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 Infidelity - Still Brokenhearted
Five years ago my now ex-boyfriend (of 15yrs) ended
our relationship by introducing me to his girlfriend (an
old women 10-15 years older). I am still devastated.
During that time I also learned that he is an alcoholic.
I keep asking myself how I could not know or suspect that
anything was wrong. We did not spend much time together
because he always had one seeminly good excuse or
another. I moved 600+ miles away to finish my graduate
education and he never complained about my not being
local, he would say that he really missed me and couldn't
wait for me to come back. Please give me some insight on
how he could lie so easily about loving me and not
wanting to loose me to someone else when he was cheating
all of the time. Also, why would he keep such an
important issue like alcoholism from me? I also learned
that his father was an alcoholic and that lead to the
parents divorce when he was a small child. I tried to
talk to his mother about this but she blames me for his
drinking and supports his relationship with the older
woman. I really want to discuss his actions with him
because I really feel that he did not treat me fairly.
 From: Bernd
I suspect that at a conscious level you didn’t
“know” or suspect anything was wrong, but deep
down, there were confusing, little ringing bells that
kept going off during this relationship. If we’ve
grown up in a home where addictive behaviors are present
(workaholism, alcoholism, overly strict rules, judgment,
or shame, etc.), we learn as children to shut off our
awareness of the truth - that something is very “not
right” here - because as children, the truth is
often terrifying, and a real threat to our sense of
safety.
An alcoholic lies easily because that is part of the
disease, just as someone with a bad cold “coughs
easily”. Alcohol warps the reasoning, and practicing
alcoholics are unable to continue their addiction without
becoming good liars, including lying to themselves. He
kept “such an important issue” from you,
because that’s a part of how addicts cope.
An alcoholic can’t genuinely treat anyone better
than they treat themselves, and you already know how well
he is treating himself. He is killing himself slowly, and
robbing himself of much of what life has to really offer.
It’s like eating candy, instead of other foods - the
longer we do it, the more rotten our teeth get, and the
sicker our body become because of lack of healthy
nourishment.
My question is, why do YOU treat yourself so unfairly?
You are looking for healthy behavior from an addict, and
blaming yourself for part of his choices. In doing so,
you allow his disease to control parts of YOUR life, and
emotional well-being.
So what attracted you to him? My guess is that this
relationship happened for a good reason, and has a lot of
good things to offer you. It’s giving you valuable
clues to hidden things inside YOU that are robbing you of
trust in yourself, and robbing you of genuine love and
happiness in relationships. Those “hidden
things” are very likely tied to childhood pain,
hurt, shame, and struggles which you never deserved, and
have coped with the best way you can. In comparison, if
you had a broken leg as a child that never healed right,
it would likely keep tripping you up and making you
stumble constantly as an adult.
I’d heartily recommend checking out whatever
resources you can - on the web and in real life - that
deal with codependency, and co-alcoholism (a relationship
with an alcoholic). Al-anon has helped me tremendously,
and they have an email-based discussion group which
I’ve found terrific. Codependency is my
“addiction”, and you may find it’s yours
as well. Codependents often use addicts or other
codependents as their “bottle”, and the disease
of codependency is every bit as baffling, and
progressive, as alcoholism. Recovering from codependency
brings back much more of the happiness and love in our
lives than we ever had before. And it helps us build
healthier, more loving relationships.
Start some searching, and bless this man for bringing
a new awareness in your life, and release him back to his
disease. You didn’t cause it, you can’t cure
it, and you can’t control it. It’s something
only he and God can comes to terms with, when he’s
ready. The new woman in his life is in for her own new
round of suffering with him. Don’t envy her.
Good luck, and take care. You deserve the best from
life. We all do.
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