Alcoholic wants family to host no-alcohol events

Dear Amy: I am an alcoholic in remission. I am not recovering — I have a disease that I fight daily. For almost 17 years I have not had alcohol in any form. This is my sore spot: I have family and friends who bemoaned my drinking for the first half-century of my life. These people have never — and I mean never — hosted an alcohol-free event.

I have requested that they do so, and they have flat-out said no. There are times that I can actually ignore the booze. But there are times when the walls start to close in and I panic because the mere smell of a deep red wine makes me lose all reasoning. So — I flee. Then I sit in the car and cry.

I want to still be part of the crowd, laugh, joke and eat good food. — Sober

Dear Sober: First let me express my admiration for 17 years of one-day-at-atime. It might be a good idea to find a local sober/recovery group where you share your story, strategies and frustrations. It is unfortunate that your family and friends don’t support your sobriety more fully. My instinct is that alcohol is an important part of your family’s culture. However — guess what? Just as they couldn’t prevent you from a halfcentury of drinking, you cannot prevent them from continuing to drink. It’s the age-old Serenity Prayer challenge — to cope with things (and people) you cannot change. I hope you have at least one friend who is willing to host alcohol-free dinners and parties so you can enjoy food and fellowship without the constant worry that you will relapse.

Dear Amy: There is an email discussion group in our community that my wife is a member of. My wife and I each have our own desk with our own computers. At her request, I always turn on my wife’s computer in the morning before she gets up. I’ve been reading my wife’s email, scanning the group message subject lines, to see if there was anything interesting enough to read. My wife got up early one morning and saw me doing this. She is now angry with me. She says she feels I’ve invaded her privacy. I feel that I’m not because the only emails I look at are from the community discussion group.

— S in California

Dear S: I agree with your wife. If you think of email as postal mail, then any letter that is addressed to both you and your wife could be opened and read by either of you. Any email addressed to your wife and sent to her computer should be considered her property. If you want to learn what your community group is communicating about, it is easy for you to get on the listserv.