I'm not so sure that I don't prefer the haze in a way, COG. Ignorance is false bliss I know, but this reality is going to mean bad things have to occur before this sitch gets any better. Namely, calling my husband on the alcohol thing at some point. I never could stand up to it, except when I was that nasty MLCer. And I can't say that I "stood up" to it so much even then, but rather used it as my own defense for my actions...God can this friggin nightmare get anymore twisted???
I see now that I did so much tap dancing around it to shield the kids before...made excuses, intervened when "discussions" weren't going well, straight up lied sometimes...I kept it in for a long time, then went batty myself. Now here I am. And you know I have that 15 months, after he came back after the first separation, when I was still "out there"...he was sober then, going to anger management and AA and he was better than I'd ever seen him....yet somehow I still couldn't SEE him...DAMMIT! When he started slipping after a year or so, when he lost all his hope...I let that justify me again and it makes me sick. Then, when he started the process to get his license back he was ordered into ASAP and that led to AA again. But he played it. I know he started out well, but he didn't have it in him to keep fighting because the way my husband thinks is - to have lost his family, he didn't give a damn anymore. So he played it. Plus, living with his parents he might as well have lived in a bar. I knew that would be a struggle, and I knew he drank at times, but I saw the pride he had over those damn groups...but he also had guilt BECAUSE he drank sometimes. He said he felt like a fraud. I never thought he'd fall headlong back into it with D11 in the house, though. How stupid was that? I KNEW, I WROTE HERE, how hard it would be for him when he moved in the house and S14 and I were gone...I knew it and yet I believed...but it wasn't long before he was bringing liquor into the house. D11 used to express her displeasure at his drinking and I know it affected him. But instead of her conditioning him, he conditioned her and now she's his protector and his enabler. And I have continued to be, as well.
