Daughters of Alcoholics Support - Page 11

[greenjenny]

hello,

I was so, excited?, relieved, hopefull to see this thread. My dad is an alcoholic too, he has been forever- long as I remember anyway. My parents are divorced, Ive never lived with him, always with my mom. We have a pretty ok relationship now, as long as I always remember that I am the adult not him. He is remarried and his wife is great but she is an enabler-excuses, excuses. I have never been to a meeting-just stopped outside the door. I have VERY VERY addictive tendencies, and I feel Im a lot like my dad. I do not drink alcohol at all. I have long since given up on the fairy tale that he will quit, and have come to terms that I will have to let go of him too early. he adores my kids and they love him too, I hate thinking that he is drinking it all away. ANyway I just wanted to do a quick intro and say hello- so hello

Jenny

[Staceyhsmom1]

hi
me too. I am an acoa. It took me all this time to admit that tho, I knew my dad was an alcoholic of course, but because my parents divorced when I was 7 I thought being an adult child didn't apply to me. plus I abhore my own stigma on being labeled, I don't like my past choosing who I am today, thus here I am. silly me.

so my parents were old, my mom was 44 when she had me and I have(had) 2 older siblings. My dad died a few years ago, I forget how many, I wasn't that close. As an adult, his slurred speech and quick temper made any contact awkward for me. He was sober for over 12 years when he died of liver disease and he was a huge aa advocate.
my mom never drank, was an enabler, she gave my brother his last drink, I can't stand her for so many reasons, I have so little love, so little respect, so little compassion for her, she's 80 now and I can't stand anythign about her. She lives with us and I worry about how transparent my issues are with her and them effecting my kids.
my brother also died of alcolism a few years ago. I've outlived him :-(
My sis, who was adopted, and is 11 years older, is sober now, more then 15 years, I forget now.
And my dh has been sober for 12 years, he went into rehab before our son turned 1 :-)

and I just entered theraphy. about time! I am so ready and so unaware of all the 'work' I'll have to do that I was avoiding.

we were mostly neglected in various ways as kids. now that I have my own kids I see things, recognize issues, etc and don't want to repeat any of my past. dh and I struggle with communication, tho we are working on it, we've come so far from how we were raised, we don't want our children repeating the cycle. 'how long til my soul gets it right' by the indigo girls is just replaying in my head these days!

oh, and I went to al-anon years ago for several years, it did help. alot. If you're not getting anything out of it, I would try a different meeting.

and, I just read a good book for over eaters who are acoa called feeding the empty heart by barbara mcfarland

...going to read the other posts....

[Galatea]

Originally Posted by Staceyhsmom1

and I just entered theraphy. about time! I am so ready and so unaware of all the 'work' I'll have to do that I was avoiding.

My 12-step work is nothing but a joy as I peel layers of my onion. Good luck!

[LauraLoo]

Hello. I'm an ACOA. I'm hoping this thread hasn't died out.

My mother went through AA recovery 22 years ago when I was in high school. I've just recently discovered that she is most likely.....no, she IS addicted to rx pain meds and sleep aids. I have no idea how long she's been on the rx stuff. She's traded one addiction for another. I'm sadly realizing that I never knew my mother and probably will never get to know her. My father is completely co-dependent. My mother was the emotional absent alcoholic. She was also emotionally abusive. I "survived" by being the good daughter with strong perfectionistic tendencies. I never wanted to ask for help because I thought it was a sign of weakness. This time, I'm asking for help.

As I read through this long thread, I realized that I should have gotten help a long time ago. I had no idea that a lot of my behavior/personality was because of the environment I grew up in. I had no idea that our family dynamics were and still are affected by my mom's past and present addiction. I know that may sound strange, but I honestly thought that since there was no physical abuse or abandoment, that my mom's issues were only my mom's issues.

I hope there are people that still check in on this thread. I'm starting out and I could use a little encouragement right now.

[yogamama]

Hey LauraLoo - It sounds like you have alot of insight. The issues with your mom sound tough - I'm sorry for what you are dealing with right now. Sometimes it really sucks, doesn't it?

I find it useful to read ACOA literature or go to an ACOA website when I am struggling with family issues. Also, I know that I am pretty healthy and I work on accepting what I can't change.

Blessings.
Kathleen

[MommyofPunkiePie]

Hello LauraLoo.

I don't have any advice for you, as I'm still working my way through my issues with my father's alcoholism and Mother's co-dependence. It's a tough row to hoe, but I think we have all been led down this path for a reason.

We are all strong enough to learn from our parents' mistakes, and we learn more every day.

[Galatea]

Originally Posted by Galatea

My 12-step work is nothing but a joy as I peel layers of my onion. Good luck!

Hah! I don't feel this way anymore.

Now I just accept myself as I am; try to talk to my father when I can, but do not see everything through the lens of alcoholism. Leaving all 12-step programs has given me a ton of peace and happiness. I got tired of feeling like everyone was sick and defective.

[granola_mom]

Originally Posted by meowee

I can't be the only daughter of an alcoholic here, right?

Have you ever attended an al-anon meeting (I haven't)?

Do you trust you parent(s) around your children (I don't)?

Do you talk to your kids about alcohol, do you tell them to avoid it (I do)?

I am also the daughter of an alcoholic parent, more specifically, my mother.

I have attended al-anon meetings, I don't trust my mom around my DD, and as for DD and alcohol... she's only 8 months old right now, but I plan to give her the truth when she is ready. I don't drink and I will tell her why. I will tell her about family members who have had problems drinking, but also show her examples of people who successfully enjoy it in moderation, so she can model after them if she does decide to drink. I must allow her to decide for herself, as I believe she has to discover the truth for herself and I want her to know I trust her and that she can make her own decisions based on informed consent. Although drinking for me is a painful subject, I remind myself how I discovered alcohol and am debating the subject of letting her try it in the safety of our home instead of having her discover it on the street where she is vulnerable to other dangers.

[Leatherette]

Anyone else dealing with this? My mom went into treatment a year ago after 25+ years of heavy drinking. She had stopped talking to me 6 years ago. Now she says she wants to talk, but when we did talk two weeks ago, it was all about what an awful person I am. She lies about the past, blames outside events for her drinking - mostly me as a teenager and my father, who is dead. She refuses to take any responsibility for her behavior (which was actually worse when sober than when drunk) or the damage that her drinking while we were growing up caused. It's all about her victimhood.

I guess she has some alcohol-induced brain damage, but I think the majority of the "memory loss" is a subconcious effort to protect herself and her image from the facts. My instinct is to write her a letter that tells the truth about what went down for the last 20 years and say, "You need to accept the truth and deal with it, then we can talk." Is this just totally counter-productive, or what? I can't sit with my mouth shut and continue to be blamed for her problems in order to have a "speaking relationship".

I was doing so well, too. One 45 minute meeting with her has thrown me for an emotional loop for two weeks. I have indignantly been replaying the truth of what happened to me as a child in my head as I try to make sense of her "version of the truth", and wonder if we can ever have a relationship that isn't about her blaming the victim.

L.

[fishface]

My dad's an alcoholic. He is sober now. He was sober for I think 3 years but got really stressed and had a couple beers so he had to give back his coins to AA and start over. : Well, that was a few years ago.

My dad is my best friend. He is bright, hilarious, and a great father. Last weekend my BF and I visited his parents. They started going on and on about how after reading Barack Obama's biography and finding out that he had done cocaine they would not vote for him. I think they mentioned him being an alcoholic or maybe another politician. Boyfriend's mom went on a rant about how alcoholics are terrible people and she would never, EVER vote for someone with a history of alcoholism. It was such an angry rant and I didn't want to get into it too much but she defended her position by saying "OH I KNOW ABOUT ALCOHOLICS, MY UNCLE WAS AN ALCOHOLIC". Well effing congrats, lady. Since your uncle was an alcoholic you obviously know ALL ABOUT alcoholism and every alcoholic who has ever walked the planet. My boyfriend and I were trying not to flip out as we tried to explain that you can't judge people by past mistakes like that. Everyone has some demons they've overcome.

This is what I wanted to say to her, but I couldn't, because if she knew my dad was a recovered alcoholic she would probably hate him. (I assume after learning about what a nut she is after her comments):

"Have you ever seen 'It's a Wonderful Life'? You know how Jimmy Stewart's character works every day to make sure the people who are having financial trouble don't end up homeless? That's exactly what my dad does. (we have lots of rental properties in our town) After September 11th, a lot of people in my town were laid off, including several of our tenants. My dad didn't evict a single one and told them to pay him what they could when they could, and together they would get through it. One of his laid off tenants was sobbing because she couldn't even afford a cake when her daughter graduated from high school, so my dad bought the girl's cake. Oh, and my dad was an alcoholic. He's been sober for several years. He's my best friend and one of the happiest, most intelligent people I've ever met. He never cheated on my mother and never hit either of us. He was never mean, he acted STUPID when he would get drunk. Alcoholism doesn't define him, nor does it automatically mean he's a sloppy violent drunk who can't be trusted."

It'll be a week tomorrow since she said that and I'm still really, really stung by it. My post doesn't do her angry ignorance and hurtful words justice. :

Have you ever attended an al-anon meeting (I haven't)?

Do you trust you parent(s) around your children (I don't)?

Do you talk to your kids about alcohol, do you tell them to avoid it (I do)?

My DH also had an alcoholic parent growing up. We're as dry as can be. DH would not even sip the champagne at our wedding toast.

-- I have not. I decided to a few months ago but it just was not possible with my work and school schedule. I would have had to drive over a half hour away in the evenings. It was my last quarter to wrap up my BA and I decided to put Al-Anon on the backburner.

-- Yes, I trust my dad with my life and the lives of my future children. I would even if he was still drinking. He was an alcoholic but I guess I would say he was a mild alcoholic. Still an alcoholic nontheless.

-- When I have kids I will talk to my kids about alcohol and explain our family history of alcoholism.

-- BF and I drink. He has no history of alcoholism other than this uncle of his mom's. We'll have a beer with dinner or a margarita at happy hour or something. Sometimes I drink to get drunk. Sometimes I'll go months without a drink of any sort. I'm not concerned about myself.

[LauraLoo]

Originally Posted by Leatherette

She refuses to take any responsibility for her behavior (which was actually worse when sober than when drunk) or the damage that her drinking while we were growing up caused. It's all about her victimhood.

I guess she has some alcohol-induced brain damage, but I think the majority of the "memory loss" is a subconcious effort to protect herself and her image from the facts.

I just posted not too long ago about the realization that my mother still has an addiction problem, but this time it isn't alcohol. Interestingly, you are describing my mother's behavior in many aspects. As a matter of fact, I think because she never got over being the "victim" that she has relapsed. I don't think she was ever truly recovering, only "not drinking." I believe that this behavior is called being a dry drunk (?)

My mother has taken the "memory loss" one step further and now she is re-writing history. She'll take a story and change it up - usually to make herself look better. Of course, these are the events that I know the real truth about. I wonder if she actually believes these lies. I don't think she is doing this to put anyone else down.

[fluttermama]

I'm glad to have found this thread.

I am just finding out now that my father is probably an alcoholic. He has been violent and unpredictable my whole life but we all just thought "dad's moody" and "you know how dad is...". It suddenly clicked two weekends ago when we were at my parent's house getting a birthday present for ds. Now I have seen in the past few years how dad always has to have wine with dinner...always or he gets really angry and moody. He gets moody around 4:30 and everyone around him has to stop what they are doing and we all go out to eat somewhere where alcohol is served. Okay...so we were over there at 2:30. My dad ends work at 2, goes home and drinks some wine. We come back to their house from visiting my grandmother for an hour and he is asleep. My mom wakes him up to see ds open his birthday gift. He comes out and violently kicks his dog twice across the deck, and I tell him to stop in front of my kids. He sits near me and I smell wine really strong. Suddenly he starts talking really really loud to ds saying the same question over and over. Then he jumps on me about my business website and all that I should be doing and that he will do for me if I just give him my passwords, etc. We all go over to their water slide/kiddie pool. Suddenly he picks up the dog, throws it at the slide and knocks my dd off of the back of the slide!!! Then he goes down the slide head first and breaks his glasses. Then he repeats the behavior with the dog. He's violent, goofy, smells like wine. We decide to leave b/c I am really really uncomfortable and angry that my was launched off the slide. I get an email a few days later about how my dd seemed upset when we left b/c she would have liked to go to dinner with her grandparents like they usually do from my mother. I tell her that dad's behavior with the dog and with my dd falling was unacceptable and that I think he was drinking too much and that we will leave every time that happens. She sends a very cold email back to me about how I expect too much from this family and that I expect perfection from people. Dad is "very hurt" by what I said and that he certainly wasn't drunk and that there is nothing wrong with a bit of wine. And that my dd wasn't upset about falling off (uh, wrong) : . Then she says that he was just excited to have the kids over and that when he is excited he becomes a kid again and that is just dad, so deal with it. : : I am so mad!!! She completely covered up what was obviously alcohol impaired behavior!! Is this normal enabler/co-dependent behavior? How can she NOT see the obvious right in front of her?
Suddenly it hit me while driving home in shock that this is exactly how he acted when I was a child. He was erratic, violent, etc., and suddenly I thought, "OHMIGOSH, he has been drinking all of these years???" I sent an email to my brother which confirms that my dad has been drinking a long time and that he thinks that my dad is an alcoholic, too, but my parents can't see it. They think that he can control the drinking and he only drinks wine and doesn't walk around drunk all the time so he can't possibly be an alcoholic. It's a little shocking to know why I lived in such a violent home! It is freeing at the same time to know WHY and to know why I won't ever repeat what they did.

[sparklemom]

She completely covered up what was obviously alcohol impaired behavior!! Is this normal enabler/co-dependent behavior? How can she NOT see the obvious right in front of her?

i am frequently astounded by my mom's ability for the same type of behavior. she denies all reality for the sake of appearances. i think you must be right...it's normal enabler/co-dependent behavior. sad, and so frustrating, hurtful and just plain pisses me off sometimes.

[MommyofPunkiePie]

Originally Posted by sparklemom

i am frequently astounded by my mom's ability for the same type of behavior. she denies all reality for the sake of appearances. i think you must be right...it's normal enabler/co-dependent behavior. sad, and so frustrating, hurtful and just plain pisses me off sometimes.

I agree. My Mother has not lived with my alcoholic father for 15 years, yet she still has enabler/co-dependent issues with my brother. My brother is not an alcoholic per say, but he is a gambler.

She always complains that she does all this work all the time and never gets to rest, but in reality, she is washing (and ironing) his clothes, washing his dishes, cooking him meals, and doing other *chores* he should be doing (like cutting the grass, shoveling snow, taking out garbage and recycling, etc.). He's 26, still lives at home, and makes more than twice what my Mother makes (but doesn't contribute to the food budget, go figure). He does pay the water bill and the DirecTV bill, but that's less than $150 a month. She enables him to live a carefree lifestyle with no responsibilities.

Sorry about the rant, but I'm beginning to think that co-dependedncy is a dis-ease that is just as valid as alcoholism. It needs to be treated because it is not healthy.

[Galatea]

Originally Posted by sparklemom

i am frequently astounded by my mom's ability for the same type of behavior. she denies all reality for the sake of appearances. i think you must be right...it's normal enabler/co-dependent behavior. sad, and so frustrating, hurtful and just plain pisses me off sometimes.

My mother has 6 years sober herself and yet she refuses to discuss my father's renascent drinking problem. When I was in high school, he used to sit with a bottle of whisky by his recliner and get really nasty. He slowed down to just one glass of wine when she quit, but recently he has been so mean and nasty, and my mom accidentally let slip that he was drinking whisky again. I have been avoiding him, b/c he is so irrational when he is drunk (he actually wishes I didn't get married and have kids, as though I had a time machine or felt that way myself). And then the next day, he is all sweetness. I didn't know until recently that this was part of his alcoholic behavior. Sad, huh?