I sure hope I'm not intruding here. I generally only post related to addictions issues. I'm a lifer; pushing six decades in.. (I remember the sour {but wonderfully fascinating} taste of Chianti when I was about 6-yrs. old) I'm fully vested and invested. I'm sincere, very fallible, but sincere.
I somehow knew your h is a good egg. (d-mn good egg sounds like.. you too). I perceive an area of very potential impact in you guy's situation. I'd give seven-hundred dollars if I could send your h a few simple mental pictures about alcoholism/drug addiction and how that coupled with 'treatment' so-called, can [mostly DOES] marginalize a person [at least inwardly] in a personal and professional sense, but more powerfully with the people he loves the MOST.
Most 'counseling' is geared toward instilling in a person a sense of “powerlessness over alcohol” and the person will never have an unbiased wholeness again, because they have a life-long disease. It is shame based because the actual guilt and shame aren't dealt with head-on, so to speak which allows a person to heal.. instead; it is obfuscated into a “disease”... very confusing. And what makes it shame based is that very paradox. The shame is now imbedded and removed from a real conscious place.. it is now insidious. It's the 800 lb. Gorilla that resides permanently.
Of course I don't know, but if he perceives himself as having failed in his marriage in a way that cannot be resolved or fully ever really over-come [he'll never have your full respect or trust].. he may be exhibiting thinking/behavior related to that. It's easy to point out the moral deficits related to alcoholism-addiction.. but that's empowering really because it can be resolved.. not so much with a life-long disease. It's reality to an alcoholic.. not a metaphor. It's how he's learned to perceive himself: “Hi I'm Danl, I'm a drunken-dope-fiend.”
Truth trumps facts. Facts are, dude goofed it bad with the booze and stuff. Truth is he's an:
Quote:
”honest caring person who everyone looked up to, had respect for and I kid you not, EVERYONE loves him. He had never (even in all the years of drinking) done anything to hurt a person and the one thing that everyone will say about H is if you needed ANYTHING he would be the first one there”
Love covers a multitude of sins. Following is a bit of maudlin lyric –that isn't much for listening, but-- that captures the perspective of an addict with regard to his relationships with the world and whomever he loves:
"Just down the street from your hotel, baby I stay at home with my disease And ain't this position familiar, darling Well, all monkeys do what they see . . . Asleep in perfect blue buildings Beside the green apple sea Gonna get me a little oblivion Try to keep myself away from me." - Counting Crows, "Perfect Blue Buildings" (1993)
