My Husband Blames Me for His Relapse

What do you do when your husband blames you for his relapse? I said things like that when I was using, so I have to answer this one. It's mine to answer.

This is lived experience from one recovery, not medical advice.

Sixteen years sober now. Back then, I had triggers too. Or that's what I called them. I named everything except the real one. The stress, the people around me, the situation, the timing. Everything got a turn being the reason.

The real one was me.

What the blame actually is

Calling the person you hurt your trigger is the addiction handing you its bill. It counts on your love to get it paid.

If he's anything like I was, that's what's happening when he points at you. The addiction has costs, and it doesn't want to pay them, so it hands the bill to the person most likely to accept it. The person who loves him. The person who's already lying awake wondering if she caused this. You're not chosen for that role because you're guilty. You're chosen because you're the one who might actually take it.

I did this. I want to be plain about that. When I was using, I made the people I was hurting into the explanation for the hurting. It wasn't a strategy I sat down and designed. It's just what the addiction reached for, every time, because it worked.

About your questions

Maybe the story is that your questions set him off. Your checking, your asking where he was, your not trusting him.

Your questions didn't come before what happened. They came from it. The hurt came first. Checking on it afterward is not what caused it.

Your watching isn't paranoia. It's memory. It's what happens after you've been hurt. You didn't wake up one day suspicious for no reason. Something happened, and you remember it, and your asking is the shape that remembering takes. Turning that around and calling it the cause is the same move as the bill. It's the addiction refusing to be the reason for anything.

What's mine to say and what isn't

What happens in your marriage is not mine to call. I don't know your husband, I don't know your home, and I'm not going to stand here and tell you what to do next. That's yours.

But the blame is mine to call. It was never yours.

Sixteen years sober, and the only trigger that ever mattered was mine. Not my family's questions. Not anyone's tone or timing. Mine. It took getting sober to see that, and once I saw it I never unsaw it.

If things are heavy right now

If you want to talk through treatment options or what this is doing to you, SAMHSA's free helpline is open 24/7 at 1-800-662-4357. If you or someone you love is in crisis, call or text 988, or text HOME to 741741. And if the blame where you live ever comes with fear, the domestic violence hotline is 1-800-799-7233, or text START to 88788. All of these are free, and you deserve every one of them.

Why Haven exists

While I was using and handing out blame, my family had no one to hand any of it back to. No support, no place that understood. Haven is the app I'm building for them, for you, and it opens August 24. If you want it when it arrives, the waitlist is at joinprojecthaven.com.