Caller: “My Husband Can’t Accept My Boundaries”

The Dr. John Delony Show

A wife shares her struggle with her husband's alcoholism and inability to accept boundaries, despite her efforts to save the marriage throug

Key takeaways

• Accepting that you cannot change another person is a crucial step toward emotional freedom.

Main topics

• Marital boundaries and communication
• Alcoholism and recovery dynamics

Notable quotes

"You can't change him. I know you have. And I would even go as far to say... his not getting sober instantly for you is probably not about you."

Conclusion

The caller must shift focus from changing her husband to protecting he

Transcript preview

Speaker 5 (0:05) My husband is an alcoholic. We've been married for 10 years and around year three he started drinking and it quickly progressed. He's not violent or abusive, just very absent and a little rude, which leads me to clean up every mess, financial, emotional, physical, and be a married single mom. Speaker 2 (0:29) What up? What's going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. Thanks for being here. I hope wherever you find yourself, today's going pretty smooth. And pretty smooth would be a win for all of us these days. And so I hope wherever you happen to be, wherever this show's popping up in your earphones or in your car or somewhere in your house, wherever you happen to be, I hope things are going well for you. This show is about your mental and emotional health, your relationships. I'd sit down with real people and talk about real things going on in their lives. And we try to get to the next right step. If you want to be on the show, I would love to have you click the link in the show notes and it will send you right over. And if you have an Apple, I was going to say an Apple phone. Some call it an iPhone, right? If you're hip with it or whatever. My wife tells me I was born in the wrong century. But if you have an Apple device. I would love for you to consider going over to the App Store and getting the Together app. I'm biased, but I think it's the greatest marriage app on the planet. And we are constantly making some pretty amazing improvements to it. But here's the deal. Here's what it is. It's micro habits for your marriage. It's an action plan for you and your spouse. You can do it in one-player mode or two-player mode. Your spouse can join for no extra cost. And the cost of the thing is so low anyway. I just want people using it. That's the main goal. But it's micro habits. It's a small action step you can take every day. Plus, we've added new learning tracks, new frameworks in there for dealing with conflict, with communication. We've added so much more cool stuff. And there's a ton left to come. But it is pretty extraordinary. And the feedback we've received from thousands of people all over. is that this thing is working well. So go over to the App Store and check it out. And you Android folks, we're coming for you. We're coming for you. Let's go out to Santa Barbara, California and talk to Danielle. Hey, Danielle, what's going on? Speaker 5 (2:34) Hi, Dr. Delaney. How are you? Speaker 2 (2:36) Awesome. How are you? Speaker 5 (2:38) I'm okay. Speaker 2 (2:39) What's going on? I Speaker 5 (2:40) wrote down my question so I could get this out coherently and give you a little background if that's okay. Speaker 2 (2:48) This show is probably not the place for coherence because I don't usually make two sentences work together. But you know what? It would be good if one of us was coherent. So yes, that's perfect. Go for it. Whatever you feel comfortable with. Speaker 5 (3:00) Got it. My husband is an alcoholic. We've been married for 10 years, and around year three, he started drinking, and it quickly progressed. I know why he drinks. It's a coping mechanism for severe childhood trauma and stress today. He's not violent or abusive, just very absent and a little rude, which leads me to clean up every mess, financial, emotional, physical, and be a married single mom. It's our biggest marriage battle, and I really believe all the small Speaker 4 (3:30) ones stem from it, too. Speaker 5 (3:32) About three weeks ago, I laid out an ultimatum, stop drinking or I'm leaving. His response was, I'll think about it. That response itself, of course, was a gut punch. The next night, I came home to him having a case of beer, and Speaker 4 (3:47) he explained to me that he needed one last hoorah, and then he quit. Speaker 5 (3:52) Night two, he's still drinking, but asked for time to wean off as he knows the dangers of alcohol withdrawal. We don't have health insurance, and I cannot afford a medical detox. So I agreed to a one-month plan of weaning. We're living like roommates. Any conversation turns into a fight and him walking away from me. I used your verbiage of laying out what I need to feel love, but I see no effort and the drinking doesn't seem to be flowing. How do I get through to him that I don't want to leave, but my kids and I need a sober, present dad, and he's going to have to start having some hard conversations with me. Speaker 2 (4:31) I'm so sorry. Speaker 2 (4:39) Oh, man. So if he was to go to AA, one of the first parts of that process is admitting that you're powerless. Speaker 5 (4:54) And Speaker 2 (4:54) for you as a spouse, this is heartbreaking, but you too have to admit you're powerless. Speaker 5 (5:04) Yes. Speaker 2 (5:05) You can't change him. Speaker 5 (5:09) I've tried. I Speaker 2 (5:10) know. I know you have. And I would even go as far to say, you know what? I don't know if this is helpful. I'll say this. Take it with a grain of salt, okay? It's not every situation, but it's enough of them over the years that I've sat with people. His not getting sober instantly for you is probably not about you. Speaker 5 (5:41) Okay. Speaker 2 (5:42) And I know it feels very personal. And the way you framed it made it very personal. And I would have done the exact same thing, okay? Speaker 5 (5:52) But Speaker 2 (5:52) my gut tells me that it's less about you and more about the sheer terror of the true and honest feelings that will come rushing like a tsunami through him the moment he kicks his crutch out. Speaker 5 (6:14) probably very true. Speaker 2 (6:15) And so I only tell you that not to minimize it in any shape, form or fashion, but to depersonalize it in a way that hopefully frees you to do the next right thing for you and your kids. Speaker 3 (6:30) Because Speaker 2 (6:31) I don't know many, if any successful folks in recovery that quote unquote got sober for their kids or got sober for their wife. Speaker 2 (6:41) Sometimes that's the only tiny dull light they can see through the haze that is their life. And that's what they say initially. But my experience has been sitting with folks in recovery. It only works when you decide I'm worth being clean. It's just too hard to do it for somebody else for too long. And you're powerless to get him to that realization. I just referenced this book on another show. Speaker 2 (7:25) A buddy of mine, Dr. Henry Cloud, he's kind of an OG. He's somebody I looked up to before I had this podcasting thing. He wrote a book called Necessary Endings. Speaker 2 (7:39) And it's oriented towards a business audience. How do you know when to keep an employee or let them go or to stay in a job or leave a job or close your business down or keep your business going right? But it also has some really powerful, powerful insights and principles for relationships of all kinds, especially romantic relationships. But at the end of the day, so I strongly recommend you read that. I used to make all my students read that book. It's just, it's a masterpiece. Speaker 2 (8:07) One of the most important takeaways from that was the difference between a hope and a wish. And a hope is wrapped up in evidence. Is there movement from a documented plan? Is there movement towards tomorrow being different than today? Speaker 5 (8:37) like good things to anchor into. Speaker 2 (8:39) And when a relationship of any sort, professional, personal, romantic, when a relationship is devoid of hope, tomorrow, because one or both of us will refuse to go do what we need to do, when a relationship is devoid of hope, that's when there's a period at the end of that sentence. Speaker 2 (9:07) And my challenge to you would be, there are so many, especially in California, there are so many resources available to folks who don't think they can afford any number of programs. There is a lot of financial resources, but he would have to make it a part-time or full-time job. Speaker 5 (9:29) Yeah. I Speaker 2 (9:32) got to, like I say, he might not be able to stop drinking right now. But he can put himself in a situation where he can begin to heal and get the skills he needs to not only stop drinking, but to then deal with the nightmare that's waiting for him behind that curtain. And again, the heartbreaking part of this call, like you can't make him do any of that. Speaker 5 (10:04) That's not what I wanted you to tell me. I Speaker 2 (10:07) know. I know. You've got to be the driver in the seat that is your, in the front seat of your own car. Speaker 2 (10:16) And so when you made that ultimatum to him, what was your, and then what plan? Where were you going to go? Speaker 5 (10:26) Or Speaker 2 (10:26) where was he going to go? Speaker 5 (10:27) Honestly, my plan is to tell him to leave. Speaker 4 (10:30) And because Speaker 5 (10:31) we have two children and a home, and it's not fair to uproot my kids into someone's bedroom in someone's house until I can figure life out. I feel like he needs to leave if he's making the choice. Speaker 2 (10:46) Can you afford that house? Speaker 5 (10:51) I've done a lot of things in my life that I didn't think I could. Honestly, no. But if we ended up separating and sold the house, I could afford something smaller. Speaker 2 (11:00) Okay. So I want you to reframe this. And no matter what decision you make moving forward, I want you to hear me clearly, okay? Speaker 5 (11:09) Okay. The Speaker 2 (11:10) greatest gift for your kids right now is a healthy, well-regulated mom. And dad, but they're not going to have that right now. Speaker 5 (11:22) The Speaker 2 (11:23) greatest gift for them. Like, let me put it this way. What you think is stability, same front yard, same windows, same doorknob. There's some truth to that. But kids can endure a lot if they are bound to regulated adults. Speaker 5 (11:47) Yeah. Speaker 2 (11:48) Right? Kids will anchor into things when there's not people to anchor into. Speaker 5 (11:56) Yeah. Speaker 2 (11:57) And so I want you to dispel with the, I'm not saying y'all should leave. I'm just saying if you found yourself having to leave tomorrow and y'all went and the three of you went and stayed and how old are your kids? Speaker 5 (12:13) 15 and 10. Speaker 2 (12:14) Okay. Yeah. That'd be awkward for three of y'all to live in a one bedroom of somebody's house. Right. But yeah, Speaker 5 (12:20) if Speaker 2 (12:20) y'all had to make do for a season. Speaker 2 (12:24) And you did the next right thing. Speaker 5 (12:26) Your Speaker 2 (12:26) kids are going to anchor into you. Speaker 5 (12:30) Yeah. Speaker 2 (12:31) Okay. What does your kids take on their dad? Speaker 5 (12:36) Well, my 15-year-old, my son, it's actually his stepdad. My son is from a previous marriage. And they have an okay relationship. And then my daughter thinks her dad's home. Yeah. Speaker 5 (12:51) And Speaker 2 (12:52) so do Speaker 5 (12:53) a really good job of protecting all the chaos. That's Speaker 2 (12:58) right. Speaker 5 (12:58) And so Speaker 2 (12:59) part of, part of doing whatever the next right thing is, if you choose to leave, it's weathering the opinions and insights of 10 year olds and 15 year olds. Speaker 5 (13:11) Yeah. Speaker 2 (13:12) Right. Speaker 5 (13:14) Yeah. Speaker 2 (13:15) And we could hope and pray that your husband would be a man of character. And when the kids say, dad, why did mom leave? That he won't say, because she's a terrible woman. He might, Speaker 5 (13:26) or Speaker 2 (13:28) he might have the courage to say, your dad's real sick. I didn't, I didn't do my part. I've known folks who struggle with alcohol who are that honest. Speaker 5 (13:41) I'm not sure that would be the case, but, you know. Speaker 2 (13:45) So it's just knowing I'm going to be not liked by my husband. I'm going to be not liked by my kids, but I'm going to do the next right hard thing. I've done hard things before, and I'm going to do this incredibly hard thing. And by the way, you cannot do this by yourself. So I'm going to reach out to resources, which is the worst. Asking for help, right? Speaker 5 (14:07) Right. Speaker 2 (14:09) But I'm going to because I'm worth it. My kids are worth it. And maybe this is the elusive rock bottom that my husband needs. But I can't count on that. I mean, I can't do anything about it. Speaker 5