Hi Everyone -

I've known about ACOA for about 45 years. I am now 67 (in two weeks). I've been in ACOA live groups, but there is not one where i live now. I've read Melody Beattie and a few others. I thought I understood how my parents alcoholism affected me, but I think there are layers. About 18 months ago I found out I was married to a sex addict. This was my 5th marriage (and now 5th divorce). Number 4 was also a sex addict but I didn't know enough about it to understand that this was the problem. He could not stop watching internet porn (I now know that is the "gateway drug) and he became increasingly hostile and aggressive toward me, finally pushing me into the outside corner of a wall and that crossed a line for me. I was married to #5 for 5 years and the "discovery" was traumatic. I had no idea. That's another story. He is in SAA and we have an amicable, civil divorce and relationship. I had a serious PTSD response but now, 18 months later, I think that has mostly subsided. I use mindfulness as an aide. My 47 year old daughter is also an alcoholic. I have had all of her kids at different times for 6-7 months reasons related to her drinking. That last time was her 4th DUI and her youngest twins were 10. As soon as she got off probation, she started drinking again.

I am online with you now because after another round of counseling following the discovery of #5's sex addiction, I thought I understood yet another layer of ACOA - Not codependence, but neglect, which for ACOA seems "normal." A year out from my discovery and 6 months out from divorce, I started seeing someone who paid a lot of attention to me and after years of neglect this was awesome. But now I believe he is an alcoholic. It is still hard for me to tell where the boundary is between "problem drinker" and "alcoholic." Where I am with that now is "If your drinking interferes with your responsibilities, including your responsibilities to your relationships, then it is a problem."

After a few months of "good behavior" dating, I started noticing behavioral changes when he drinks. He gets self-centered, irritable, and argumentative. It was hard to see at first because I think he is a fairly high-functioning drinker, meaning it is hard to tell the difference between drinking and sober (although sober he often displays symptoms of bipolar or depression).

So I am here because geeze, I thought I was over codependence. I thought I was over being attracted to addicts. You have to realize that you cannot "see" sex addiction the same way you can see drunkenness. So it was MY radar for addicts, clearly. Out of 5 marriages, 4 were definitely addicts and the other was depressed. I really need some support to draw and maintain better boundaries, to deal with my low-self-esteem issues that draw me to addicts, and not to get drawn back into a relationship with this most recent man. He is intelligent, interested in many of the same things I am (like yoga, poetry, dancing, opera, any live music etc) so I had been so starved for companionship...I will miss that. And he was/is very emotionally engaged and intimate and I had missed that too. But problems arise from his drinking and I have to say "no" and mean it. Thanks for any advice and support.