work due to being sick. Then this weekend I decided for the first time in 7 years that I was going out without him....He tried to start a row before I went but I went anyway. He sent a message saying he was sorry and he loved me. I didn't answer it, so he phoned and I basically told him I was not spending my night out on the phone to him. I tried to phone a few hours later but he wouldnt answer so I assummed, that he had gone out. I decided to stay in my friends house and got home at 10.30am on Sunday. He hadn't gone out at all, but he never even phoned me to see if I was okay all night.

 

Anyhow on Sunday then he went out and I thought I have finally had enough so I packed his bags and brought them so his sisters house, who lives 2 minutes away from me. He then phoned all night and I told him to either come home or leave me alone.

 

Monday night I got my Mum to call down and see what he was for doing and he told her he would be home that night and that he had sold his Ipod, another Christmas present which cost me £200, for £25 and that is where the drink came from.

 

He never appeared and today I have phoned loads and he has phoned me. The last talk was me telling him to go away and not to phone me again, but I really dont mean it and am sitting here in tears at the thought of not being with him.

 

I know if you read this then you are probably going to tell me I dont need to be with him anyway, but I know that it is only the drink making him do these things and if we could get the drink sorted for once and for all then we would get on great.

 

 

Any advice you can give me will be greatly appreciated...

[caroline78]

I should have added on that I have thrown him out before and he knows that I will take him back. He also has no job and no money and apart from when he is drinking at his sisters he has no where else to go. His family don't want to know him unless he brings money or drink with him. Also I am 30 and he is 34

[theBrokenMuse]

You're doing nothing but enabling this man and harming yourself. It's obvious you don't think very highly of yourself and continue to rationalize and apologize for his emotional problems and his abuse towards you. Why don't you think you deserve better than this? The guy is a bum (as my grandfather would so eloquently put it) and things aren't going to improve in your life unless and until you find the courage to extract yourself from this situation for good.

[Billy Bob]

Please go back and re-read what you have written. You are together with an abusive unemployed alcholic.. and no kids in the mix. You are definitely co-dependant with this guy. Get yourself into independant counseling, fix whatever is wrong with you and kick this bum to the curb.

[mark982]

even tough you love him. this guy has a boat load of problems. starting w/ you bailing him out of his mistskes. then there's the hitting issue. the list just goes on and on. this guys just going to drag you down w/ him. he hit you again while on probation? call the cops. toss his stuff out and forget about him.