How Addiction Happens

Question by ichimitsu: Can you help me understand this relationship?
I’ll try to keep this as short as I can. My partner and I (woman/man) have been together for nearly 13 years. He has only had a job for 2 years (a few jobs in between that only lasted a few months each). We are both college graduates. After college, we both moved to California. I have had a job the entire time (sometimes two). It got so bad that I wrote the President of the company I work for to get him a job. He got it. We work different shifts, and I don’t know anyone he works with. But he has spent the last two years telling me that I have slept with people, spread rumors about him, etc. I have not. He is a pretty paranoid person in general and has been the entire time we have been together. I thought it was odd, but I thought it would get better. I haven’t cheated on him, but he has accused me of the most outlandish things…and I haven’t done any of them. Well, last year, he quit smoking and we both started eating healthy. He is definitely an alcoholic (I do not drink, but I do smoke still). Anyway, he started working out and he has gotten in really good shape-it’s slower for me because he only works 6 hrs and uses my car to get to work, but I work 8 hours and take the bus to work (2 hrs. there and 2 hrs. back). I actually have to walk 5 miles through the city to get to my bus in the mornings. He told me a few weeks ago that he isn’t attracted to me sexually anymore. Basically, we just live together. Everything is the same-we just don’t have sex. Anyway, he thinks we can live together and help each other get out of this situation (living in a bad area and get better jobs, etc.) My problem is that every day I come home, it’s like my heart breaks again and again. I still want him sexually but he doesn’t want me. I can’t live this way. It’s weird, too, because at night, he will cuddle up behind me. What is that? He is crazy, I think. In the time we have been together, he has never gotten me a birthday present, he doesn’t even remember my birthday. I have spent the last 13 years working and stressing out trying to make ends meet and now he comes to me with this and expects me to get over it. He thinks I am trying to make him feel bad. I’m not….my heart is just broken. I am so hurt and confused. He is not cheating on me. I am pretty sure he hasn’t cheated on me. He doesn’t really make enough money to support himself, and I could support myself…it would be tight, but I could…and I could save the money he generally spends buying beer every week. And when I say beer, I mean A LOT. He can stay up for 20 hours just drinking and drinking, and then he gets mean. I just wonder why he thinks I could agree to stay? I love him….I would die for this man…but he just doesn’t seem to understand how much I have done for him, or maybe he just doesn’t care. I have always been there for him no matter what. I asked him if we would be together once we better our situation and he said, “I don’t know what’s going to happen”. Should I just leave? I would feel guilty because I do love hime and I don’t want to leave him with nothing, but in a sense, that’s what he has done to me. Everything I have worked for, just gone. Sorry this is so long, but I really need some insight.

Best answer:

Answer by ren_faire_rose
You are downing and this man is pulling you under. You can’t save him if you are drowning yourself. When you look into your future, where do you see yourself in 5 years? how about 3 years? You don’t mention any children so it would be easier to leave and just cut all ties. You think you love him, but maybe it is an addiction or a fear of being alone. You need to seek counseling, perhaps your employer has Employee Assistance Program as a benefit that you can access via a toll-free number so nobody in the company has to know. If not, try Al-Anon or a nearby church or community counseling service.

Answer by Liz
You have wasted 13 years of your life on a paranoid alcoholic. Man, you’re some kind of dumb.
Leave already. How much more time do you want to waste on this joke you call a relationship?

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