YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

I've recently come to the conclusion that both my Dad and my sister are alcoholics and now I have to attend my younger sisters wedding and pre-wedding events and I'm terrified. The anxiety of the wedding is overwhelming. I need a lot more time and some therapy to deal with this revelation and my families eventual destruction, but its only been a few weeks. I didn't therapy would help so quickly, so I've been journaling and reading books about how to deal with alcoholism. I've also been listening to this podcast nonstop. The alcoholism for both of them has been progressing. They're about to either be arrested for a DUI, or fired from their job or kicked out of their apartment for not paying rent. My sister lives with my mom, so she doesn't pay rent, but she's slowly destroying the house and we're all worried she might accidentally burn the house down. I guess I just need advice. Part of me is terrified of facing the reality of situation. I feel like I've only seen the surface of my dad's addiction. I stopped calling him because he's always drunk. I haven't been around him drunk since I was a teenager and he either really angry or tells me how proud he is of me. Both make me uncomfortable because both always felt like lies. I've only caught glimpses of the desperation for alcohol. I'm really worried that its much worse than what I know now and what I know now is pretty terrible. I do know the full extent of my sisters alcoholism. Every time I've had to deal with her drunk has been atrocious. It always shakes me to my core and takes me weeks to get calm again. She usually is mean and says terrible things. She either wants desperately to hurt me or make me feel pity for her. When I can't pity her, she tries to hurt me. She often succeeds. I'm worried that they're going to ruin my sisters wedding. My heart is already breaking for her, and the wedding hasn't happened yet. (although, they have done quite a bit of damage already). I can see them just exploding at each other and causing a big scene. Or I can see him being fall-down drunk and embarrassing my sister in front of her brand new in-laws. I guess I'm worried about everything that I can't control. Does watching your family self-destruct get easier with time? How about watching your father slowly kill himself? or you sister not only slowly kill herself, but take your mom down with her? will we ever have a normal family event again?

Hugs. You are not alone. You are not "crazy". I send sunshine, healing, and peace over the internet if I could.

Alanon.

That is the extent of my advice

Alanon is genius. I encourage you to ask around your friends and family for anyone they know in Alanon. If they do, invite the Alanon person out for dinner, tell them what you told us, then listen carefully.

Sometimes in tough situations like this, I like to tease out different threads, or issues. As I see it, you are facing:

1. Your father is an alcoholic, and has blurred boundaries.
2. Ditto for your sister
3. While many people are charming when drunk, sometimes drunk, angry people are absolutely awful*.
4. Your other sisters upcoming wedding.
5. Fire risk at your mom's house. Fire is no joke.
6. Dealing with all this heartache, along with all the drama already present in your life

* I work, professionally, in a field that is notorious for drunken destruction and widespread heartache. pm me, and I'll tell you the industry and you'll understand.
Thus, I have been annoyed to the extreme, physically threatened, taunted, and lied about by drunken people. Admittedly I am fairly biased, but only after long experience with drunk people.

Thus, and I realize saying this makes me a jerk, but I advise you, your sister, and her fiance to have a number of tough conversations beforehand.

Though it is easy for me to say, and hard to implement: when you all agree on behavior standards, inform your father and sister of the expectations.

All people deserve dignity, until they start (IMO and IME) to make a mess, or make a scene.

Basically, your sister's wedding is not the venue for your other sister or father to air dirty family laundry. There is a time and a place to have these tough conversations, and the reception is not the time.

Personally, I am straightedge and most of friends are sober. Ergo, no alcohol should I ever get married. In fact, were I to be asked "Why not have alcohol?", I feel this is a situation where I am comfortable telling them "I'm not discussing it, and I'm not discussing not discussing it".

In other words, I advocate coming down hard, quickly on behavior that has been previously discussed as unacceptable.

Further to prove that I am a jerk, if I am sober and someone else is drunk, then I get to decide if the behavior violates our agreed upon standard of behavior.

In other words, drunk people have no rights. "Discussing" or "arguing" with drunks is a pointless waste of time.

Now, when the drunk person sobers up I will listen carefully to everything they have to say, and support them as much as I can. But, personally, a drunk person has nothing to tell me.

Thus, my advice is agree on a standard of behavior, and enforce it. Have this convo _before_ the wedding!

There is a 100% your father and sister will get deeply hurt. They will accuse all and sundry of being mean jerks, and bring up a bunch of old hurts.

They will weep and wail and threaten. They will throw out bait to infuriate you, and try to avoid taking that tempting bait.

Your sisters wedding is her and her fiance's day, and for people who are willing to play nice.

If someone else wants to make it about them, come down hard. Have the conversation beforehand.

I feel for you.

Lastly, remember that people get sober all the time all sorts of ways. I would have never believed in spontaneously sobriety until June 16, 2008 until it happened to me.

Your father and sister may get sober yet. If they continue with the same things they're trying, it is a closed loop.

Maybe this tough conversation I suggest could be a good first step for them to examine their behavior.

If I may offer some more advice.

As far the fire risk, I encourage you to risk the relationship of your mother/sister.

One my friends died a lingering, agonizing death from smoke inhalation, so again as easy as it is for me to say, come down hard.

I suggest risking your relationships; this is balanced against the risk of fiery death.

Sometimes it helps to get an outside, third party opinion or view on these situations. A similar situation is that tv show "Hoarders", where the houses have to meet objective standards set by the county code inspectors.

Similarly, you may want to have the city or county inspect your mom's house for fire violations.

If your mom is the owner, then perhaps you can show her how this is in her interest (ie no fiery death). If she is renting, you may have other methods of getting such an inspection...

Whatever happens, much like the upcoming wedding, your sister is going to be super angry.

But if she can't moving towards a fire risk, how much is her opinion worth in this case?

Again, this easier for me to say than for you to do, but I believe you have a good heart. A failing fire inspection* could be a matter of life and death for your loved ones.


*And every city code will fail you the first time, to document that they were thorough.

Thank you so much for your response, it has helped me calm down significantly. I considered Alanon. I’m still working up the courage to actually go to meeting. I'm not terribly religious. I will try to ask around, but I’m not sure if I know anyone in Alanon. You nailed everything that’s pretty much going on with the anxiety. I will talk to my sister- I’m not sure if she’s worried about the same things, but at least talking to her might help. We should really talk more about solutions. We have talked about the drinking problem, but we've never talked about solution. I don't think anything you said made you sound like a jerk. I know these conversations need to be had. Its a source of a little control or at least boundaries. I'm worried about rocking the boat right before the wedding (its this weekend coming up). Talk about procrastinating to the last minute. You're right though, I know you're right. thank you again