My whole family chose the bottle

I do not have contact with anyone in my family because they ALL chose not to get sober. The latest is a sibling who refused to go to rehab, so I do not have contact with any of them. How is one supposed to deal with people like this? I should mention that my mother is already dead (from alcoholism related illness) and the sibling is the only one whose whereabouts I know.

I am sorry about your family situation. As you have seen, not only is alcoholism familial but also learned behavior.

You have done the best thing by distancing yourself from them as long as they are behaving in destructive behavior. If you haven't found Al-Anon, that is a good support group for relatives of alcoholics. I feel your grief as you lose your family to alcohol. Sometimes the most painful part of losing someone your care about is watching them self-destruct.

In these cases, we have to build our own non-related family to be there for us. It isn't exactly the same as biologicial family, but alcoholic families tend not to be a good support system either. And isolation is not the answer, either.

Best wishes,
N.

I'm not sure how helpful this will be, but I see family simply as just other people. If they're good people then great, if not then you don't need to associate with them.

Issues… you asked the question “How is one supposed to deal with people like this?”

This is really quite simple, keep doing what you are doing. Maintain a healthy distance, it is the wisest choice.

Did you hear the one…

This guy dies and he goes to Hell. Satan meets him at the brimstone gates and starts showing him around.

As they walk through hell, the guy notices a pit, covered with great iron bars. “In that pit is where we keep all the murderers,” Satan tells him. They go a little further, and he sees another pit covered with heavy iron bars. That is where we keep all the rapists, Satan tells him.

They walk a bit further and the guy sees a shallow pit full of people, but with no iron bars covering it at all. He asks Satan, “Who is in that pit?” Satan tells him that pit is where we keep all the alcoholics and drug addicts.

The guy asks Satan, how come you don’t have any bars over that pit, aren’t you afraid they will try to escape? Satan says “I’m not worried about any of them getting out, when one tries to get out, one of his buddies always drags him back in.”

Richard

Shadowalker,

That is a wonderful analogy. Only, in my case, I drink alone. I don't have any friends who drink like I do.

I drink because I tried for so many years - sober - fighting my depression, trying to overcome issues originating from childhood about trust and love. Counseling, meds. I cannot navigate intimate relationships - they always end badly.

I say this only because I hope that people can observe the alcoholic with compassion. I do not think that anyone in any kind of relationship with an alcoholic should allow themselves to accept poor treatment, or remain in such a relationship if it is harmful.

I simply advocate compassion. AA seems to say that once the alcoholic stops drinking, they will be 'happy, joyous and free'. And some of us drink so we don't kill ourselves out of the hopeless of life.

Welcome Joyless…. I don’t think I have seen you here before. Always good to have one more.

You said… “I say this only because I hope that people can observe the alcoholic with compassion” When I first got sober, I was told that we are not bad people trying to get good, but that we are sick people trying to get well.

I believe my alcoholism was and is a spiritual disease. It is a physical disease, and a mental disease as well, but at it s core, it is a spiritual malady.

I understand when you talk about alcohol like it were medicine. “And some of us drink so we don't kill ourselves out of the hopeless of life.” The problem for me was I couldn’t stay drunk. I kept coming to in the morning undrunk! I hated that part. And I knew that a drink or two would make all those feelings of self loathing just go away. It was my medicine. So, I drank every day.

It always worked. It always changed my feelings and outlook. But at a price. A big price. Every one of my un-dealt with problems from yesterday were still with me in the morning when I came out of my alcoholic fog, plus any new ones I had manufactured that day.

It just kept building up until I thought there was no way out.

I was wrong, thank God. I showed up in my first AA meeting, hung over and beaten. I haven’t found it necessary to pick up a drink in a long time, Stuff still happens to me, but I have a set of tools to =deal with them as they arrive. They don’t build up.

The freedom alcohol offers is an illusion. It is a gruel and pitiless master that wants us dead. It will settle for us drunk, but it wants much more.

Richard

I agree 100% with Richard, as usual. Alcohol and other drugs worked well for me for a while. they made me relax and feel as good as anybody. For a while, I functioned at a high level, then I slowly went downhill until I wanted to die everyday. I was depressed, anxious, and a drunk. It seemed hard to discovered where the alcoholism ended and the depression began. But, I went to AA and received something I had not had in years--hope that I could get better. Eventually, I achieved control over my mood swings and my anxiety. I did become happy, joyous, and free as they promised. My life became beyond my wildest dreams.

But I had to really work the program--steps, service, meetings, sponsorship. It probably does not work if you leave out parts--like making a cake, but forgetting to bake it.

It can be difficult entering a room where no one knows you, but it does get easier. I did not mind getting drunk with strangers at a bar.

I hope you give AA another try.
Good Luck,
Jim S

Just to perpetuate our mutual admiration society, I gotta agree with Jim, as usual. It may be tough to walk in the rooms the first time, but compared to how it is now, it will be a piece of cake (baked).

Do yourself a favor, getting and staying sober together is soooooo much easier than trying it do it solo.

Richard