What if he can?

Dear M. -- You have a lot of insight, just keep an open mind for now would be my suggestion.  But please read this excerpt from the Big Book of AA, and PLEASE keep going to Al Anon.  This was written in l939 when there were only a few hundred people in AA, but look how closely it addresses you're asking now.  I'm not saying you should share this with your husband; I'm sharing it with you so that you can see how long we alcoholics have been grappling with this question.  I'm going to make one more suggestion -- don't make any major decisions right now. That's what they told us in rehab; the first year you need to get your head in the right place before you decide what to do with your body.  Learn and learn and learn so that you make a decision this important using both your head and your heart.  


Most of us have been unwilling to admit we were real alcoholics. No person likes to think he is bodily and mentally different from his fellows. Therefore, it is not surprising that our drinking careers have been characterized by countless vain attempts to prove we could drink like other people. The idea that somehow, someday he would control and enjoy his drinking is the greatest obsession of every abnormal drinker. There persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.

We alcoholics are men and women who have lost the ability to control our drinking. We know that no real alcoholic ever recovers control. All of us felt at times that we were regaining control, but such intervals usually brief were inevitably followed by still less control, which led in time to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. We are convinced to a man that alcoholics of our type are in the grip of a progressive illness. Over any considerable period we get worse, never better.

Here are some of the methods we have tried: Drinking beer only, limiting the number of drinks, never drinking alone, never drinking in the morning, drinking only at home, never having it in the house, never drinking during business hours, drinking only at parties, switching from scotch to brandy, drinking only natural wines, agreeing to resign if ever drunk on the job, taking a trip, not taking a trip, swearing off forever (with and without a solemn oath), taking more physical exercise, reading inspirational books, going to health farms and sanitariums, accepting voluntary commitment to asylums we could increase the list infinitum.

Wow, reading that again reminds me of where I was then. Valentine's Day I went on LOA for four weeks to stay with D (my boyfriend) to help keep him sober. He accomplished it, but like a lot of people that go to rehab because they HAVE to and not because they REALLY want it, he only managed to not drink for a month and still believed that he could control it. He's of the mind that those who can't quit are weak. He hasn't yet mastered step one, nor does he care about AA. He thinks it's a joke. Well, of course, that was then. I don't know how he feels now, since he doesn't communicate with me about his thoughts. I can only hope that last week, when he drank and couldn't explain why, that he might start to get the inkling that he CAN'T control it.

Yes, I wanted to believe then that he could, but I knew deep down that he couldn't. I'm pretty sure I'm out of denial now.

About the rehab thing...I had to go twice and both times I WANTED to go...and it was still hard.  I was finally diagnosed with depression and began taking antidepressants but every alcoholic is different.  Take care of YOU, okay.  

MORE FROM THE BIG BOOK (l939):

This is by no means a comprehensive picture of the true alcoholic, as our behavior patterns vary. But this description should identify him roughly.

Why does he behave like this? If hundreds of experiences have shown him that one drink means another debacle with all its attendant suffering and humiliation, why is it he takes that one drink? Why can't he stay on the water wagon? What has become of the common sense and will power that he still sometimes displays with respect to other matters?

Perhaps there never will be a full answer to these questions. Opinions vary considerably as to why the alcoholic reacts differently from normal people. We are not sure why, once a certain point is reached, little can be done for him. We cannot answer the riddle.

We know that while the alcoholic keeps away from drink, as he may do for months or years, he reacts much like other men. We are equally positive that once he takes any alcohol whatever into his system, something happens, both in the bodily and mental sense, which makes it virtually impossible for him to stop. The experience of any alcoholic will abundantly confirm this.

These observations would be academic and pointless if our friend never took the first drink, thereby setting the terrible cycle in motion. Therefore, the main problem of the alcoholic centers in his mind, rather than in his body. If you ask him why he started on that last bender, the chances are he will offer you any one of a hundred alibis. Sometimes these excuses have a certain plausibility, but none of them really makes sense in the light of the havoc an alcoholic's drinking bout creates. They sound like the philosophy of the man who, having a headache, beats himself on the head with a hammer so that he can't feel the ache. If you draw this fallacious reasoning to the attention of an alcoholic, he will laugh it off, or become irritated and refuse to talk.

Once in a while he may tell the truth. And the truth, strange to say, is usually that he has no more idea why he took that first drink than you have. Some drinkers have excuses with which they are satisfied part of the time. But in their hearts they really do not know why they do it. Once this malady has a real hold, they are a baffled lot. There is the obsession that somehow, someday, they will beat the game. But they often suspect they are down for the count.

How true this is, few realize. In a vague way their families and friends sense that these drinkers are abnormal, but everybody hopefully awaits the day when the sufferer will rouse himself from his lethargy and assert his power of will.

The tragic truth is that if the man be a real alcoholic, the happy day may not arrive. He has lost control. At a certain point in the drinking of every alcoholic, he passes into a state where the most powerful desire to stop drinking is of absolutely no avail. This tragic situation has already arrived in practically every case long before it is suspected.

The fact is that most alcoholics, for reasons yet obscure, have lost the power of choice in drink. Our so called will power becomes practically nonexistent. We are unable, at certain times, to bring into our consciousness with sufficient force the memory of the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago. We are without defense against the first drink.

The almost certain consequences that follow taking even a glass of beer do not crowd into the mind to deter us. If these thoughts occur, they are hazy and readily supplanted with the old threadbare idea that this time we shall handle ourselves like other people. There is a complete failure of the kind of defense that keeps one from putting his hand on a hot stove.

The alcoholic may say to himself in the most casual way, "It won't burn me this time, so here's how!" Or perhaps he doesn't think at all. How often have some of us begun to drink in this nonchalant way, and after the third or fourth, pounded on the bar and said to ourselves, "For God's sake, how did I ever get started again?" Only to have that thought supplanted by "Well, I'll stop with the sixth drink." Or "What's the use anyhow?"

Thanks for that FriaryGrad. I know that many who want to quit and enter rehab of their own accord still have a hard time, so I want you to know that I was basically implying that those who are forced may not get out of rehab what they need to since they may not feel like they really have a problem. Maybe D did know he had a problem, but he still felt like he could control it and wasn't ready to give it up fully. I just hope that someday he'll realize he has a problem, want to quit, and for good, and is willing to do something about it. That's progress from where we've been, even if it isn't the end of the road.