Maclean’s. June 1. ‘1949

I WENT BACK TO A DRUNK

By Anonymous

One black night she even thought of murder. Read the dramatic story of this Canadian woman’s victory over liquor for her husbands love.

Five years ago I wouldn’t have given a It wasn’t long before occasional drinking plug nickel for my chances at happiness with the parties in mixed company appeared to pall on man I married more than 25 years ago, the man my husband and some of his buddies. They whom I had loved, and whom I finally despised, found that they could drink much more without hated and sometimes thought of murdering. But wives around to scold if they drank in their here I am, back again, living a normal, happy offices. married life in a Canadian town, loving and My husband had a very good Position respecting that same man. for a young man – manager of a branch business The average married woman, whose life – and had a comfortable office in which he and has been free from the curse of alcohol, can his buddies would drink in comfort. never understand the humiliation, degradation It was at this time I began to realize that and utter hopelessness of living with an liquor was beginning to rule my husband’s life. alcoholic. lt is a disease that isn’t recognized Foolishly I scolded, resorted to tears, which only until it has the victim so firmly in its grip that the infuriated my husband when he was drunk. Then chances for recovery, until recently, have been horrible words were flung at each other, unkind about hopeless. thoughtless things were said, and our love Not only does this disease affect the became a bit tattered around the edges. physical health of the individual, but, worse still, Like all alcoholics, when my husband it affects the brain to such an extent that sobered up after a bad bout he would promise everything becomes warped and the truth is not never to touch the stuff again, and really meant in him. lt is pathetic and frustrating to see the it, for he hated himself and the things he did man you love and whom your children adore when under the influence. gradually fall victim to an insidious disease ln those in-between periods we’d be so which society considers only a weakness. happy doing the things we enjoyed; hunting Years of pleading, of tears, of threats, trips, picnics, driving over the countryside with were of no avail in the losing battle I waged the children. ln that period of happiness I would against alcoholism, and it slowly destroyed begin to forget the humiliation of the past. But he everything I held dear. was in the grip of something he could not It all began away back in the early 2Os, control. in prohibition. Perhaps because “forbidden fruits Strange as it may seem I never thought are sweetest” many of our friends and my my husband would become involved with husband considered it was smart and clever to another woman. Perhaps it was because he produce a bottle. never seemed to be interested in women, and I At first I didn’t drink because I didn’t like was often teased about this by his friends. They the taste of liquor, but when I began objecting to said, “You need never worry about Bill, he is not some of the silly antics it was suggested that I interested in any woman but you. ” This was was narrow-minded, a prude, and so on. So, l, flattering, but small comfort when I realized that, too, drank a little and found that when I did I was although he wasn’t interested in other women, much more tolerant. I never drank much he had a mistress in a bottle who held first place because it made me ill, and deep down I really in his life. hated it.

I am sure that if there had been no husband home, as he was very drunk and was children I would have left my husband in those disrupting their party, which he had crashed early days, but when you have small children earlier. After persuading him to return home I

you think twice about giving up a home and found I hated him and wished him dead. security. I had long since learned it was useless Even though mY husband drank to to remonstrate with him when he was drunk and excess he still managed to do his work. His boss I tried to be calm and cool, but he would have who visited our city periodically, were heavy none of this as he was in an ugly mood and drinkers too. spoiling for a fight. For several hours I listened to Then came the depression of the 30s. his drunken jargon and, finally, in disgust, I My husband’s heavy drinking bills, the repairs to started to go to bed. This infuriated him, and he cars he wrecked and fines used up any spare tried to prevent me from going upstairs. Then I money we could have saved. When our salary struck him. He is a big man and could have cut came it meant retrenching, but fast. At first it crushed me with one blow, but he had never was a bitter blow, but somehow I thought, struck me in his life. This night he was a different foolishly, this would mean that there would be person. He followed me upstairs, threatening nothing left over for alcohol. But the setback with each step to strangle me for striking him. acted as a stimulant and he drank more than He yelled, “No one can hit me and get away with ever to forget the depression. I found myself it. I’m going to wring your neck.” avoiding the butcher, the grocer and the When we reached the top step I turned landlord, as we soon owed money to them all. and faced him, saying, “There’s my neck, During this period our six year old son strangle me if you wish, it will be one way of had to have an appendix operation. I shall never getting rid of you for the children’s sake.” He forget rushing him to the hospital late at night, stared at me drunkenly, his eyes bloodshot and and the kind neighbours who drove us, refusing full of hate. Then he spat in my face, turned, and my husband’s request to get a bottle and bring it went downstairs. to the hospital for him. The doctor finally He was still asleep in his clothes on the persuaded him that he could do no more good couch in the living room after he got up. Then he there and he was driven home where he asked me if he had been obnoxious the night proceeded to get drunk. before as he couldn’t remember anything from I stayed at the hospital, and it wasn’t the time he had crashed the party next door. until 10 o’clock the next morning that my He wouldn’t believe the things I told him husband had sobered up enough to know and accused me of making it up. Then he whether the operation had been successful of became contrite and asked forgiveness and a not. chance to prove that he could be a decent Finally, on SaturdaY, we agreed to meet husband and father again. at the hospital around 2:30 P.M. and have a long I remember when I first realized that the visit with our son. I got there at the appointed respect in which I held my husband had been time and said that daddy would be along soon. supplanted by contempt. He had been drinking Each time footsteps were heard in the corridor, very heavily and brought home some strangers our son would sit up and say, “l bet that’s daddy late at night. He walked into our bedroom with now.” Then the look of disappointment on his them, introduced me as I lay blinking at the white little face was a knife twist in my heart. His bright light, and cursed because I refused to get dad didn’t arrive and by 5:30 I had to return up and get them food. Following this, he went on home, living in terror that my husband would the wagon, or so he said, for a week or so. Then visit the hospital drunk. we were invited to a party by friends who could I arrived home worried and weary, and throw business in my husband’s direction. after getting dinner for the rest of the family Before we left home I asked him to began to feel a knot inside get tighter as the watch his step and he agreed. I remember so hours went by. Finally around 10:30 a neighbour well what he said: “You keep an eye on me phoned and asked me to come and take my

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dear, and when you think I have had enough just partly, I think, to drown his humiliation and pinch my arm and l’ll not have another drink'” frustration. After about an hour I noticed the usual When he lost the job in the factory after a signs: my husband tossing off large drinks too few months, he decided that he would have to quickly, making repeated trips to the kitchen, our go away to battle it out himself. My health was host eyeing him with suspicion. I quietly slipped suffering, not from the work I was doing but from to his side and gave him the warning pinch, the worry he was causing. The children avoided looking into his eyes and silently pleading with him, and when he was sober he realized this him to go easy. and was more depressed. So the break was That pinch seemed to act with the made. suddenness of a match set to gasoline. My No one can know the relief it was to be husband strolled over to the buffet where free of worry and the thought of him coming several bottles of whisky were open, calmly home drunk. A cloud had been lifted from our poured himself half a tumbler of straight whisky, life; the children felt free to bring their friends then turning to catch my eye he tossed it off with around; and by watching every penny I was an air of bravado. able, with some money my husband sent to me I shall never forget the feeling of at odd intervals, to pay off some of the pressing humiliation about half an hour and six drinks debts. later when my hostess took me aside and asked We corresponded regularlY and me if I would take my husband home as he was although his letters mentioned his private battle I spoiling her party. knew he was trying. The cheques became more Hundreds of such instances occurred frequent and a little larger each time, so that we during the next few years. Perhaps one of the were able to face our creditors. However, I was reasons I stuck on was that deep down gaining a feeling of independence; and the underneath I felt some miracle would happen, children were older, one of them working. My that basically he was a wonderful husband and heart was numb as far as any feeling of affection father. for my husband was concerned. At last I got a position in a department I began hearing of his drunken exploits store, working from 8.30 to 5:30. Our youngest again, and it was then that I wrote and asked child was now in school and I felt free to work. him for a legal separation. He knew I meant it My husband lost his job and got another selling this time. He wrote and asked for a little time to on commission. prove he could win his battle against alcohol. I One bitter experience occurred during agreed to three months, and the following week the summer holidays when the children were he wrote and said he had joined Alcoholics home. My husband had been absent on a Anonymous. I had heard of this organization but drinking bout for i about two days and nights. I didn’t know very much about it, so I was quite had told him after the previous bout that if he skeptical. He wrote glowing letters of the work of repeated it again I would visit a lawyer and A.A. and how he was endeavoring to learn more arrange a legal separation. He agreed. Yet he about it. arrived home in the middle of the night so drunk When he wrote, after six months, that he that he fell into a stupor as soon as he hit the was coming home for Christmas I kept my bed. As I lay there listening to his mutterings and fingers crossed and hoped. snores, I hated him and actually wondered if I We were delighted in the change in his could press a pillow over his face and strangle appearance when he 1 got down from the train. him. lt was such a temptation that I found myself He was much thinner, had lost that alcoholic trembling with fear…. and I got up and walked puffiness, his skin was clear and fresh. We the floor the rest of the night. talked for hours that evening about the therapy He finally got a job in a factory at a low of A.A. and how it worked and I found my but steady salary, most of which went to pay the respect slowly returning. But I still had a deep back rent. But the heavy drinking continued, fear I couldn’t overcome.

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After a few days, just a day or so before give up my job, my freedom, and set up a home Christmas, he asked me if I had any wine or in another city. scotch in the house to serve friends. When I said It wasn’t an easy decision to make, but I hadn’t he remarked, “Don’t worry about me, after listening to my husband, who had never dear, those bottles are marked poison as far as I been a religious man, tell me that he would am concerned. Because I am allergic to alcohol, never have won the battle had it not been for a doesn’t mean that normal drinkers can’t handle Power Greater Than Himself. I knew he had won it.” and for keeps. Fearful and trembling, I saw him come As a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, home the next day with a couple of bottles. lt my husband would strike out those last two was with a sick heart that I saw him pour and words, “for keeps.” lt is against the principles of serve it to our guests. But he didn’t touch it, just A.A. to say, “l’ll never take another drink.” They quietly sipped a Coke. I couldn’t believe it, and say instead, “l shall try not to take a drink still had reservations. I knew he had fought a TODAY.” bitter battle, one of the hardest any man ever I shall never forget the thrill of knowing had to fight, and yet I wasn’t convinced the that respect and love for my husband were victory wasn’t permanent. slowly returning. I will never forget the night He returned to his job in another city and when he said, “Each morning before I get out of I carried on with my work. The children were bed I ask for guidance and help through this happy with the change in their dad, but when his day, and each night as I return to bed I say a letters came suggesting we might become a grateful thanks.” family unit again, I rebelled. The children, now in Basic honesty, utter humility and a desire their teens with the oldest faith in their father. to help others is the foundation of a life of happy But because I had lived my own life for so long I and contented sobriety, which I am now didn’t want to give it uP. privileged to share. My husband had established himself in The love and respect which I had thought his own business by this time and was doing Iost forever have returned with a greater well, and working hard to help other alcoholics. lf intensity and deeper meaning. Our children we were to live together again I would have to again love their father. I have no cause to regret that I came back to live with an alcoholic.

Source: Maclean’s Magazine, June 1 ,1949.

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