Q: Scott,
I have been dating a man for 1 1/2 years. I fell in love at nine months and thought we were great together. He makes me laugh and laugh at myself. My problem is this … when he drinks hard liquor, he turns into a different person. He is mean and mouthy towards me. He picks on me to no end. My other problem is that he didn’t acknowledge Mother’s Day for me. I wasn’t expecting a gift or anything of that nature, I was expecting a “happy Mother’s Day” phone call, anything would have made a difference. He was pitying himself, because he no longer has his mother and was envious that his friends got to take their mothers out for brunch. I asked him what about the living?
We had dinner Saturday night, and he was drinking Crown Royal and just got mean. I left him at the dinner table, and I’m sure that ruined his pride! He has not phoned me and I have not phoned him.
We also have a trip planned to Mexico; everything is paid for. His son and my daughter are going, along w/ his twin sister. I don’t want to cancel this trip because it would hurt my daughter, but I don’t know how to proceed.
Anyway, please tell me what you think.
Thank you!
Mary
You know I’m always happy to tell you what I think, especially about Mr. Wonderful. I answer every e-mail I get and if you read the column regularly – as any self-respecting person should – you would have some idea how I would respond to your trip planned with the selfish belligerent alcoholic who forgot you for Mother’s Day.
Poor him and poor you! Do you really want to go on a trip with this guy to, of all places, Mexico the tequila capital of the world?
Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure he has some redeeming qualities somewhere that I don’t know about, otherwise you wouldn’t be with him (rigghhht?), but he obviously has a problem with alcohol and until he addresses that, you can count on putting up with more of his humiliating behavior. Honestly, allowing him to treat you so poorly is pitiful to say the least and I don’t like it one bit.
When you do talk to him, tell him you don’t like his behavior when he drinks and make him promise not to drink on the trip. If he can’t promise, then save yourself and your daughter a grip of drama and get out of it. This is the perfect time to confront him with his alcoholism and urge him to get treatment. Helping him is one of only two ways you stand a chance of being treated well in a relationship. The other way is to break up with him and find someone else.