Intimacy is the Solution | Sober and Unashamed

“If you would have more sex with me, I wouldn’t have to drink so much.” Ah, the twisted phrase uttered out of intoxicated desperation in marital bedrooms around the world. And every one of the millions (maybe billions) of women who have received that accusatory plea have the same two simultaneous thoughts:

How dare he try to put his drinking problem on me. It is my body and my choice, and frankly, sex is the last thing I want with this man who has grown increasingly unattractive to me over the years and decades of his abusive drinking. Maybe he’s right.

We alcoholics lie and gaslight for two reasons. The first is that alcohol reduces our capacity for considering the feelings of the people around us. We drink ourselves into the mentality and maturity of a two-year-old. We become selfish. If we can think of something to say that will help us get our way, we will say it. We don’t consider long-term ramifications or lingering emotional damage. We go for it to get what we want. The second reason we lie and gaslight is because we are trying to convince that alcohol is not the problem. If we admit the truth about our drinking, we will have to at least consider sobriety. In active addiction, sobriety is such a horrifying and outlandish thought that even allowing it entry into our minds must be prevented at all costs. So, blaming you for not…