Early Addiction Recovery: Essential Things to Know for Your Marriage to Survive

The first year of recovery from addiction is often cited as the most difficult period of recovery, not only because early recovery is so fragile and the likelihood of relapse is higher, but because relationships change in early recovery. Many marriages that survived decades of alcohol/drug addiction do not survive early recovery.

The alcoholic/addict is making big changes in the first year of recovery and family members still feel abandoned and unimportant. While the alcoholic/addict struggles to maintain sobriety, regroup with work and career goals, and regain a positive sense of self, the spouse or other family member is usually still smarting from past hurts. They watch the alcoholic focus on their own recovery and problems and wonder when they will devote some time and attention to the family.

Family members who have picked up the slack as the addict has relinquished more and more responsibilities within the family may now be waiting for the recovering addict to take back those responsibilities. Once they have stopped drinking/using, family members expect the addict to be the person they always wanted them to be. Family members may not even know they have this expectation and are often confused by their anger at the addict for not changing fast enough, working in a good enough program, or not accepting enough responsibility.

Family members may also have a hidden expectation that the recovering addict will be able to say or do something that will erase all the pain caused by the addiction. They think that when the addict “makes it right” by grieving enough, or really understanding how the family member feels, the pain will go away.

Although family members harbor these hidden expectations, they are afraid to discuss them with the person in recovery. They fear that such a discussion could provoke a relapse in the addict. Fear is often rooted in memories of past behaviors and arguments.

Sometimes when trying to talk about problems, the addict gets defensive and wants to put the past in the past and not dwell on old hurts and anger. The addict often doesn’t want to hear about family members’ pain caused by her addiction because it hurts him to hear it. The addict often carries a great deal of shame and guilt for having the addiction, for the things he did in the addiction, especially misdeeds involving loved ones. They still have denial and defenses that have prevented the full extent of the pain caused by addiction from being fully revealed to them.

Alcoholics/addicts often have skill deficiencies that prevent them from communicating and problem solving effectively, or even identifying and managing feelings. Couples in recovery often have difficulty resolving issues on important issues because they are operating from this position of skill deficits and from a history of failed attempts. These failed attempts create more emotional debris that gets in the way and makes it harder the next time they try to solve the same problem. As a result, the couple in recovery are often trying to resolve old relationship problems that they have been unable to resolve. They may also be fighting over power shifts in the relationship, which can make resolution even more difficult.

In the midst of all the changes that occur in early recovery, relationships and families seek to regain some balance or equilibrium. Couples and families in recovery struggle to redefine relationships, to restore old roles, responsibilities, and power to the relationship(s). Sometimes it is not so simple or easy for the family member who has assumed all the roles and responsibilities of the addict to give back. The addict who tries to reclaim roles and responsibilities from her may be experienced as a threat to the family member.

The recovering addict may continue to act irresponsibly, continue to lie, or continue to be completely self-absorbed and narcissistic. The person in recovery may, according to the family member’s perception, care little for the needs or feelings of others. The person in recovery may want to be rewarded for the extreme sacrifice of getting off the chemical. Family members struggle to understand this line of thinking, hoping to watch and wait for the person in recovery to take the initiative and take care of business, without being asked, bribed, or rewarded for doing so. Therefore, the family often has different expectations for the recovering addict than they do for the addict. Often when this happens, the addict still feels controlled. Family members still feel taken for granted, taken advantage of, and often manipulated.

The recovering addict may also be making new friends and relationships and this too can be threatening. The addict may not be as dependent as they were in active addiction. As they return to their previous (or even higher) level of functioning, they may exceed the family member’s level of functioning.

Another factor that threatens the relationship in early recovery is the extreme emotional ups and downs experienced by the addict. In trying to figure out what’s going on with all this emotion and how they ended up where they are, the addict often questions her feelings about the marriage, whether he loves his spouse, or even if he ever loved her spouse. . Early recovering addicts often think about or actually act on leaving their spouse.

The non-addicted family member often experiences a similar reaction, trying to figure out if there is anything left in common, or if too much damage has been done to the relationship. Family members may even feel that now that the addict is clean and able to take care of himself, they are free to quit. Or family members may be overwhelmed with fear of relapse and think they will never stay clean and sober.

Other stressors in a newly recovering marriage could include unrepaired damage from illness, including legal troubles, financial troubles, career and job problems, unresolved anger and resentment between in-laws; all of these need repair or resolution at a time when couples are often least equipped to resolve them. Too often, the recovering addict and family member have the expectation that when use ends, everything will fall back into place. Under most circumstances, nothing could be further from the truth. Armed with knowledge about typical early recovery marriage difficulties, it empowers a couple to begin problem-solving and overcome those difficulties. Marriages strengthened by members’ recovery can ultimately be among the healthiest, happiest, and most secure marriages. But first, they have to get over early recovery.