I agree you about the emotional connection. My x would be happy to talk to me but it wasn’t really a two way conversation. It often sounded like spin. Also you could never really catch his eye he was always on the move! Like his attention was always on something in the other room or a friend on the phone or which mate he was going to meet up with tommorow/this afternoon. He was never really with me in the moment.You begin to feel invisible or boring!

One time when he was on a come down I tried to talk to him gently about how the drugs were hurting him. He got up and walked into the conservatory. I could see him through the glass just standing there looking around slightly confused. Its like his legs had just picked him up and taken him away from the conversation! Eventually he picked something up as if he had gone into the room for it.

I did notice that one time at the end of sex he scooted down the other end of the bed .Like the emotional feelings were just too much or too alien. When i asked if he was ok he just waved his arm in a dismissive gesture and laughed saying oh its just everyhting.

Actually does anyone on here find that their patner does this arm waving stuff? its like they are a poletician. They emphasise what they are saying with repeated arm or hand gestures.

Sarah

My problem was an emotional disconnect–or lack of connection. He could not handle emotion, which I know is why they drink. When he wanted to emotionally connect with me his answer was sex. I needed the other emotional stuff first.

Has anybody had a terrific emotional connection with a drinker?

Since reading all JC’s tips I haven’t argued with my boyfriend. Last time I saw my him we didn’t argue even tough his behaviour really hadn’t changed. I thought of myself much more as a seperate person observing his behaviour.
Almost like I had a protective force field around me…It really helped but I think if I spent too much time with him I would lose myself to the addiction again. Luckily I live with a friend and go to work, so I get good in put from non-addicted people.

I have noticed that when he made me feel insecure I would get even more clingy and you can’t get comfort from an addicted person it was a downways spiral.

Over the space of an hour or two, the tension would build, the lumps in the throat would come. I also had the shallow breathing and nervous tummy too! until I couldn’t pretend everything was ok anymore. I would express that I was upset…and bang he would blow up with righteous indignation, like he was sick of my “nagging”. When I was just trying d say how I felt and get some comfort. I think all the little jibes were leading to the point when I would leave and he could get high. Some of the anger was probably just his mood swings from his poor damaged brain but alot of it was to get me to react so he could be the victim and be left alone.

When you say “she has broken me down to the core” I am sorry you feel so beaten by it all…maybe when we all stop fighting the disease and accept they are ill, we wont take it all so much to heart. I really got so sucked in to the madness. At one point I kept waking up scared that some imaginary judge and dury would find me guilty! and all his friends would say its you….you tormented that poor man with your arguing and now he has died of an over dose. Crazy but I didn’t tell my own friends about how much we argued so in a way I was hiding an addiction too.

reading all these posts and going to a therapist myself has really helped me. I hope you will see that it isn’t just your partner who picks fights and blames. It seems to crop up in most of the posts!