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MrWalker
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Member Since: Dec 2018
Location: NC
Posts: 9
5 yr Member
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Trig Dec 16, 2018 at 08:05 PM
 
It was a relief just to learn that there were others like me, people having issues due to growing up with an alcoholic parent or parents. I don't have a lot of people to talk to about my issues, and no one that I know of who can relate completely to this. It's hard facing my issues head-on, even just to tell my story. Numbing and avoidance is much more my style, but I know it's not solving anything.

So, my story. I guess I'll start with a brief overview. I'm a male, mid 30s. My father was always an alcoholic, he died a few years ago of a heart attack. My mother died of cancer when I was 18. I tried to stay with Dad afterwards, but couldn't cope as the loss of Mom pushed him deeper into alcoholism. I went to stay with my paternal grandmother. I started working at 17, but going off on my own wasn't something I was mentally or financially prepared to do at the time. She passed away a few years before Dad did, and I'm in my own place now.

I was never abused as a child, never went cold or hungry. Though I'm sure a lot of that was due to the kindness of family and friends.

I think 2 of my biggest problems are fear of getting close to others, and self-loathing. Apart from never knowing if Dad would be the loving father or the loud, drunken lout, I also suffered a painful betrayal from a sibling-in-law who cheated on and left my older sibling. We've actually since reconciled, but that doesn't do much to ease my fear of betrayal.

Being on my own does get painfully lonely sometimes. But on the other hand, having absolute freedom and general order after decades living with the chaos of an alcoholic (either directly or hanging over my head after I left home) isn't something I can let go of easily. I've already decided that I'll never have children, as I feel that even the slightest risk of making an innocent child suffer the way I have is too much. I'm not an evil man, of course. But neither was Dad. He was hardworking, loving, caring. He helped out anyone he could if he was able. But he still scarred me emotionally for life.

On self-loathing, it runs from "if I'd tried harder, I could have got him to stop drinking," to "it's my fault he's dead, if i hadn't left him I could have saved him the night of his heart attack." Things my rational brain knows are not true, but it still occasionally gets drowned out by my inner demons.
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