My Best Ally

I am madly in love and have been for twelve years.  We've been married for two.  When he came into my life, I had just began to cope with life's struggles by drinking a glass of wine or two almost daily.  We are both free spirited and wantonly treated each evening together as a celebration of our love and shared a bottle of red each night from the start.  We were inseparable and so our wine drinking became a nightly ritual.

Over the years as I've become more aware of drinking's negative effects on me, I've quietly been trying to control the problem through mediums such as this, books and willpower.  My husband has humoured my bouts of abstinence with respect and bewilderment.  Never really knowing why I put myself through the pain of not drinking, he played along each time I tried to quit.  He drank when he felt like it but usually a little less when I was on a quit.  Often he could take it or leave it.  

I sometimes tried to explain to him that I had to stop drinking because my mind worked differently than his but he didn't seem too interested so I just dropped it. 

This evening, I proudly announced that it was day eighteen of my abstinence, and Hubby, good naturedly, congratulated me.  He asked if it would really hurt if I had a couple of drinks once in a while.  I, then, realized he really needed to understand alcoholism and it's cumulative effects. 

I began by detailing what has happened each time I've quit drinking and after a few days or weeks decided that one drink wouldn't hurt.  I went through the cycle of that one drink turning into two the next night, three for a few nights in a row followed by a drunk which might include vomiting, peeing myself, difficulty walking, accidental burns or bruises, a rude remark, a slurred telephone conversation, a three a.m. anxiety attack, a massive headache, heart palpitations or a combination of any of the above.  

I explained that I've wasted literally hours each and every day for many years either drinking, suffering from the physical and emotional effects of drinking, trying not to drink, devouring material on how to stop drinking, planning to drink, drinking, .. and the cycle goes on.. 

I reminded him that when we share a bottle of wine, I always get more than my share.  He laughed at that because I am under five feet and a welterweight.  I told him that, in reality, it wasn't funny that a tiny woman like me drank as much or more than her big, construction worker husband.  We had another chuckle when he reminded me that we often opened the second bottle and finished that too.

I pointed out the gradual escalation of humiliating events I've put myself through in the past few years and he agreed that he would never let himself get to the recent level of my drunkenness but that he associates drinking with friends and having a good time.  He solemnly stated that he thoroughly enjoys drinking and would never quit.  I indicated my respect for his right to drink and that I was not concerned about his drinking.    

I winded down the conversation by asking him to agree that, although he is not going to quit drinking, if he had to, he would find abstinence very difficult, if not impossible.  
I just needed that feather in my cap.  He agreed and told me how genuinely proud of me he was and that, now that he understands, he will support me even more.  I thanked him and warned him that ten years ago, I was where he is in my drinking pattern and to be aware of his drinking's trajectory at all times.

That was the first time in the years of fighting this disease that I've enlisted the help of my soul mate. He listened with his heart and he will be my greatest ally in this most challenging fight to the death between me and alcohol. 

For that I am grateful.