Anniversary of a Death

It sounds like hubby has some guilt with his dads passing. Maybe he didn't tell him how he felt or something else. The drinking will not solve this and it is time to tell him. Will he consider grief counseling?

It's time. He was not close to his father but yet the death's anniversary drives him to drink? It doesn't make sense.
If you can try to get him into counseling, maybe he would go for couple's counseling first.
Also, you attend an Al-Anon meeting. THey are wonderful at giving you tools for dealing with someone who has alcohol issues.

Grief Counseling is a good idea if you can get him to go. Some men though just wont you know be tough hold it in. do you have any good picturs of father. Maybe you can great a book or something and then let him cry it out with you. Help him sort it out so to speak. Just tell him your there if he needs a soudning board.

There truly isn't a set timetable of how people grieve or how long, so instead of saying, "enough already," why not suggest he go to grief counseling or a grief support group? He's trying to cope in a negative way by drinking, so he definitely still feels the pain, or possibly denial or guilt, since as you say, they were not close whatsoever.

Google "grief support group" in San Fernando, CA. They're often held at hospitals, churches, mortuaries, etc. Offer to go with him but if he chooses to go don't be surprised if he'd rather go alone. Let him know you care about him but see he is suffering, and that you want him to move on with his life.

You can try Al-Anon, but you can also try counseling on your own as well as marriage counseling. That might help toward getting your husband to move toward his own individual counseling as well as Al-Anon.

"How long of a time span should I give before I speak up and say enough?"

There are too separate issues here. One is grief/emotions/closure -- and the other is drinking.

It is never too soon to speak up about the drinking. The time is now. Drinking is never a healthy way to deal with emotional issues. And while your husband's complicated relationship with his father may take years for him to fully grapple with -- his drinking needs to be dealt with immediately.

I agree with others who suggest Al-Anon.

Your husband is allowed his emotions of grief and and loss -- and you can't set a timetable for that. But excessive drinking is not an acceptable way to work through those feelings. He has a responsibility to be a healthy, functioning human being, a father and husband. Binge drinking will solve none of his problems, and will only create more for you as a family.

Acknowledge and accept his unresolved feelings about the loss of his father -- but put your foot down about the drinking .

And be prepared for the fact that this won't be the only thing that will drive your husband to drink.

Work together to seek a support team for dealing with his grief - but more importantly, his drinking problem -- now!

I wish you both the best.

Please, please get yourself to an Al-Anon meeting. This group can help you, as the spouse, work through what help your husband needs (which may include both professional grief counseling and AA). Al-Anon is for family members, not for the drinker him/herself.

Just because he drinks heavily only periodically -- that does not mean he's not an alcoholic. Not all alcoholics are constantly drunk. Some turn to alcohol at certain periods but still need that alcohol to cope. You can't know for sure. Al-Anon groups can help you figure out what is going on and how you, yourself, are or aren't coping.

You mention that the dad and your husband weren't close but that doesn't necessarily matter. There is a lot of history there before you and your husband met that you may not really know -- even if he claims he's told you everything about his past with his dad. Also, the death may have scared your husband and made him start thinking about his own mortality and his own death, which could be stressing him enough that he's drinking. Unresolved issues with a not-close relative can also spur this kind of behavior; he may be feeling that "Now there is no chance of ever making it up with dad/having it out with dad/telliing dad how much he ruined me/telling dad how much I really loved him despite it all..." Whatever. So the lack of closeness, as you define closeness, does not prevent your husband from feeling a lot of very, very tough emotions about his late dad. But as long as he deals with it all by drinking, he is just medicating the pain away, not getting rid of the pain.

Again, please find an Al-Anon group -- they are all over the place. Look online for one in your area. You may have to have a very tough talk with your husband, or get him to a therapist, or tell him -- if it's true -- that your marriage is on the line so he must get professional help. But the key word is "help" -- for both of you. If it's his dad's death that is spurriing heavy drinking now, what will happen in later years when there are other stresses? What will your kids learn from dad's behavior -- that it's acceptable to numb pain with alcohol? What will your husband miss, of your kids' lives, if he's drinking?

Death is such a difficult situation to deal with, and it's different for everyone. My dad died on MLK Day 6 and a half years ago. He never went to church, but every week when I'm at mass, I think about him the entire time. I feel so close to him there. It's the strangest thing since I never went to church with my dad. I cry at some point during the mass most weeks even though it has been so many years since he has died. My point is that you can't put a time limit on grief, and you can't make sense of it. I do like the suggestion of trying to get him to a grief counselor if you can. I understand your frustration, and I hope your husband gets his drinking under control.

So sorry. Sounds like his dad passed away the same day as my mom, who also had cancer.
Grief counseling would definitely help. The one through Stephen's Ministries is great. It sounds like he must have some unresolved issues. But for some reason it seems like men are very reluctant to seek grief counseling. Is there anyone else who would help you with intervention--another family member or a good friend of his.
He needs to think about what he is doing to his family.

I had a similar situation with a friend. I grew up with her and her family, and she and her mom were ALWAYS butting heads. She always complained about her and her mom never got along, she couldn't stand her etc....

When her mom passed away of cancer, she LOST it. She started drinking like CRAZY. That was her excuse for her entire life falling apart. She lost jobs, got utilities turned off sued for custody of her kids......

I finally told her, while the passing of your mom is very hard and sad. It's not a reason to turn to drinking excessively, and ruining your life. While there's obviously issues unresolved, this will not fix things. Try to be at peace w/ what you did or did not have.
Your husband obviously has some guilt issues over things with his dad. It sucks, but it's not a reason to drink. It doesn't solve anything.