I met my ex-husband Gary and the father of my 17 year old son, in 1989. My ex husband is an alcoholic and has been for over 30 years. And though I knew he drank when we met, the extent of his addiction to alcohol was not clear to me until a short time later. When I did realize it, I attempted to end the relationship. He promised me as he wept that that I was the most important thing in the world to him and he would stop drinking. He didn't.
Several months passed and again I decided to end the relationship and again he swore he would stop drinking. He didn't.
This happened more times than I care to admit here but finally there came a time when I simply could take it no longer and told him I was leaving him and why. He swore, as he had done so many times, that he would stop drinking and furthermore, to show he was serious, he would go into treatment to do it, which he did for thirty days.
He managed to stay sober for four months.
During one of our many arguments regarding his alcoholism, he swore if I gave him a son, he would never touch another drop, that he would never have a reason to because he would have everything he ever wanted; a woman who loved him and the son he had always dreamed of. I did...and so did he.
And later, I was told if I married him which I refused to do and in fact, had put off 3 different times by 'losing' the marriage license, he swore on his son's life that he would be a completely different person as well as a sober one.
He wasn't.
We divorced 8 months after our son was born. As the years passed and Gary's drinking grew worse, he began to fade from his son's life. Visits were few and far between and always colored by Gary's alcoholism. At first my son tried to keep in contact but after years of trying to remain close to his father and having no success, he simply gave up as his father drank on and on.
So it was with a great deal of sadness that I learned from his ex-fiancee last week that my ex husband is dying from throat and lung cancer. It wasn't a surprise as he smokes 3 packs of cigarettes a day as well as drinking everyday to excess but it was news that tightened my chest and brought tears to my eyes.
I had known that since his mother had died in 2003, that Gary's anchor in this life was gone and I had worried that his drinking would become uncontrollable. It did.
For the last several years, my son and I have literally watched as Gary has slowly, surely and with great deliberation, almost succeeded in drinking himself to death. And now after being warned over and over and over again to stop or at least slow down on his smoking, he has been diagnosed with throat and lung cancer.
This morning as I wept for my son, Jeff and for Gary, who always seemed at war with this world, I realized what agony long goodbyes are and that this had been a very long, very sad goodbye from a boy to his father and from a father to his son.
It mattered to me that Jeff might never get to say goodbye to his father in person before his death and it also mattered to me that Gary get the chance to say goodbye to his son. No, Gary would never, ever be the father that Jeff needed or wanted and now that Jeff was almost a man, he was able to accept that. It wasn't so easy for me. I had deep grief over the fact that Gary had chosen alcohol over his son as well as the pain his drinking had caused Jeff and I realized that I had to accept the situation and let go of the grief as well as the hope and dream that Gary would somehow wake up, realize what he had been doing all these many years and become that father my son had always wanted and needed. That was never going to happen and deep in my heart, I had always known. I needed to say goodbye for the last time.
And so, Goodbye Gary, Goodbye My Friend, for even through all the pain and bitterness, we were friends...Thank You for the gift of my son. Thank you for the times you made me laugh. Thank you...for just being You. I don't think you ever heard that before. I'm sorry for the pain you have endured all of your life. I'm sorry that the only way you chose to deal with it was with alcohol. Most of all, I'm so very sorry you missed your son growing up; for Jeff and for you.
I know you tried. He's turned out to be a hell of a man...You would be so very proud.
And to my son? I don't have to say much because my son and I have an unspoken understanding about his father. But I have said, "I'm so very very sorry, my son.
Life is not perfect and neither are people. Your father has an illness called alcoholism and it has affected his choices and so he has not always made the right ones...but he always loved YOU."
Until next time My Dear Friends,
LadiofZen
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