[shantry2020]

I was initially very reluctant to post on here. Mainly because of the shame and overwhelming guilt I know I will have when I press that submit button. But I need advice or at least someone to share their experience so I know I’m not alone.

My mum is an alcoholic and has been for as long as I can remember. I’m nearly 28 years old and her habit has become significantly worse over the last 11 years and I’m trying to understand why.

So, I’ll summarise as best I can. There are 4 of us, 4 daughters. Over the years we have all taken in turns, if not collectively, to support our mum in trying to curb her habit. Getting advice from doctors and mental health professionals on how we can get her back on track. Her first marriage (which 2 of my sisters are a product of) broke down which my mum claims was due to abuse. I believed this for so many years until she made the same claim as to why her second marriage broke down with my dad. My dad would not hurt a butterfly… but I’ll get to that.

We all worked in my sister’s pub, my mum was the head chef. And I spent my weekends helping and learning things in the kitchen. When I was about 18, I started to notice my mum having bottles of wine in her handbag, where she would drink on shift. Thought nothing of it because we’re Italian and a couple seems innocent enough. Except it was a daily occurrence, pretty much all day. And when challenged she was always very defensive.

Then wine would only get her so far through the day and she switched to spirts. Watered down at first but then less and less dilution. Now this may come as no surprise, but it eventually cost her, her job. Who was my mum’s boss? My older sister. So really put a wedge in the family dynamic. This forced her to go to the bottle more and we get to a point where my mum is at home, in bed all day. Only surfacing when she needed to go outside for a cigarette.

I lived at home whilst I was at university and saw this regularly, resulting in embarrassment when friends came over to the point where I just stopped inviting them. My mum would hide empty bottles of rum, vodka, whiskey in her room and when we found them she would play dumb.

She became very skinny and unhealthy due to a poor diet of just chocolate and snacks. Can’t remember the last time she ate a vegetable but she’s always suffered with anorexia. She could go days without food but would always drink.

There would be days where I would offer to take her for lunch, go for a walk, go and spend time with family and she would always brush it off and say I don’t want to be a bother, I don’t have any money. She began to isolate herself more and more, so it became increasingly difficult to help her, because she clearly didn’t want to help herself.

On to my dad.. the best dad in the world. And adored my mum! He retired early and had a good private pension to be comfortable. As my mum spiralled and spiralled out of control she began coming up with this wild story that my dad abused her, kept her locked in her room as a prisoner and wouldn’t let her out of the house or feed her. Now, my dad is an amazing cook and there was always an abundance of food in the house, yet she continued with this wild story. I would hear her on the phone to my nana or great aunt slandering my dad basically saying he was a monster, which just broke his heart. He tried to do everything for her. But that’s mum, she has to be a victim. I quickly put two and two together and realised that the result of her first marriage failing wasn’t because of the abuse, but because her drinking probably goes back that far!

Anyway, fast forward to just a few years ago. I spent a year in Australia and with just 10 days left to go of my trip, my sister calls me and tells me my mum has left my dad. Packed a small Sainsbury’s bag (those plastic ones before the 5p charge came in) and got in a stranger’s car and left. Turns out she had been speaking to a women’s refuge for MONTHS, convincing them that she was a victim of abuse and had to be strategically extracted from the house. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

I fly home as scheduled and confront her about. Her answer? You don’t know what it was like, he did abuse me. So this put a real black mark on our relationship. I go and see my dad and my mum had basically drained my dad’s finances as she wasn’t working so he had to pay for everything, whilst also funding her addiction. And I am heartbroken to see our family house is packed up and he’s having to move out.

So here we are now at present day, my dad lives in shared accommodation (a nice size flat near the sea front) and he’s really happy. My mum has got even worse. She was hospitalised just over a year ago where the doctors had said she was an alcoholic and that if she didn’t stop, she would die. My sisters and I all rallied round to try and support her, I’ve moved to a different part of the country now but she came and stayed with me for a week. We thought she was getting back on track but she had a few relapses and now I think we are now at the point of no return.

She has barely interaction with me except when she’s asking for money. One of my sisters gets her to stay with her whilst her partner works away as mum says she’s lonely all the time, yet when she goes round all she does is lock herself away in the spare bedroom to drink. Much like she did to my dad all those years ago.

I get texts from my sister that read ‘mum is hammered’ or ‘mum’s a nightmare’. Whilst we’re in the midst of lockdown, my sisters and I all have a weekly zoom call where my mum has been around but refuses to join. She always has a daughter of the week that she wants to insult, it’s mostly my sister that houses from time to time. She’s childish, pulls funny faces when my sister says something on facetime or a zoom call. She continues to ask about my dad claiming that he owes her money. But does it in a way that she thinks is subtle but I know her ways too well now. She destroyed her relationship with my nana who unfortunately passed away last September and was furious with me when I went to the funeral.

I suppose why I sought to share my story is to maybe vent to people who have a similar experience to me. The guilt has fully rolled in now as I finish my narrative, I often lay awake at night saying I need to snap out of the anger I feel towards her because I’ll one day regret it. I must make it clear that I have tried so hard to get her help, I can’t even begin to tell you. All of my sisters have. For me I can adopt that out of sight, out of mind approach because I live miles away. But for two of my sisters, they still very much carry the burden with their daily interaction with her.

I love my mum, so much. But this person is not my mum, and she hasn’t been for a very long time, despite our best efforts to remedy that.

I suppose my only question would be, what do I do now?

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