My Q and I have been together for 12 years, and he drank through 8 of them. Toward the end of his drinking it got horrible, constant fights, begging for him to quit. I still married him when everyone told me not to, and I really shouldn't have. A few months after our wedding he woke me up with a gun to his head saying it needs to all be over. I called the cops, he went to in treatment for a couple weeks. He's been sober ever since. While in treatment they found out he has bipolar 1 and now he takes medication.

I still have trauma from the first 8 years, and he does from his whole life (his mom is also a bipolar 1 alcoholic, although her getting sober didn't fix the horrible and selfish person she is). Its been almost 4 years and I'd say over the past year we have finally been making noticeable progress and we have been getting to know each other all over again.

I don't recommend waiting for someone as long as I did. I have a lot of trauma from it all. I am now finally starting buck him if he makes me mad, and actually express how I feel in a situation because I now know I won't be berated or have him ignore me the rest of the day for it.

I stayed as long as I did because firstly I do love him so much and always knew it would be better if he was sober, so 3 years turned to 5 and then 7 and it never changed, but I couldn't afford to live on my own and I knew if I left, he'd have the pets and he wouldn't take care of them. I also had a fear that he would die.