The Diary of a Victim of an Alcoholic

Well, in the last post I ask whether Jane, my alcoholic partner, would stay sober while I was away in America and whether she would be able to look after my cat, plus feed the stray cat and finally keep the place looking half decent. The answer is a resounding, No. The emails dried up after about day 3 and I was away for 10 days, so I returned to pure mayhem. The flat looked uninhabitable. Wall to wall mess. Pure chaos. It looked like the place has been ransacked in a particularly nasty way. The floor was littered. It had the appearance of a tramp's den of 30 years. She has been drinking heavily and continues to drink as I write this. I was anxious since the emails stopped and I had tried to phone without success. I was particularly anxious about my cat. I had real fears of getting home and finding my cat seriously ill or worse. As it happens she was OK but nervous and hungry. Her water bowl was almost dry and her litter tray a complete mess and unusable. So there it is, the same...

More of the same, alcoholic chat . I am off to the good ole US of A tomorrow for 10 days. I have built a website that is doing well (for animal charities actually) and I have a connection with people there. I want to thank people and try to build some relationships to make it even more successful. So, the big question is, "will Jane stay sober while I am away?". And another one, "will Jane keep the place in reasonable shape?" No criticism meant but Jane is horrendously untidy and I am boringly very organized. Well not quite actually but fairly organized. I do the minimum to make life easier. Anyway, I said to her, please keep it tidy. Actually I said, " I don't want to come back to a tip!" She said, "I'll keep it tidy 100% defo." I guess we'll see. She'll make it messy and then the day before I return she'll do a massive clear up, if she is sober. She is managing well right now. No excessive drinking just the occasional little...

photo by kpishdadi Alcoholic chat - things are OK right now. Well things are alright in a kinda not alright way. We argue etc. Who doesn't? But Jane is OK, working and doing things right. That deserves some praise and I praise her for her efforts. It is a long, actually infinite, road to recovery. Recovery is the wrong word. Control is better. Perhaps she is learning to control her drinking. That is what most of us manage to do if we drink. We put the brakes on. Alcoholics don't know when to stop. I am being criticized for this blog. It's mainly by women. No, it's entirely by women. This is a sex war thing. There is a lot of antagonism between the sexes. I am surprised society works at all sometimes. One day if and when Jane is better perhaps people will stop criticizing. I need to express myself and at its heart this website is meant to do good, to instruct alcoholics what it is like for other people. Alcoholics sometimes are unaware of the damage they cause to people...

Although all scientific reports should be digested with caution, there was a report recently that said that binge drinking leads to an increased risk of Alzheimer's disease in older age. This is not at all surprising if true. Alcohol is a poison in large doses. Even in relatively small doses it is unhealthy but we consume it nonetheless. The after effects tell us how poisonous it is but we treat the after effects as some sort of routine process not as the body telling us that it is poison. We can feel sick. We get a hangover. Apparently a hangover is due to the brain swelling up. If you observe hard drinkers their entire body looks frail as if it has been broken down throughout. I would be surprised if there was no damage to the brain. In fact I think that Jane is more forgetful than she was or her memory is less good. As the change is gradual it can be hard to measure especially if you aren't actually looking out for it. Alcohlics don't care that they are hurting themselve...

Photo by HJRook More alcoholism chat - Alcoholics lack self self discipline and self esteem. They also lack rational and logical thought sometimes. Sounds harsh. It is harsh but I think it is true. And the marshmallow test supports this. Some time ago a scientist/psychologist devised a test in which he placed a marshmallow in front of a child and said that if he/she didn't eat it while he was out of the room for a while he would let the child have a second one. He left the room. A percentage ate it immediately. A percentage waited and ate it before he came back. Some left it and got a second one. When they grew up who do you think had a higher likelihood of becoming alcoholic? Yes the first group. The third group, the ones who abstained are the people more likely to succeed in our society. They are more rational and think long term and about the consequences of their actions. They are less impulsive. Impulsive behavior leads to problems in this world although it can help in creativ...