MIL and wife - sure its the pair of them

[Leonor]

Hi p123,

I think that this might be a time to give yourself and your wife permission to grieve.

Your mil isn't  a heavy drinker. She's not bending the elbow from time to time. She is an alcoholic, and she is now undergoing the mental and physical consequences of her addiction.

I am the daughter of an alcoholic who passed away from this horrible disease and I know how desperately you may feel the need to take care and support and reassure. But that deep need isn't actually a need from the addict. It's not healthy, or productive, or helpful. It's codependence.

Codependence is simply the trauma experienced by kind and caring people who love someone in the grip of an addiction. And the trauma twists that love and caring into anxiety, frustration, panic and control.

You're not cruel or cold for putting up very strong boundaries around the addict and her addiction. Addicts are not receptive to good intentions. You cannot love them into health or even awareness. The addiction overrides their functioning, and they are abusive, manipulative and violent, emotionally or physically, as a result.

Putting up boundaries is the compassionate thing to do. Allowing your mil into your space is sacrificing your wife's wellbeing to your own (very human) desire to connect with a parental figure during holiday times.

You cannot save, do-over or rescue a relationship with your alcoholic abusive dad by replacing you with your wife and your dad with your alcoholic abusive mil.

There is nothing you can do for them. Nothing. And there is nothing they can do for you.

It is very sad. It is a dark time. Isn't that what all of the holidays of light all over the world and in all our cultures *really* mean? It's cold and dark outside and we need to bring a glimmer of humanity into the winter void and know that one day the light will return?

Draw your family of choice round the hearth, embrace warmth and light, and feel the feelings. You are safe.

[nanotech]

Hi p123,

I think that this might be a time to give yourself and your wife permission to grieve.


You cannot save, do-over or rescue a relationship with your alcoholic abusive dad by replacing you with your wife and your dad with your alcoholic abusive mil.

I think Leonor may be right on this. It crossed my mind too, that this could be happening.
I soeng so many years over functioning for my parents and siblings. When I stopped, it felt weird, and I felt sad and incomplete,.
But those feelings went. I was addicted to the over functioning, over accommodating. I had to detox.
When I stopped the PDs hated it. Ndad tried to appeal to my hubby about my 'behaviour!' My Nbrother contacted my daughter with fake concern  to tell her I was 'behaving strangely!'.  Wow that was an eye opener! Watch out for it! They love divide and rule.
My Ndad now accepts the boundaries I put up. Nbro doesn't like them one bit but he's stuck with them. 
Maybe you could try what Jerry wise suggests when he asks us to consider ourselves nog to be a relative of that person, but someone who is an acquaintance. ' What would Betty, mil's neighbour, do?'
She would make sure the six week
Plan was in place. She would ask for done counselling for MIL concerning her alcohol problems and issues with food. She would Make sure mil got everything she was entitled to from local services such as benefits, help with cleaning, prescription delivery, shopping delivery, physio etc.
She may ring her regularly to check in her and to chat.
Not once would mil dream of waifing to someone like Betty. She can't press those FOG buttons because Betty's  not been programmed long ago. You two have.
When we distance ourselves in this way it's more loving and it's healthy, helpful helping.
Inviting her into your home may seem more caring but it isn't, not to anyone.  Inter generational living  is a tough situation, even without the addictions, the disorders and also the physical illnesses your mil has. The latter is probably the most straightforward problem.
Be Betty, be helpful but not codependent. Help in lots of ways, but keep those boundaries up and strong.

[p123]

That's a LOT of lager. That's 4-5 bottles a day!  I would agree that to have mum stay with you after, is going to be a mistake. She's entitled to the six week package, so that will be in place. She will need it the most during the first week out so you will actually be doing her a favour.
I know your wife is a nurse, but she has her own job, her own health issues and she already has family responsibilities.
If your wife continues not to get any time to herself ( if mil is there all the time and very emotionally and physically demanding on her days off) then she will burnout and become ill herself. You too.
It's the 51% rule- you put yourself first so that you CAN help other people. You can help by checking up with her on the phone, making sure foods been delivered ( lol) etc.

So yes, home or care home for MIL. Care home would also have a rehab effect. It would lead to a moderation of her drinking. She would  also be a lot less lonely.
The waifing wouldn't cut any ice, but they WOULD look after her.

The NOT EATING stuff and bleating about it.  This is when a disordered person weaponises a disorder. She may genuinely have lost her appetite, but the doctors will have told her that it's the lager filling her with empty calories. And  she doesn't want to stop drinking- so she dresses it up as a 'disorder' .

I suffered from an eating disorder at 15.
( I had ignoring parents plus an abusive boyfriend) When it's a genuine problem, you  generally try to hide it. People don't notice it for a long time, even when you live with them.
My sister has taken to weaponising food, or rather, her apparent non- intake of it. This is another reason I stopped going to family meals. Either she was 'just having a dessert' or
'I just can't eat and I don't know why' - followed by welling up with tears and walking away. Various people tried to tempt her all day, but no. It was massive supply for her. 
I also  found it triggering in terms of my own past issues around food.
After one chaotic family meal out, where she'd waifed to anyone who would listen to her about not being able to eat, including the waiter, I'd asked her many times or more to order more food, giving her the menu and saying 'choose, ( I was paying). She'd  refused rather smugly while drooling over the others'  full plates.
It's uncomfortabletucking into fish and chips while the person beside you has eaten a tiny dessert and is eyingyour plate. I tried to 'fix' that, which was what she wanted. Later that evening she messaged me from home, clearly with pleasure, saying,
' It's  funny but I'm really hungry NOW! lol!'
Oh the games they play.
At some get togethers the loud food refusal occurred in front of my grandchildren- luckily the bouncy castle was a distraction. 
I don't see her any more and neither do the grandkids.
How damaging such behaviour must be to children viewing it, especially young girls.

I realise your mil does have some genuine problems, but try to separate the real from the imagined/ exaggerated. There's always some truth- but then they turn it into a performance. The real problem is the drinking.

Yeh she was always consistent! When she was with us she used to drink prob 3 a night. So we KNEW at the weekend it was lots more. Sometimes MIL would phone wife at 10pm on a saturday night for little reason and just talk rubbish. It was obvious she'd drunk more than 3 those times.

She did get ill but then wouldn't listen. So wife told her she'd be better off staying home and getting better. Then it looks like she decided to not listen and, because she felt ill, didnt make any effort to eat at all. Of course, part of this is her being a martyr, and part of it is trying to make people do things for her....

[Leonor]

Hey P,

Rather than thinking that your mil's behavior is due to her being manipulative, consider it this way:

Your mil's manipulativeness is due to her alcoholism.

That is, she is an addict, and her addiction sustains itself through her manipulative behavior.

If you give in to the manipulation, you are sustaining her addiction.

This is why it is so important to not try to accommodate or work around or give in to the manipulation.

That's how the addiction wins.

To help your alcoholic mil, you must ignore the addiction. Override it. Go over its head, as it were.

If you all rush to the hospital now, I bet dime for dollar mil will experience a slight recovery (if her disease has not yet made that impossible). Her appetite will improve. She will stay hydrated. She may even be discharged! It will be very tempting to take her in: "But she's doing so much better", "But she's learned her lesson now", "But she needs someone to keep an eye on her", on and on. "Just for a short time," "But it's Christmas" etc, etc.

And the addiction wins. After all, it's a lot easier to get your hands on a bottle out of the hospital than in the hospital. And her manipulation has gotten her out of the hospital. Now she can drink in peace while being tended to at your place (don't underestimate how clever alcoholics can be at hiding their drinking.)

Overriding the addiction means saying, "Mom, I know it's hard and you're not feeling well. But you are here because of your drinking. We are willing to help you by meeting with you, a physician and an addiction counselor to decide what steps you should take next right here in the hospital. But if you are not willing to accept our help, then we cannot support you."

That way, you're offering real help by real experts, and you can draw boundaries and conditions around your relationship. But the decision is ultimately hers, and if she declines (which is sadly very likely), then you do not engage with the addiction. Doing so will only endanger your family's safety and wellbeing, both emotionally and even physically.

I'm sorry this is happening.

[p123]

Nano - see my other thread - shes out now. Thought it better to have a new one for the new "situation".

Yes this is not going to end well. As I said in the other thread, day one out of hospital she already missed some important doses of medication all because, basically, she could not be bothered and wanted to wait for my wife to tell her what meds to take. Ultimate waifyness. She admitted that the hospital had gone through it all with her though.....BUT as per  usual can't be bothered to think about it, play dull, and get someone else to do it for her.

She was a nightmare in hospital. In the end, wife had to ask the hospital to call her. MIL would sit there, they'd explain, she'd not. Even after we asked them to make sure she understood she'd nod and say yes. Then on the phone to wife "I don't know what they said".

This is going to happen now. Its a game - make out you're as needy as can be and get what you want. My Dad takes a whole host of tablets but to be fair he gets on with it, and he does eat too.

She even asked the doctor apparently if she could drink on the tablets. Even though when this all started she got told to stop drinking. She is going to start again.

She wont eat at home either. This is another game from her - if she comes to our house we cook for her and she eats a little otherwise wife is bad daughter for letting her home to not eat. She knows this. She'll start with toast for breakfast but then it'll go back to "i just wasn't hungry" again. I know it.

She'll be back in hospital before too long. Not before treating my wife like complete c@ap and expecting her to put her life on hold.....