Deciding to divorce my alcoholic/addict husband was a lonely, painful process. I had told my addict husband that if I ever found drugs in the house again, I would leave him. It took me 54 weeks after the day that I changed the locks to tell him I was filing for divorce, and a total of 1.5 years for our divorce to become final.
Even now, several years later, I’m not sure it was the right amount of time. I wish I’d gone to Al-Anon sooner and gotten out of his business faster. I heard in an Al-Anon meeting recently that sometimes the only way we can take care of ourselves is to leave the addict or alcoholic; since I grew up with alcoholism, I knew I couldn’t live with the chaos any longer, and so divorcing him was really an act of self-care. I still love him, even after all these years, but we cannot live together.
You can read about my divorce in the following posts:
Should I Divorce my Alcoholic or Addict?
How to Divorce an Alcoholic or Addicted Spouse
On Custody Arrangements When Divorcing an Alcoholic or Addict
