Amy’s story starts like so many other family members of people who’ve come through the doors of Country Road for treatment. These are the partners and parents who live with, and love, people struggling with addiction. She noticed something shifting within her husband. Meals were quieter. Sighs were louder. He was dead behind the eyes.
“I didn’t know what I was going to come home to,” Amy said. “I felt like I had to walk on eggshells.”
So she did what many partners of alcoholics do - she blamed herself. Maybe the house wasn’t clean enough. Maybe the kids were too loud. She was full of self-doubt while her husband was full of booze.
Trying to “Fix It” Almost Broke Her
When Amy first found the empty bottles of alcohol that her husband had been hiding in the garage, she thought: Ah-ha, now we can fix this. He even quit drinking for a month, and went to a few counseling sessions. It seemed everything was solved.
“He was lying to me, but deep down I knew he was using,” Amy said.
What followed was anxiety, weight loss, and a secret life lived in complete emotional lockdown. She stopped eating. Stopped going out. Stopped existing outside the walls of her home and classroom.
You Can’t Rescue Someone by Setting Yourself on Fire
Eventually, Amy hit her version of rock bottom. It wasn’t because her husband crashed the car or lost his job, but because she cracked. She knew her house was burning down emotionally and she was still there, trying to keep it decorated.
So she did the unthinkable: she got help for herself.
“I called my husband’s counselor and said, ‘I need someone to talk to.’ Not to fix him - to fix me.”
The First Time She Said “You Can’t Come Home”
Boundaries are what turned things around. When her husband was three times over the legal limit and landed in the ER, his parents tried to bring him home. Amy refused.
“He’s not coming home,” she told them. “Not until he’s healthy. That, right there, was the moment everything started to change. It wasn't long before her husband was in an addiction treatment program.
Sober Living Isn’t a Punishment
When her husband went to rehab, Amy was initially pissed.
“He got a massage,” she said. “I was like, ‘Are you kidding me? You’re on a vacation while I’m home covered in kid puke, paying bills, and holding everything together?’”
But she also admits: it was the first time she could breathe. And when it came time for him to come home after 30 days in treatment, Amy said no. She pushed for sober living.
“I didn’t want to be the parole officer anymore,” she said. “I didn’t want to worry about whether he’d keep going to meetings.”
Sober living wasn’t abandonment. It was the thing that made sure he didn’t crash-land straight back into old habits.
Recovery Means Getting Out of the Therapist Chair
Here’s what Amy had to learn the hard way: loving someone in recovery doesn’t mean managing their recovery.
“I had to learn I’m not his therapist, not his AA sponsor, not his doctor or nurse,” she said. “I’m his wife.”
And she backed it up. She went to Al-Anon. She started setting Do Not Disturb hours on her phone. She started walking again. She saw a therapist. She even knew when “crazy Amy” was about to make an appearance and had the tools to stop her before she spiraled.
Nine years in, she’s still doing the work. And that’s the point: recovery isn’t linear, and it’s definitely not one-size-fits-all.
Life on the Other Side
These days, Amy says things like: “Our marriage got stronger after addiction.” Not because everything’s perfect, but because now they do weekly check-ins. They see counselors. They name their feelings. They let each other have space to grow.
Want to explore sober living, support groups, or how to set a boundary that actually works? Give us a call today.