I’ll try to keep it fairly concise, this just happened, so bear with me. I’m still processing shit.
My partner (34F) and I (37M) have been dating for over two years. When we first met, I was a bartender at a popular dive in my town and we were pretty typical late night, bar-hopping party people for the rest of my time at the bar. Basically the kind of people who went to bed at 630-7 every morning with runny noses, the whole nine yards. We quickly fell in love, and I basically moved into her apartment after only a few months (I know, super quick, but I’m in my mid-late 30s, she is a mature adult as well. I knew how real this feels, etc). If I remember correctly, after about 6-9 months of that, we had a massive blowout about my cocaine usage, working extremely late nights at the bar, etc. Basically, if I wasn’t ready to move on from that life style, we would have to go our separate ways. I love this woman, so I told her that I would do what I could to prove that I could be someone she would want to spend the rest of her life with.
I eventually got a new job, just over six months ago, and it’s great for the life I want to lead. Good salary, benefits, room for growth, with a company that seems to really care about its employees. I quit the drugs and basically stopped drinking altogether, haven’t missed the life, haven’t looked back. So, needless to say, I’ve been quite happy with how my career has been unfolding. Our relationship has similarly blossomed (or so I thought); we started renting a place together at the beginning of this year that’s twice the size of the place we just moved out of. She left her job where she was surrounded by sexual harassers, enablers, toxic management and ownership – not totally unheard of for a restaurant job, but also not acceptable – to go back to school and get a 9-5 kind of gig (which she hasn’t landed yet, but she’s been doing a lot to get her career started too).
We’ve had what I considered normal long-term partner issues and fights. We haven’t been as passionate in the sack as we were in the beginning. Part of it I think is my adjusting to a new life/career. I had to COMPLETELY flip my schedule in a matter of about a month (I wake up at 530 AM these days) and my job is in a completely new field with a tonnnnnn of responsibilities I’ve never had before. Part of it is also just a differing of libidos; she has a much more active libido than I do. I would be completely satisfied having sex 2-3 times a week, whereas she asks me if I’ve lost interest in having sex after two-three days. That’s all pretty normal, nothing I don’t think we can work through. The much larger issue, for me, is her drinking.
She loses all self control when she drinks. Up until today, that meant she cannot just stop at two or three. She drives when drunk, and has driven blackout drunk multiple times, while we’ve dated. I have a HUGE issue with that. Let alone the seeming double standard that I gave up “that life” to show who I can become, yadda yadda. I’ve never had suspicions that she would cheat in any form, even when drunk. But today, a friend of mine reached out to me out of the blue. We aren’t tight enough that we talk all the time – I don’t talk to my closest friends often enough – but he’s someone I would consider a “good dude” and unless proven otherwise, would stick up for him and be there for him when needed.
Apparently, on her birthday about two weeks ago, she kissed him. He told me details that line up with the few details I had already gathered from the night, but I wasn’t super laser-focused on that night because I hadn’t known there was any reason for me to be. All I remember is that she came home super late, woke me up on her way into bed, and lied about how late she had been out. I could tell she was wasted, but I wasn’t super upset because I knew she hadn’t driven and that’s my main point of contention when she goes out drinking. So I hadn’t really paid too much attention until today.
Long story somewhat shorter, she had been flirting with my friend for a while that night. He wasn’t sure if we were still together because we don’t really keep in touch like that, but according to him, when she said we were, he stopped flirting back. Eventually, he was going home, wanted to walk her to her next destination, and she ended up basically pinning him against the car and kissing him. I have no reason to doubt my friend’s account. She doesn’t remember everything from that night, but she’s also not flat out denying it happened. I don’t know what to do, I love this woman.
EDIT: A couple of responses have made me realize I unnecessarily exaggerated how often she blacks out and how often she drinks and drives. That’s my bad, I shouldn’t exaggerate, I’m still very reactionary right now. She doesn’t “black out” regularly, but when we first started dating, it wasn’t unheard of. The driving has gotten better lately. For the past month or two, I’ve been able to convince her most of the time to just leave her car at home when there’s a chance she’ll be drinking.
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Backup of the post’s body: I’ll try to keep it fairly concise, this just happened, so bear with me. I’m still processing shit.
My partner (34F) and I (37M) have been dating for over two years. When we first met, I was a bartender at a popular dive in my town and we were pretty typical late night, bar-hopping party people for the rest of my time at the bar. Basically the kind of people who went to bed at 630-7 every morning with runny noses, the whole nine yards. We quickly fell in love, and I basically moved into her apartment after only a few months (I know, super quick, but I’m in my mid-late 30s, she is a mature adult as well. I knew how real this feels, etc). If I remember correctly, after about 6-9 months of that, we had a massive blowout about my cocaine usage, working extremely late nights at the bar, etc. Basically, if I wasn’t ready to move on from that life style, we would have to go our separate ways. I love this woman, so I told her that I would do what I could to prove that I could be someone she would want to spend the rest of her life with.
I eventually got a new job, just over six months ago, and it’s great for the life I want to lead. Good salary, benefits, room for growth, with a company that seems to really care about its employees. I quit the drugs and basically stopped drinking altogether, haven’t missed the life, haven’t looked back. So, needless to say, I’ve been quite happy with how my career has been unfolding. Our relationship has similarly blossomed (or so I thought); we started renting a place together at the beginning of this year that’s twice the size of the place we just moved out of. She left her job where she was surrounded by sexual harassers, enablers, toxic management and ownership – not totally unheard of for a restaurant job, but also not acceptable – to go back to school and get a 9-5 kind of gig (which she hasn’t landed yet, but she’s been doing a lot to get her career started too).
We’ve had what I considered normal long-term partner issues and fights. We haven’t been as passionate in the sack as we were in the beginning. Part of it I think is my adjusting to a new life/career. I had to COMPLETELY flip my schedule in a matter of about a month (I wake up at 530 AM these days) and my job is in a completely new field with a tonnnnnn of responsibilities I’ve never had before. Part of it is also just a differing of libidos; she has a much more active libido than I do. I would be completely satisfied having sex 2-3 times a week, whereas she asks me if I’ve lost interest in having sex after two-three days. That’s all pretty normal, nothing I don’t think we can work through. The much larger issue, for me, is her drinking.
She loses all self control when she drinks. Up until today, that meant she cannot just stop at two or three. She drives when drunk, and has driven blackout drunk multiple times, while we’ve dated. I have a HUGE issue with that. Let alone the seeming double standard that I gave up “that life” to show who I can become, yadda yadda. I’ve never had suspicions that she would cheat in any form, even when drunk. But today, a friend of mine reached out to me out of the blue. We aren’t tight enough that we talk all the time – I don’t talk to my closest friends often enough – but he’s someone I would consider a “good dude” and unless proven otherwise, would stick up for him and be there for him when needed.
Apparently, on her birthday about two weeks ago, she kissed him. He told me details that line up with the few details I had already gathered from the night, but I wasn’t super laser-focused on that night because I hadn’t known there was any reason for me to be. All I remember is that she came home super late, woke me up on her way into bed, and lied about how late she had been out. I could tell she was wasted, but I wasn’t super upset because I knew she hadn’t driven and that’s my main point of contention when she goes out drinking. So I hadn’t really paid too much attention until today.
Long story somewhat shorter, she had been flirting with my friend for a while that night. He wasn’t sure if we were still together because we don’t really keep in touch like that, but according to him, when she said we were, he stopped flirting back. Eventually, he was going home, wanted to walk her to her next destination, and she ended up basically pinning him against the car and kissing him. I have no reason to doubt my friend’s account. She doesn’t remember everything from that night, but she’s also not flat out denying it happened. I don’t know what to do, I love this woman.
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Your cheating S/O has problems.
The drinking just takes her mask away and helps her cope with the shame of being herself.
It’s ok to outgrow people, no matter how painful it is at first. She’s probably not your person if she’s kissing your friend. You sound like you are craving different things from this pointless drunk existence. Go find them. Don’t let her drag you down. I say this as someone who lived the party life for a long ass time.
Had a similar drinking problem and I genuinely would not remember doing those things but obviously it still caused problems in my relationship and lots of other areas.
If you’re not ready to leave, you need to look into resources surrounding AA. Her behavior won’t stop until the alcohol does. And honestly, you need to ask yourself how much do you love her. Is it enough to buckle down and help her through this, knowing that it will be incredibly painful and difficult for you to watch her battle this? Particularly if she drinks more than once a week on a regular basis. Because sobering up changes a person, and it’s along road to find a new normal. You know that from your own experiences I assume
When I was her, none of it stopped until my friends started telling me I scared them when I was drunk, and people were openly upset to see me drinking.
I know you say you love her, but what she did with your friend shows she doesn’t love you back. Her using the excuse of being drunk and not remembering seems like her refusing to take accountability for what she did. I was in a position like yours, with someone who was an alcoholic/drug addict. Staying with him completely drained me. You need to ask yourself if this is what you want for the rest of your life.
I would talk to her about your worries about her health, about the possible cheating, the endangerment when drunk. Tell her how it makes you feel, and ask her if she’d consider talking to a professional about it. It is also possible she’s fine acting this way, and that’ll give you an answer too: perhaps youre no longer compatible.
She’s getting blackout drunk on the regular. Basically she’s doing some very risky stuff and she could end up getting hurt or attacked, or hurting/killing someone’s while blacked out.
The folks you ran with while living la vida loca ain’t going to be the ones you run with when you’re no longer in that game.
She’s not quitting, Y’all need to decide.
I would lay out an ultimatum of no more drinking or you move on. She”ll continue this type of behavior every time she gets drunk, which seems quite often. I doubt she’ll give up drinking to keep you, so get your affairs in order and plan to move on.
She’s sloppy! She won’t do for you what you did for her. Sobriety is hard to achieve and she doesn’t even try.
You beat the odds and got out of that crazy lifestyle. She didn’t. I think if it was going to work out between the two of you, she would have already noticed your self improvement and stepped up her game. You can’t make a woman live a stable lifestyle if she’s still a few years away from wanting it. She has to want it. You can’t want it enough for the both of you. It’s a common mistake.
If she continues down that path, quietly passing her the closed tab might be the only route unless you want to go back to taking turns trying to piece together the previous night’s events.
Source: lived it. Sober reality makes sloppy drunk unappealing.
Best of luck
You said she’s so mature in your post OP.
In her 30’s and she KNOWS she loses all self control when she drinks and she knows she can’t stop at just 2 or 3 drinks.
But she drinks anyway, knowing this. That’s not being mature OP.