It is so heartbreaking for those of us that are left behind. At the root of all of it is an intense lack of understanding for the nature of this addiction. I just keep feeling that we are good people who are blaming ourselves for deserting our most precious loved one in their most urgent hour of need. I myself feel as though I treated my husband’s alcoholism as a behavioral problem that he was submitting all of us to on a daily basis; and that all he needed to do was have the courage and conviction to quit. This belief of mine was born of ignorance and lack of understanding for the disease of alcoholism. It caused me to become angry and extremely intolerant. Its tentacles spread throughout the family. I yelled incessently at him and sometimes at my children like some heathen beast because I was so angry. But it was so much more complicated than that. It was bigger than all of us. To have that person gone; the I loved with every grain of my being is just such an attack on love and human dignity. In losing my husband I have become a more compassionate person. It is almost as though I have learned an invaluable lesson in the power of love and patience and understanding. I want to take that with me for the rest of my life and live in this new way with my beautiful husband guiding me every step of the way. I’m doing my masters in teaching at 55 years old and I am going to try and bring healing wherever I go from this point onwards.
