First post

So frustrated that I tried to make a blog SO anonymous that I can't find it myself. I knew I made the user name/password too hard...and of course I didn't record it anywhere. I poured my heart into that first post, and now have nothing to show for it.

Here goes nothing...take two.

I'm married to an alcoholic. Our ten year annivery is coming up in March. I've known from the beginning that he was an alcoholic. I came to terms that I was an enabler and went on with my life. We had fun together. It's fun taking vacations when the main thing on the agenda is to sit in a beach bar and drink. It's fun to spend most nights, pre kids, in a bar with friends. It's great to sit home and finish off bottles of wine every night.

As I said, I knew he had issues from the very start. One of my first early indications is when we were still just seeing each other. I was thirsty, took a drink from what I thought was a glass of water, and it was pretty much nothing but flavored rum with a splash of sprite. That was 14 years ago.

I could tell story after story, about the DUIs, bar fights with strangers, and knock down drag out screaming matches between us.

I was ok to deal with all of these things, because "I love him." Don't get me wrong, I still love him. But there are three wonderful, beautiful children in the picture now and it is my SOLE and PRIMARY job to protect them.

I/We fought tooth and nail to have those kids. I suffer from unexplained infertility and they are all products of IVF. Part of me knows I fought so hard to get pregnant, because at some level I didn't expect us to be married forever, and as I reached my mid 30's knew that it was with him, or not at all.

My kids are the best thing that have EVER happened to me. They made the 4+ year struggle of infertility worth it. The shots, the ultrasounds with the dildo-cam, the entire reproductive endocrinolgy staff having many look-see's at my hoo-ha. All.worth.it.

But, now that I have them, I have to protect them. I pushed DH hard, and placed a call to his psychiatrist and before I knew it he was in out patient treatment. This was about 5 weeks ago, and not exactly his first time at the rodeo. He's had one previous out patient treatment, and one in patient treatment. I wanted inpatient again this time, but insurance won't cover it until there is a "failed attempt at a lower level of care." Well, he has that now.

Divorce keeps pushing it's ugly head closer and closer to the forefront of my brain. As the classic enabler, I DO want to keep giving him chances, but he's now on his 8 1/2 life.

Besides the house we live in,we own a condo where we lived for the first 8 years of our marriage. Because we couldn't sell it, we had no choice but to rent it. We are currently renting to our 2nd set of renters. The first renters went swimmingly, but decided to by a house.

Imagine my surprise when I get an e-mail from our tenants last night discussing "an incident on Nov 27." Apparently, DH decided to ditch his treatment and head on over to our condo, thinking the tenants were out of town. While there, he decided to stay awhile, helping himself to their alcohol, their wine glasses and their TV. I was FLOORED, LIVID, HUMILIATED after reading this. DH, drunk last night, didn't deny it; in fact, he just thought it would go away and not cause a problem.

What planet is he from???! They are threatening to file a police report, and minimally want their locks changed and the opportunity to break their lease without notice. I don't blame them.

DH is also manic depressive. I've always thought so, but he was only recently diagnosed with this. Doctors usually told me that it was impossible to dx the mania in the presence of alcohol use. I get it, but I know my husband. They finally agreed with my lay person dx after I painted a picture of him last fall that could have earned his picture a spot in the DSM.

I mention the bi-polar only to say that the mania has been rearing it's ugly head. THere's not too much specific I can put my finger on, but it's there, waiting to be unleashed. While I do credit most of this "break in" mentioned above to alcohol, I have to believe it is also mania.

I think I can stop now. Stay tuned for what I'm sure will be some fine, FINE stories of the weeks ahead. The options at this point are inpatient treatment, or divorce. He's exhausted all other choices.