[tinker]

I am crying writing this. I feel beyond desperate now.

I am a mother to two beautiful girls who I love more than the world. Their dad is an addict. When we first met he told me he wanted to stop, knowing nothing about addiction I believed him when he said he had and we started to have a relationship. I had a little girl so I told him that until he stopped our relationship would not be an option. He told me he had. Fast forward I get pregnant. He starts using weed again. A lot. All the time. I ask him to stop. He can’t. This ends up in horrific fights where I say I’m leaving and he tells me if I do he will make my life miserable. Eventually I find the strength to leave. Both daughters are devastated. He quits weed. Swears on our daughters life he won’t use it again. So we try again. He then becomes addicted to alcohol. He tells me this is normal. I rationalise it in my own head that it is, because I’m desperate to keep my family together. Again lots of arguments about his addiction. I feel a lot of codependent rage over this. I start to research addiction and everything makes sense. He has moments of clarity where he try’s to stop. He won’t go to a group though as he feels it’s below him. I find out he’s doing cocaine “just a little here and there” and now I’ve found out he’s done it midweek. I wake up in the morning trying to get kids ready for school and he’s passed out on the sofa. Stinking the whole room out of alcohol. He smells like a tramp. He makes my skin crawl. I feel so trapped. I don’t want this to be my life. My daughters biological dad died of prescription overdose. I walked away. He was also addicted and told his own life. I can’t do this anymore. I am always the strong one. I may as well be a single parent the amount i do for my kids compared to my partner. He loses his temper with them and shouts a lot. I assume this is to do with the addiction. His dad has just been diagnosed with cancer. I just so desperately want him to change and for us to have a normal family life. I’m not sure this will ever happen. So I know I should probably leave and safeguard the kids and allow him to hit rock bottom so he can get help. I can’t have my eldest lose two dads. It’s killing me. I love him but I hate his addiction. I feel like o a roller coaster of emotions. I have been for 7 years now. I’m desperately trying to cover him all the time and try and have a normal life for my kids but everyday is a battle and I can’t see him kill himself. Although honestly some irrational part of my brain wishes him dead so this will all be over. This is his house, although I’m on the mortgage. I know he won’t leave it, even though it would be good for the kids to keep their own rooms. I am in debt as I pay for everything. So I don’t know how I would afford to rent. We have money in the remortgage we did for binding works so I’m thinking I may ask him to pay off the debt using it. He has complete control of that money and I worry he’s using it to pay for coke. I doubt he will give me any money from it though as he doesn’t want to facilitate my leaving. Thought about bringing social services in to help me but I don’t want them taking my kids away when I bend over back wards to be an amazing mum to them. Please help me?

[lindyloo]

Hi Tinker and welcome to the forum,

I’m so sorry to read your story and I wanted you to know that you are not alone and there is lots of help and advice on this forum.

If you read the other threads, there are people who are going through similar emotions with their loved one’s addictions.

There is also good advice from people in recovery who can tell you what the usual cycle is from an addicts point.

The forum also has help available on their homepage and the Icarus trust. Unfortunately I don’t have all the answers, but I wanted you to know that people care and want to help you.

My son has addictions to alcohol and cocaine and I know from personal experience what it can do to a family.

Look after yourself first and foremost and your children and accept all the help and support you can. Don’t be alone in this nightmare, things will get better, but it definitely begins and ends with the choices that your partner makes.

I hope you both get the help and support you seek.

Always here to chat.

Take care

Lx

[debc]

Hi Tinker,

This is a great forum to get help and read other people’s stories in the same situation.

Like Lindyloo I also have an addict Son who is in Recovery.

Your partner really does need help, but that can only come from him.

There is the Icarus Trust that helps people as well.

Look after you and your children first, keep in touch with the people on this forum, they are really helpful and always helps to share your story.

Take care

Dx

[tinker]

Thanks so much to you both. It’s just so hard. I’m so tired all the time. I feel like a single parent who’s always shouldering all the responsibilities while he gets to act like a teenager. He’s 42. I think it’s pathetic. I’m not kind about the addiction. I say horrible things all the time but I feel entitled to do so when he’s behaving this way. It’s ok for a while and then it starts again. I can’t be bothered. I don’t want to spend my life doing this. Life is too short to waste dealing with drama that isn’t even your own. It’s just the financial crap that keeps me here and the kids. I don’t want to hurt them but this is probably hurting more than if I left! It’s boring. I just feel like I’m constantly repeating the same drivel I’m bored of it all! I wish he would meet someone else and set me free x

[Author]

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