When a Loved One’s Drinking Starts to Affect Your Life

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When a loved one’s drinking has got so out of hand that it’s causing problems, it’s with relief that the family member finds he or she can seek help. With one in five adults regularly abusing alcohol, little thought is given to the damage alcoholism causes to mothers, fathers, sons and daughters.

Those in a close relationship with someone who has a drink problem are often exposed to violent outbursts and other irrational behaviour. And that’s why Al-Anon was formed in Northern Ireland – to provide help and support to those suffering in silence. Al-Anon Family Groups is a worldwide fellowship which provides a haven for those affected by someone else’s drinking.

I met one woman who has been a victim of her spouse’s drinking, and she is keen to share her story with others who may be in a similar position. Her husband has since passed away, but at the height of his drinking, their marriage was in ruins. The Ulster woman discovered Al-Anon after it was recommended by a professional a number of years ago. And for this woman, the support and friendship was a lifeline.

 ”Over the six to seven years my husband had the drink problem, I lost weight, my health deteriorated and I developed depression. My husband’s drinking caused chaos in our home and the children were upset all the time. People think that Al-Anon is like Alcoholics Anonymous and that the people are all drinkers, but this couldn’t be further from the truth.”

“The effects of someone’s drinking are horrible and it nearly destroyed my marriage.” she explained.

The woman revealed the group helped her to build up her confidence and self-esteem which had been completely destroyed when her husband was drinking.

“It is not to help the drinker,” she emphasised. “It’s to help the families of the alcoholics.”

She hopes her story will strike a chord with others who are suffering, and perhaps prompt them to come forward.

“I used to be out working and my husband would be at home,” she said. “He started out a weekend drinker and from there on, the weekend just started to get longer. He would drink anything – spirits, beer, whatever, and he would sit and drink at home. He didn’t go out to bars or anything like that. He’d just sit at home and drink. He would say it was because he was depressed and he didn’t have a job, or because we’d had an argument or something.”

And she said that alcoholics are cunning people who manipulate situations to allow an excuse for their drinking.

“He would start a row and that would be his excuse to drink. My children never ever wanted to bring their friends round to the house. He might drink on a Monday and Tuesday and stay off the alcohol on a Wednesday and Thursday, then start again on the Friday. So it was just going round in a circle,” she said.

But her woes didn’t stop there as her husband’s drinking had a profound effect on another family member. And the woman believes her husband’s death was a trigger. Thankfully, the family member is a recovering alcoholic and has got his life back on track.

“People of all ages avail of the group, both young and old, from age 16 upwards,” she said.

And the woman is keen to emphasise that no information goes outside the room.

“Everything is told in complete confidence and people need to realise that. Nothing you do or say will go outside that room. Talking about it helps you build up your self-esteem and confidence, because with me, that was all destroyed with the verbal abuse I got,” she said.

“We want people to know there is help out there and that they are not the only ones suffering. No matter who the drinker is, whether it’s a husband, wife, son or daughter, they have an effect on the whole family. And you also realise that when you think the drinker is drinking just for badness, you realise you are wrong. I learned that alcoholism was an illness. I had to readjust myself too, because I would have become angry at his drinking. Al-Anon made me realise that I could change too as a person,” she said.

The woman also said she learned that the anger she directed towards her alcoholic husband was wrong.

“Someone else’s drinking just takes over your life and you become obsessive about the drinker. It was like living with Jekyll and Hyde – he had a split personality.”

And she added: The disease of alcohol changed me because I then became the person I didn’t want to be. I had lost the real me and the drinker made me a very cross person. I now have compassion for anyone who is a drinker.”