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At the end of a rope


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WrongvsRight

Hi all, I have never reached out on the internet but decided to give it ago.

I absolutely love my wife and spending time with her. We have had what I thought was a lot of fun and a great relationship for the past 25 years. I have help her and support her fully thru the years and made sure her every need was taken care of. We worked thru a sexual encounter she had the 1st time we were apart that she did not tell me about 20 years ago (I found out thru trial and error).

I NEVER asked what she was doing, who she was with or told her no to anything she wanted to do.  She had my complete trust and freedom with all the trimmings. But every time she is not with me she always says she has issues with her phone. Now keep in mind when she leaves I NEVER have an issue with it as I do not dance or like hanging out with a bunch all woman.

Then the bomb shell happen and hit me like a ton of bricks, she told me she has been depressed for the past 20 years. I tried to talk about it with her but honestly I dropped the ball and missed the signs. Now please keep in mind my wife really never tells me anything, I mean anything good or bad. Like she wanted to go back to work so I said great, but when she gets a raise or anything goes on (again good or bad) I do not get told anything, even when I ask. She wanted to continue her education and get a degree, hell yes I was onboard. I always made sure she had a nice home, nice cars, nice clothes, trips and everything she wanted in life. I always love being intimate with her but after the 1st few years it was a one way street, I had to go to her. When we had our kid she wanted to stay home and again fully supported it and gave her money and anything she needed (traded in the monster truck for a mini van). I had just started my company the February before her birth so I was working from 5am to 7pm and sometimes later.

I am not trying to sound like the perfect husband but in all male & female opinions (not mine) I was a great provider and husband.

The Signs missed:

My wife always drank (I am not much of a drinker) but she was putting away a huge amount of alcohol when I started noticing. Please do not judge me as my wife drinks diet coke all the time and I do not check what she is drinking or what's in it, nor do I visit the liquor cabinet a lot.

She started loosing interest in me and sex.

She started going out of her way to lye when she did not have to.

She wanted to spend time with friends over time with me.

She says she tells me things or she will do things when she does not.

This lead to our 1st real blow out and me asking her to leave.

So I decided to speak with my aunt who specializes in this sort of issue and she suggested a Therapist specialist (which she was) but she did not want to get involved as it was family. Her and her husband are like 'Therapists on steroids' and highly respected thru out the country. Basically the over several phone calls and talks we figured out that something traumatic happened in her past and now she has become an alcoholic to deal with it. She agreed to get help and I had her stay in the spare room until we could get things back in a good direction and was going to monitor and stop drinking as much as she can. Then her dad past and best friend moved away literally at the same time all this was going on. Again I overly helped with the dads passing.

Sorry for rambling on but wanted to give you a bit of background. 

SO THE QUESTION IS, please read below and answer.

So she went away on a work trip last month (again phone issues) and sent me a text that she just got back to the room and was wiped and was getting into jammies to settle in for the night 7:05pm. Since this has been going on we have kept our son really involved as it effects him as well (18 Years old) and he was watching her fall apart.. My son was next to me at the time of the text and grabbed his phone. I said what are you doing, he said dad mom tracks me, but I can track her. I felt ignorant as to this was going on but I said ok. within 3 minutes of her sending the text she was on the move to the bar. And let me tell you, this app he has tracks you to within 10ft of your location. She was in the bar until 9:30 as far as the bar receipt goes. The next morning she texts me "ON A COFFEE HIGH' and that's it. The last time I have ever seen her drink more than 1 coffee was when she was hung over.

So she gets home and does not tell me anything about the conf. So I ask, she said she had a great time and offered not asked they were back in the room a 7 every night in bed.

Please remember, she is trying not to drink. When I confronted her about the lie she told me it was "none of my business",  got angry and said so what. then she said they decided about a half hour after they got back in the room to go to the bar which I know is not true.

She said none of the above are what she told me was a lie, when I said you told me you were back in the room at 7 in jammies. She said we were back in the room at 7 so that is not a lie.

Am I just an a$$ or is this an act of deception and or a flat out lie.

 

 

 

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2 hours ago, WrongvsRight said:

Am I just an a$$ or is this an act of deception and or a flat out lie.

Yes it’s a lie. Your wife is an alcoholic; lying comes with the territory. She’s not serious right now about quitting drinking. For an alcoholic it’s not something you try. If she’s serious, she could start going to AA meetings. And if she’s not serious, then I think you’re going to have to decide whether or not you want to stay in the marriage. 

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Your wife has issues with alcohol.   Check out a support group called Al-Anon.  It will help you understand her better  

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Lotsgoingon

Wow, you sound in denial, like you're barely able to face reality.

I am so sorry. What are you facing is devastating and demoralizing. But you gotta face reality that your wife is deeply troubled. You have to move away from doubting this and into figuring out what to do. 

Definitely investigate Al-anon. And you might start with googling phrases like 'how to deal with an alcoholic spouse" or 'my wife/spouse is an alcoholic."

Alcoholics (and other addicts) frequently lie and hide. That's part of the condition--otherwise, they now people would object to how much they are drinking. And right now, she is literally dependent on that alcohol. Time to get going here. 

Sounds to me like you have worked really hard to be a super fair husband, but I don't think you have been fair to yourself. Partners have a right to be skeptical and worried and do some checking when a spouse acts strange. You seem to have kept some kind of distance such that you didn't really know your wife and you missed signs that she was deeply troubled and an alcohol addict. That's not fair to you--you had a right to know some of her life a lot better. Partners repeatedly earn our trust and we theirs. We don't just blindly give the trust and close our eyes.

 She had my complete trust and freedom with all the trimmings. But every time she is not with me she always says she has issues with her phone.

There is NOTHING good about giving someone your complete trust when they haven't earned it and when their phone always breaks down--which is total and obvious nonsense. Your job is to protect yourself and your children as well as to look after her.  In fact, the best thing you can do for her now is to come fully out of denial and start to get ahead of things. You may not be able to save her--don't assume you can.  Addicts have to want to conquer their addiction. And that can take time--sometimes they never get to that point. In the meantime, protect yourself and your children. 

It's far past time that you stop trusting her. 

 

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WrongvsRight

Thank you for your input. I will go one step further and say she has been in therapy since December for this issue. One thing that concerns me is I do not feel she is telling the therapist (addiction and trauma specialist) the entire truth about us and her drinking Therapy started in December and I got involved in July. Example: her therapist classified her as a 2 out of 3 alcoholic prior to me getting involved with her drinking (3 being a full blown from what I understand). To me if the Therapist knew she was putting away 1.5 gallons of alcohol at home per week and then who knows what when she was out it would have been a different outcome. Now she is classified as a 1 because she limits herself to 5 drinks a week but who knows what happens during the day or when she is out. 

Also after I did this post she had therapy a day later. I asked her to ask her therapist to do an exercise with her and tell her what happened that weekend to see if her therapist interpeptide what she did as a lie or to see if I over reacted. I told her she had to be honest if she wanted an actual opinion. And sure as the day is long she did not tell her the entire story.  She left out what I feel is the most important part. Which to me is that when she told me about the 3 days she was gone she offered (I never asked) and reaffirmed the in the room by 7pm thing twice. That was the truth or lie breaking point.

My fear is over the years that I may have caused her some of the depression without knowing. Prior to her having a several day affair back 20 years ago we were really into each other and she always wanted to be physical with me and shared her life to an extent. Now looking back that was really a turning point, I had turned her life around so she now had security: home, cars, no money worries and it meant so little to her that she would just throw it away. I was keeper her at a bit of distance since it happened. She never really shared what actually happened and I know what little she told me was to spare my feelings and I am sure alcohol was the key factor. 

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Going to a bar at 7pm after a conference is very very standard in my industry. I don't have any issues with alcohol, but I personally prefer to not drink when I'm out with work colleagues, and yet I'll still go and order a non-alcoholic drink - it's a standard part of networking. Everyone just goes, including teetotallers.

That being said, there are obviously deeper issues with your marriage and her alcoholism in particular, so I can understand why you'd be concerned about her (although policing someone to the extent of tracking their location while they're on a work trip would also be concerning to me). Have the two of you tried MC to talk this through?

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WrongvsRight

Agree with you that 100% of a conf situation is having a drink after the fact, I have done it dozens of times. The issue is one I have never had an issue with any type of substance and the little white lies do not need to be in the picture at all because in the 2+ decades we have been together I really have never had a trust issue. If I go and do something good or bad I can not wait to share it with her, whether it be as small as I stubbed my toe to I got a bonus at work. My life is an open book to all who are interested.

My friends think I am nuts when I say to them when she goes out she can dance with whom she likes as long as she comes home to me and is honest. They see it as a disaster waiting to happen when alcohol comes into play. Now mind you my wife is not a trophy wife.

Since this is fresh and she needs to work on her issues with her Therapist I am hoping she is open to some sort of MC when she is done.

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The hiding and lying are coherent with alcoholism. That’s all I can say based on the limited amount of information.

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23 hours ago, WrongvsRight said:

Agree with you that 100% of a conf situation is having a drink after the fact, I have done it dozens of times. The issue is one I have never had an issue with any type of substance and the little white lies do not need to be in the picture at all because in the 2+ decades we have been together I really have never had a trust issue. If I go and do something good or bad I can not wait to share it with her, whether it be as small as I stubbed my toe to I got a bonus at work. My life is an open book to all who are interested.

My friends think I am nuts when I say to them when she goes out she can dance with whom she likes as long as she comes home to me and is honest. They see it as a disaster waiting to happen when alcohol comes into play. Now mind you my wife is not a trophy wife.

Since this is fresh and she needs to work on her issues with her Therapist I am hoping she is open to some sort of MC when she is done.

She does need to work on things with her therapist, but you two can do MC at the same time. There's no reason why one needs to be done after the other - therapy is best used as a long-term thing and lots of people do MC and IC simultaneously.

I can sympathize with your feelings and your concern about her alcoholism. However, I don't think that tracking her phone and policing her behaviour will be beneficial to either you or her - this sort of controlling behaviour by a partner tends to make things worse, or at least not any better. Her alcoholism is for her and her mental health professional to handle - your options are to either stay and support her, or decide that you can't be with an alcoholic any longer and separate.

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