Hi Logic,
Its hard to hear you berating yourself, being in a relationship with a CG particularly one in denial is next to impossible because you don’t ever truly relate, your relationship and his is with the addiction not each other.
I came to this forum to find out how to help my CG, I was desperate, he had put his life in danger and was receiving death threats, I HAD to help him. Imagine my annoyance when I didn’t get the response I wanted!! I was expecting to either be told to get out while I could or a magic formula for getting him ‘cured’, instead I got told to take care of myself. Frankly I was furious, what were these people going on about? I shouted at my computer, I wrote more posts about yeah, yeah I’m doing that but what about HIM but to no avail it all came back to me taking care of myself, luckily for me Velvet and other contributors were very patient. When i started listening and decided on an ultimatum they warned me not to make it if I couldn’t carry it through. When the ultimatum ultimately failed (as no doubt everyone else expected) I knew to carry it through, I stuck to my word. I felt I had lost my soulmate and my best friend it was only later I realised that I had already lost him to gambling.
By the time I finally ended it we had lost respect for each other, i worried constantly and felt resentful, his mind twisted by the gambling was resentful of me not believing in his recovery. Had we stayed together I am fairly sure we would of continued an unhealthy relationship and both ended up stuck in a cycle of him gambling, tearful apologies, attempts at recovery and so on spiraling down until we had nothing and I was as far in trouble as he was and all love was gone.
Instead I went away and worked on myself, kept busy, poured time into my son, improved the relationships I had with friends and family, started a business doing what I loved. I never expected to see him again but I understood what had happened was for the best for us both. From time to time there were emails telling me he he had completed treatment, he had a job, he was working on it although there had been many slips. My partners gambling is deep rooted, the money he has lost is more than many people have seen in a lifetime, gambling addiction is progressive so the longer it goes on the worse it gets so treatment and recovery has been a long road and it is still early days yet.
7 years on he was come a long way, I have come a long way, despite feeling we would never be back together and accepting that or maybe because we did, here we are in a healthy two way relationship, taking each day as it comes and being open and honest. We are very much together but we also have our separate lives, homes and finances which removes the anxiety and has reinstated the respect.
My point is while you are not putting yourself first nothing can change for the better. Once a family member or partner has learnt to self care though things can move forward for them and some times this also turns out to be the best thing for the CG too. I am not saying that things work out how you wish now or even as you expect but things have a way of falling into place for YOU and your life will be very different.
You are right to suspect things are not as he is telling you, they well be worse than you suspect they are, this is my experience. You are doing the right thing protecting yourself financially and by not moving in with him and you have been very courageous working on yourself by doing the counseling, protecting yourself emotionally however is more difficult and some times takes some hard choices as I think you are realising.
Your holiday should give you a good opportunity to think things over and work out what is best for you.
Take care, Lily x