How To Find Joy When You Love An Alcoholic
i’ve never shared all of this
with anyone before and that really is
how most stories start when you love an
alcoholic
the guilt the shame fear of being judged
afraid to take to face the truth we keep
it all a secret
in 1997 i met my love
he was the most witty charming gentleman
that i had ever met
perhaps it was the english accent but
ten years
and two beautiful children later we were
a family
although we were a family with an
illness we just
didn’t know it one night my husband
didn’t come home from work which was
completely out of character
i was awake all night with worry the
call came the next morning at 10 am
from a hospital in london it was at that
moment that i knew i had to face the
truth that my husband
really was an alcoholic and i wasn’t
just making it all
up in my head life was chaotic
we had disrupted meal time and bedtime
routines
disrupted sleep patterns always late
for school an absent father who was
often at home
but behind a closed door and me a
completely frazzled
mother never taking care of myself
all of the signs were there the damage
but all unspoken and my smile
was gone chris and i decided that we
desperately needed a weekend away
so we packed our bags and went off to
spain
just the two of us and on the first
night we were eating in one of those
beautiful spanish town squares where
you’re sitting outside and you have the
umbrellas
and the outsides dining all the way
around
everyone outside enjoying the beautiful
summer weather
we got up to leave after dinner and
as usual chris stood and grabbed his
glass and
just once i wanted him to leave
something in the glass
but now he tipped back every drop
emptied along with my hope
as he started to walk away from the
table he lost his balance and he
fell taking out three tables in one
graceful swoop
everything was on the floor the food the
plates cutlery glasses
linens everything everywhere including
chris on the ground with blood
coming from his head
i could feel the redness in my face
not here not now
i just wanted to run to get as far away
as i could
the waiters helped me get him onto his
feet
and when he stood his incoherence
and everyone thought it was from the
fall
but i knew the truth and i knew what
they were thinking of me
life started to rapidly spiral into
chaos after that point
and the next time he fell it was at home
i lined up all of the bottles from the
weekend’s drinking
on the table there was too many to count
and i didn’t want to count but it was at
that moment that he decided to go to
rehab
thank god he loves us
and when he came home from rehab i made
him
a cup of tea the first cup of tea that i
had with my husband
after 11 years of marriage we sat and
drank that cup of tea together
we’re going to be fine our family is
going to be fine
the third time he came home from rehab
he looked amazing he had discovered
painting and what an incredible talent
that he had
he’s going to crack this he’s going to
do this
the fourth time driving to rehab to
visit him was on christmas eve
and i’d left the children behind with
friends
i can’t keep doing this the kids can’t
keep seeing me broken like this and they
can’t keep seeing him in this way
i’ve got to leave but it would kill him
he loves us so much he won’t come to
that
this time he’s gonna he’s gonna do it
we’re gonna be okay
i could always feel it coming
the chaos and the next time i had the
crisis
team in my house and while they were
with chris
i sat at the table with my mother-in-law
and i said to her
i know you have to do what’s best for
your son
to help him with his recovery but i have
to do what’s best for my children
to protect them and to give them a
normal life
it was at that moment that i decided to
leave
and i lost my english family
but even after i left i kept getting
pulled into the chaos
pulled back in
i was broken i had nothing left to give
i was so tired and i just wanted
it to stop i wanted the chaos to stop
it’s gonna kill him one day god i wish
he was dead
it was at that moment that i stopped
talking afraid of those
voices going on in my head
in may 2017 i got a phone call from his
sister
his heart had stopped
chris was dead
the days the weeks the months that
followed were filled with
emptiness grief and anger
i was all alone i was no longer a single
parent i was a solo parent
the months rolled one into the next
i received a phone call from a friend
and she said to me kim put your crown
back on
he doesn’t want you to live like this
and it was at that moment that i
realized chris was
gone our marriage was gone
all of our hopes
and our dreams
they were gone everything that we had
planned
was gone
but my happiness
my unhappiness and the loss of my smile
that wasn’t caused by chris’s alcoholism
it was caused by me
and just as i was the one that had
decided to feel
unhappy i was the one that could choose
to be happy again
after 15 incredibly painful years i
finally learned a very valuable lesson
and it’s one that is transforming my
life today and helping me get my smile
back
is that if we dare to break free
we allow ourselves to blossom
in the world today we are so busy that
it’s incredibly difficult to break free
from the things that hold us back
and it’s taken a global plan pandemic to
get us all to slow down
and to rethink our lives and to make
some changes
six hundred thousand deaths brought the
world to a stop
but there’s another silent pandemic
one that kills 2.8 million people per
year
but shame and guilt keeps it swept
under the carpet alcoholism
2.8 million people multiply that by the
number of people in the family
and that’s the true impact of alcoholism
and the ripple effect that it has on the
family
alcoholism is sneaky its impact is so
mild in the beginning
for years it’s so sneaky that you
question whether or not there really is
a problem
maybe you’re just making it all up in
your head
and the impact on the children often
doesn’t get noticed until they’re adults
sadly my story isn’t unique it’s far
too common because when you love an
alcoholic
you hold on to the hope that they will
get better
never ever wanting to give up on them
because you love them so much
your life becomes consumed with helping
them
manage their drinking helping them stop
their drinking
and while the alcoholism progresses
so does the family illness we don’t talk
about it
as a mother and as a wife who’s lived to
tell you the story to stand here today
before you
we need to talk about it
if you have a story like mine perhaps
one that you’re too afraid to tell
i challenge you to join me
together we can disrupt the unhealthy
behaviors
and we can create new helping ones
together we can blossom and fill the
world with color
if we do these three things
the first thing that we can do
is to let down the walls
let people in
for years i watched chris’s
battle in the agony of the battle with
alcoholism
i saw everything i remember everything
i felt everything and to protect myself
from it all
instead of creating healthy boundaries i
put up walls these walls got so high
with every episode with every event that
eventually i was closing myself in
left alone in silence
my mother-in-law gave me a a note
years years back in the beginning of his
illness
and it was one that i didn’t really
understand the meaning of at the time
but it said that everything of beauty
has crack in it
and that’s how the light gets in
let down the walls let people in
and each time that you do you’ll be
letting a little bit of light in
you don’t have to face this alone you
don’t have to go through this alone
don’t keep it a secret let people in
let down those walls the second thing
that we need to do is we need to open up
to joy
look for joy joy is all around us
every day this painting
has been in our house since 2000
and 3.
for all of those years i thought it was
a beautiful painting and i enjoyed it
but i never really understood its
meaning not until after
chris died and that’s when i discovered
that the almond blossom
painting painting means new beginnings
i had new beginnings in front of me
every single day
but i didn’t see it look for joy around
you every day
make a list of the things that make you
happy things that you see
or things that you want to do do things
every day to help you smile
and the third action that we can take
is to interrupt the silence
talk
i didn’t want to talk for years
i stopped talking and i actually
cut chris off for many many years
because that was the only way
that i could deal with the pain but i
was given the gift of a very
last conversation with him one week
before he died
we talked years of silence
broken in one single conversation
filled with love and understanding
talking helps and we knew that talking
helps
and i’m standing here today because of
that conversation
because he said to me that no one is
more open to your story than i
am keep talking talking helps
so find someone to talk to
don’t keep it all inside don’t keep it a
secret
talk because through talking that is how
we will build
an understanding and understanding of
alcoholism breaking them all of those
misconceptions that people have about
what it is and the impact that it has
talk share your story because by sharing
your story
will get more support you will start to
feel better
when we dare to break free we allow
ourselves to blossom
so if you’re sitting there with a lump
in your tummy or perhaps in your heart
it’s okay it’s okay to let it go
perhaps you have a story like mine one
that you’ve not
told i challenge you to break free
to let down those walls to open up to
joy
and to interrupt the silence
and blossom put that crown back
on find your smile and fill your life
with joy once again
thank you