Honestly Dechan, she may be afraid someone might see her that she knows at Alanon too. She probably is VERY private and doesn't want anyone to know there are problems. After all, she wanted the ideal and that storybook life she thought your mother created. My guess is she is too embarrassed to tell you that too.

When a friend explained to me one day when I learned she was leaving her husband that if you argue at all about alcohol "there is a problem", it was the first time I realized that she was right because it had been a problem and something my husband and I fought over. With binging, they don't think there is a problem because they don't drink everyday and only get really drunk once in a while, AND, they can control consumption and drink socially too. So often they themselves THINK they have control and don't know THEY actually do have a problem.

You shared that you remember her husband drinking socially, but that you saw him control it. Ah ha, yes but there are times he gets drunk too and often because it's progressive, what you remember in him not showing problems, well, no one expects to develop a problem. Many children of alcoholics DO develop a problem even though they HATED how their own parent had problems. It's more common than one might think. My father's father was a mean drunk, otherwise was an extremely talented nice man, but NOT when he got drunk. My father tried and tried to get him to stop drinking too. Yet, my father too developed a problem and insisted he could control it because he binged and did not drink daily like his father did.

And also, I don't think it's that your friend can't figure out how to get involved with alanon online, I think she is too afraid to admit there is a problem. Also, most of the time the advice given at alanon meetings is TO LEAVE your alcoholic partner. And most women do leave once their partner gets sober, they typically wait until their partner is sober and managing and then they divorce.

And you are more than likely right about your friend being too afraid to live on her own like you do. No, she doesn't have the strength you have. That doesn't make her a narcissist though. She is probably more of a codependent and quietly suffering. Being married to an alcoholic is like being married to a narcissist and suffering many of the symptoms of that kind of abuse. You may be dealing with an injured animal that is so hurt and frightened it growls and bites when further threatened.