Ok I stumbled across this site today. On 1-8-05 I found out my wife had had a six month affair with a man she met on a website tailored for such meetings. I found out by accident, she left an email open on taskbar. She was explaining the affair to another different man she was just conversing with on same site, suggesting they possibly "meet for coffee" later that night. She was getting ready to go out with a friend, I knew this, she just didn't know I was reading email as she was doing her hair in den getting ready. I let her go, then confronted her when she came home late that night.

So basically I caught her as she was beginning to start yet another affair with yet another stranger.

I confronted her.

We fought.

I'm alcoholic.

I've been drinking heavily at times during all of this.

During the last two months, we've been fighting, making love, fighting etc. Getting xanax and ambien scripts from doc. The pain is sometimes unbearable for both of us. I drank for over half my life before stopping in 1995. Over the years, I've fallen a time or two, but not like as of lately.

When confronting her, in anger, I pointed out how I'd made a pass at next store neighbor once when she was out of town. I also told her about what I guess would be considered an emotional affair with a woman I met online that lasted for several years.


My wife and i love each other I truly believe, but some of the stuff I've said to her while drunk, I can never take back and some of the images that come to me of her with another man are sometimes unbearable.

We've both been tested for HIV and so far so good.

For a while I became obssessed with scouring over cell phone bills counting the times she'd called this man, the dates. Holidays. It hurt. I asked for some details, they hurt more.

Now I get this triggering effect and can go from feeling good to feeling like paint it black in mere seconds and those triggers can be almost anything and come anytime.

I have come to conclusion I cheated on her just as she did me, even though mine wasn't physical. I feel like we will be better because of this, but sometimes dread just creeps in on me.

She went to see a doctor today. She has been suicidal and severly depressed over this. We've both lost time from work and weight over this. I'm sure I've lost at least 20 pounds since january. So has my wife. I've gone from being mad at her, to being scared for her.

Last night I got drunk again. I'm hungover as I type this. I sometimes feel we are at the point where we are close to coming to terms and actually having a good marraige, but I also get these bad doom vibes too, like we have gone too far.

I know I haven't been a good husband. I also know it's hard living with an alcoholic.

I feel bad for her, because she is so depressed over this and I believe she is truly sorry and that she wants to recommit as do I to her, but I can't stand these triggers and thinking about how she called him while I was in the house so many times. I feel like an idiot when I look back over the time frame and see now what I didn't see then.

I should have never started drinking when I found out. Things would have been better, but I can't take that back any more than she can take back the affair. She seeked a "discreet" affair, and told me the man asked her if I owned a gun the first time they met. I was told she was going to visit old college friend in another city, while she was meeting this guy, this stranger she seeked out on a website. I wanted to kill the man for the first few days after I found out.

Anyways, here I am typing this stuff, hoping it may make me feel better somehow.

biscuit,

I'm very sorry that you and your W have become the latest adition to the club nobody should ever be a member of.

It's good that you are owning up to your shortcomings as a H and if you read Dr Harley books, you'd be going a long way into becoming the H your W needs. In the meantime, please throw every bottle of booze you may inside your home and tell your W that you will give her all the discretionary income you may use to buy more booze. This can help her see that you are very serious in having NC [no contact] with your 'lover' [alcohol] and it just MAY inspire her to do the same with the computer and the OM she had her affairs with.

Are you and your W going to IC [individual counseling]?

TMCM

Hi. I don't know why I'm on the computer right now. I just got back from taking my wife to a psychiatric treatment center. I found her dry heaving this morning after getting back from taking our daughter to school. She asked me to take her there so I did. But they wouldn't let her leave so now I have to gather some of her clothes and take them to her. I promised her I will remain sober because I know i have to. I'm going to have to explain this to my daughter when she gets home and I can't get my wife's crying face out of my head as they led her down that hallway.

biscuit,

At this moment, you are the strongest of the two and if truly love your W and want your marriage to survive, then you must shoulder the whole weight of it for some time.

This is a very perilous time for both of you, especially for you since, unlike your W, you are free and about and the present hardship can easily try to seduce you to hit the bottle. If this happens, please come here instead so that we can help you avoid yielding to alcohol's siren call.

My prayers are with you and your W in this most darkest of hours.

TMCM

<small>[ February 24, 2005, 10:49 AM: Message edited by: T00MuchCoffeeMan ]</small>

((Biscuit))

Do you have any ties with an AA group? If not, make some. You can't be there for your wife, you can't be there for your daughter if you are not there for yourself. If you continue to drink these problems will compound and worse things will happen.

I would suggest that you get around some people who have a strong recovery program going. And whatever you DO NOT DRINK. Don't drink today, if that's too long of a commitment, don't drink for this hour, if that's too long of a commitment, don't drink for the next 5 minutes and rededicate yourself after that 5 minutes passes.

Now I'm going to ask you to do something uncomfortable. Pick up the phone and call someone for help. Not necessarily for your drinking but for your life. You need to get all this out to a someone who cares about you.

bisquit, I am sorry you found yourself in this postion, but I will point out that it is not uncommon for the spouse of an alcoholic to have an affair. The reason is because she is your second love. They get very tired of playing second fiddle to our first love [booze] so we leave them vulnerable to the first sweet talker that comes along.

The first thing you need to do is get yourself to an AA meeting and get this drinking under control. You have a serious crisis on your hands and don't need to add yet ANOTHER crisis by drinking. Drinking COMPOUNDS the problem, it doesn't alleviate it. Stop compounding the problem by CRIPPLING your mind and emotions at a time when you need them the most.

Now is the time you need to be at your mental BEST, not your MENTAL WORST. You need to be SANE to manage this problem and can't afford the insanity and wacko thinking that comes from a pickled brain. Your emotions will be a mess from the affair alone, no need to warp them completely with booze.

Please. Go to a meeting today and ask someone [a WINNER with several years sobriety] to be your sponser. This will all work out if you sober yourself up. If you stay drunk, you don't have a chance in hell.

P.S. I am a recovering alcoholic with 20 years of sobriety so I can relate to everything that is happening to you.

Thanks all. I just got back from taking her some clothes and stuff. I'm going back tonight to see her during visiting hours.

I've already called some family. Probably stay over at sister's this weekend. I figure it'd be easier on my daughter and i if we were not in empty house over weekend. My wife's uncle is one of my best friends and we spent some time on phone. He knows me really well and said some stuff I needed to hear.

I'm definitely not going to drink. May be hard to believe but I rarely ever drank during hard mental times, I usually fell off wagon when I was feeling good about things. I just wished I'd never went for the vodka when I found out about her affair. I think I did it mainly to piss her off because I really didnt want it until I started drinking it, then of course... Twisted, but no, drinking is farthest thing from my mind right now.

Besides I'm too scared to drink even if i wanted to. I have to be here for my daughter and I'm going to have to explain where her mother is when she gets home from school in about an hour.

Thanks again for comments all. It does help, reading them. I'll come back here again later.

Biscuit -

I'm an Alcoholic too and here to help you any way I can.

Melody is right on with getting to an AA meeting as soon as possible. You have not said... did you get sober in AA before or was it 100% on your own?

If you did not go to AA before, please try it now. AA can help you to become a better person. This will benefit your marraige and your life in general...

Let me know if I can help you in any way.

Blessings -


Gib

Hi again. I've been to hundreds of AA and NA meetings. About 11 years ago one day I ended up walking out of the police station fresh from my 3rd dwi which involved a wreck. Luckily no one was hurt. It was noon and I was supposed to be at work, the accident happened on the way that am. So I walked around the corner of the police station and I ended up with another absolute jug at a hotel and started calling places in the phone book while drinking it. Someone from AA called me thru the night and then the next morning I went into detox, I only had 20 bucks left but the cabbie felt so bad for me, he drove me there anyway and then I went straight into a 30 day program from there. I've had good times and bad times since. My wife went with me to a meeting shortly after I found out about the affair.

The talk with my daughter went surprisingly well. She is only 12, but she is smart and I worded it all as carefully as possible.


I didn't really read the rules on these forums much before registering, but I gather it's based on some help tools off the main site from what I've read in the threads. I just felt like talking from behind the safety of a keyboard some. Thats a great help tool right there, but since I'm here I will check out the site in more depth as well.

bisquit, I would still suggest getting to an AA meeting. AA is not about stopping drinking, it is about learning to live.....WITHOUT ALCOHOL. If you have been on and off all these years, that is something that would be beneficial to you. You would also get some great support as they will keep your mind in the right place. [no easy feat for an alcoholic!]

Thanks again folks.

Still sober and happy for it.

Just finished steam-cleaning the carpet, heh gotta keep busy <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

Wife sounds better today on phone.

biscuit,

Keep up the good work and I'm glad that she is doing a lot better. Remember that we are here for you and your W.

TMCM

How's it going Biscuit Man?

Still kickin'?

Still sober?

<img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />

Hi Biscuit,

I am married to an alcoholic who is still actively drinking.

I am not giving advice but alcohol is a depressant and taking anti-depressants and alcohol could have a negative effect. You should speak to your doctor about this. Remember: "One day at a time"

Take care