“I never dreamed there would be an addiction in the middle of our marriage!” my client shared in pure exasperation.
I’d been seeing her husband for a while and wrote about him last week in my blog entitled: Marriage & Addiction.
She’d come with him a few times to learn communication exercises and healing exercises to begin to work on the marriage once he was sober.
Whether your spouse is sober yet or not, the things I share will help you stay strong.
Remember, addiction is not just about alcohol or drugs … there are many substances and processes that can be addictions.
Things such as:
Pornography or sex Food, carbs, or sugar
Work or busy-ness Sports or Netflix series
Religion Exercise
Smoking Gummies
Approval seeking Gambling
Being right Self Image
Gossiping Drama
Chaos Gaming
Social media Picking (nose, nails, teeth, fights)
Cell phones Playing sports
Watching sports Spending/obtaining “stuff”
When I use the word ‘sober’ … I’m referring to you no longer using any substance or process as a coping mechanism or making it or the use of it a priority over the marriage.
It is not unusual that the emotional whiplash of a spouse or partner of someone they love … who has been fighting addiction … then steps into recovery … that it brings them in for therapy or coaching.
Why?
When you’ve loved an addict and spent years fighting the addiction, trying to help the addict, and/or being on the end of the wrecking ball that comes with addiction …
Then suddenly that’s over …
And sobriety comes with its own set of new challenges …
The partner is confused or skeptical … and comes in for a visit!
My client, like many spouses or partners of addicts entering recovery, was already worn out.
The new set of challenges can feel like the end of their road! (of patience, of tolerance, of cheerleading, of parenting, or being the responsible one, etc.)
I always begin working with the spouse on “3 remembers” to get them on track for the recovery journey.
I’d like to share them with you also.
From my heart to yours … I KNOW how difficult living with and loving an addict is!
-I know you may’ve lost yourself.
-You may’ve lost your confidence.
-You may’ve even lost that loving feeling.
“I have. I have lost it all …” my client said tearfully. “I didn’t want it to go away. But years of waiting for him to come home. Years of his unpredictability. Years of ruined family dinners, events, holidays, birthdays … It’s all just faded …”
(From my AA friend. “As the Big Book says… (Selfishness-self-centeredness. That we think is the root of our troubles.) Just as we say in recovery, “Check your ego at the door and grow up!” the same goes for bringing the healing your marriage needs when you bring your sober recovering self through your door 24hrs at a time. Never forget…you can’t spend 50% of your empathy focusing on when it’s your time to drink/use … and then suddenly expect 100% redemptive feelings from the one you’ve withheld that 50% from. When your marriage gets to this point … the only way to know if it’ll survive and heal is staying focused on you and you alone as the problem … and time will tell both of you the truth … that’s a guarantee.)
I understood.
I shared with her it’s like the old Righteous Brothers song says:
You’ve lost that lovin’ feelin’
Whoa, that lovin’ feelin’
You’ve lost that lovin’ feelin’
Now it’s gone, gone, gone, whoa-oh-oh-oh
Baby, baby, I’d get down on my knees for you
If you’d only love me like you used to do, yeah
We had a love, a love, a love you don’t find every day
So don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t let it slip away
I promise you can get back “that lovin’ feelin’.”
But to do so, you must remember these 3 things that I’ll be sharing.
1. Remember who they really are.
Perhaps your spouse has been an addict since you met them.
But even so, you’ve seen moments of who they really are.
“I think I know what you mean,” she reflected while staring out the window, gazing across the pond. “But it’s hard to remember sometimes. And now when I do see it, it almost feels like it’s too late.”
Set boundaries to call forward that person that you know is in there!
“How would I have done that?” my client asked.
“Well, you said he would not tell you he was coming home late and you’d wait and worry … and he wouldn’t take your calls or respond to your texts, and come home intoxicated, right?” I asked.
“Right!” she replied sharply.
I suggested: “Perhaps you could have said something like: ‘I know you wouldn’t want me to be here worrying about you …I know the ‘real you’ would care about that. I am no longer willing to accept that. If you are more than 15 minutes late, and do not notify me, I will leave for the evening and go stay in a nice hotel.”
She burst into laughter.
After a good laugh, she asked: “What can I do now that he’s not drinking, but still not addressing the damage done, because after all … it’s football season?”
I suggested: “How about something like this:
‘I know you know how lonely I am. I’m trying to be supportive of your recovery. But I don’t feel like you are supporting MY recovery. If you don’t have time for a 15-minute healing conversation or to eat dinner with me before you take your dinner up to your man cave … I will stop preparing your meal and go out to eat a nice dinner while you watch football. On your dime!”
She slapped her leg and bent over laughing.
“That will be done tonight!” She proclaimed.
I continued.
“But I also want you to find some photos that represent that great part of him that’s buried inside. Look at them twice daily. It will set your RAS (reticular activating system) in your brain to looking for the real man that you know is in there!”
“That’s a GREAT idea!” She agreed. “Because I do know he’s in there!”
Do the same with the addict you love. Set your RAS to remember and look for the greatness that you know is in them!
(From my AA friend. “Recovery of your partner’s trust is their recovery. And that’s not up to you and yet all up to you. Understand when we the addict decide we really do have a problem all the hunches of our partner prove to be true. That’s a mountain creating moment of needed forgiveness that only they can decide to climb. And only they know where and when they’ve reached the summit. So shut up, grow up, man up and don’t use for the next 24 hours!)
2. Remember that gasoline doesn’t put fires out!
“I shame him mercilessly at times. Then I feel so awful about it … I overlook the addiction for a while … then let my boundaries slide.” My client confessed.
I explained to her that it’s totally natural and normal to want to lash out… even when sobriety has begun.
But it’s crucial that we remind ourselves of the fact that what fuels the addiction in the first place is pain, shame, and trauma.
Therefore, lashing out with more of what fuels it is like trying to put a fire out with gasoline.
She laughed, as many people do when they hear me say that.
But rarely do people forget, and therefore it helps them reduce the urge to lash out and shame.
“That makes total sense, and I get it! I really do!” She reassured me. “But it’s really hard to just hold it all in when I’m watching him burn his life down as he burns our marriage down!”
I assured her, “All of that must be addressed! And you’re right to desire to do so! It just can’t be done successfully with gasoline!”
I suggested that these are moments when she needs to request a conversation as I wrote about in last week’s blog.
So that she can share her feelings without attacking, and he could listen, reflect, validate, and empathize.
It’s much easier to have healthy dialogue when you remember that doing it otherwise … is pouring gasoline on a fire. Because you have a resource where you can have a healthy conversation and be heard.
“The truth is, you’ll find these conversations so healing, that you’ll gladly set aside, your can of gasoline!” I reassured her.
“Truthfully, since we have been having those kinds of conversations, I don’t think I’ve touched the gas can once!” She commented.
Remember, I’m not shaming you for the gas can solution/response to the addiction. Especially when the one you love is burning their life and your marriage down.
But I can assure you, that these healthy conversations are the best preventative of grabbing that gas can ever!
You deserve to be heard, you deserve to be comforted, you deserve to be healed!
3. Remember to take care of yourself.
My client looked at me with a look that seemed to say… “What on earth are you talking about?”
I smiled and said, “Foreign concept, right?”
She laughed out loud and said, “I didn’t even know I was an entity here… much less someone who deserves self-care!”
Weeks, months, or years of living with an addict saps our desire for self-care or even remembering that it’s possible. When we need it the most!
Not only is it possible to practice self-care, but it’s a MUST!
The chaos, the doubts, the worrying, the long, lonely nights lying in bed beside a stranger we used to know… saps us of almost everything.
It’s time to change that!
It’s time to do things to take care of yourself:
- Eat well.
- Get some healthy exercise.
- Take a long hot bath and light a candle!
- Do something fun.
- Watch something funny.
- Get a hot rock foot massage.
- Get a manicure.
- Get a pedicure (Yes, men can do this too!)
And most importantly, if you haven’t already done so, set some healthy boundaries for yourself that provide opportunities for self-care.
“I’m not sure I’ve thought about self-care for years, and I don’t even know what it means that I could set a boundary that would promote self-care?” She stated inquisitively.
“Recently I had a husband who set a boundary with his wife, who is struggling with addiction to prescription drugs,” I shared.
“She was going to so many doctors for prescriptions, and using the credit cards for those visits, as well as for multiple medications that the insurance would not cover.”
She was currently unemployed but doing a little bit of contract work. I continued.
“Because he paid all of the credit cards, he told her that if she continued to use the credit card for doctors’ appointments or prescription drugs (unless she was sick and they agreed on the appointment and the prescription) … He would remove her from being an authorized user on the credit cards,” I shared.
“And how did that provide an opportunity for his self-care?” She asked with curiosity.
“In two ways,” I explained. “He would be less worried about the mounting credit card debt and be able to begin paying them down.”
“But he would also have the opportunity to get some medical care that he needed but had neglected due to mounting credit card debt.”
She commented.
“So he could finally start taking care of himself?”
I nodded.
(From my AA friend. “No reaping only the sowing of love. That’s your mission for you to give your best for your partner’s recovery as you recover too. That’s the only way to know that you know that you have a future and a hope.)
-How will you begin to take care of yourself?
-You deserve self-care.
-And it will make you a better partner for the healing journey.
To join them in theirs, if they’re already in recovery, and prepare for the time when they do enter recovery if they’re active in addiction.
You may feel hopeless that they will enter recovery.
Send me an email, and I will be glad to share helpful tips from my Marriage and Addiction series!
******
As I said last week, addiction affects marriages, and relationships, often in a devastating way.
But it does not have to devastate your marriage.
Don’t give up hope.
Spend some time with other people whose marriages or relationships have been saved after addiction.
Remember who your spouse/partner really is beneath that addiction.
Don’t try to put out the fire (of them burning their life, and maybe your marriage down with their addiction) with a gas can.
Take care of yourself!
I can share with you that when couples enter recovery, and do it together… They become some of the most powerful marriages ever. I know you want that… And you certainly deserve it!
“Addiction often pushes people to their limits, driving wedges between loved ones and creating emotional distance. However, love has the power to bring people together, mend broken bonds, and offer hope in the darkest of times. The love and support of family, friends, and even oneself can become a lifeline for individuals battling addiction.”
Angie Sowers
