*RANT**My husband is a hypocrite

He spent the morning bitching because he was going to a union meeting 2 1/2 hrs away with a couple of guys known for drinking til they fall over.  Now he is 1 1/2 hrs late getting home and I know he is out drinking.   I cant stand this.  My stomach is in knots because I know he will drive home.   I know if I say anything tomorrow (I know better than trying to talk to a drunk) it will cause a big fight. 

Well thanks for listning...I just needed to vent.

I think you should calmly speak to him. dont start the conversation with something he's doing wrong. it will just make him deffensive. im sorry i cant think of any other advise.

FallxOutxNow

There's really not much you can do aside from telling him how you feel (without it being an attack, of course), that you're "concerned." I'll tell you what, it sure would SUCK if he got into a car accident and killed somebody (not to mention himself) and had to spend the rest of his life in jail. That has happened a few times around here in the recent past and I find it terrifying. People that just threw their lives right in the garbage over a night of drinking. Getting a DUI and having your name in the paper would be pretty humiliating (and probably humiliating for you and your family as well). Here you have to get a "special" license plate and everybody that sees it knows you've had a DUI.

Maybe you could have called him and urged him to get a hotel???

If he was drunk driving and killed my daughter, I would not notify the authorities.  I have a large axe in the garage which would be useful for dismemberment.

Having been a teetotaler in a heavy-drinking town (Superior, WI), I have no patience with or tolerance of people knowingly and willingly intaking a substance that impairs their judgment and reflexes to the point where they are a danger to society.  I don't know why we show them any mercy at all.

I know if I say anything tomorrow (I know better than trying to talk to a drunk) it will cause a big fight.

I know we're all here to hold hands and be warm fuzzy enablers but frankly this is ridiculous. Your husband is a menace to society when he does this and will end up killing someone and maybe if he's lucky, just himself. This is inexcusable and it infuriates me. Talk to him dammit.

You should talk to him in the morning. Let him know that you are afraid something bad could happen to him and that you are worried he could hurt someone else. Remind him that not only can he get a DUI, but he could end up with manslaughter. (A joke charge, as it should be premeditated murder) Be calm but firm. People normally get angry when they know what they are doing is wrong, but he still needs to hear it. 

If you know he's driving drunk, call the police and let them know where he is.  I agree with dnrothx and spirochete.  Drinking and driving is inexcusable.  I think it's better that he's arrested than dead, his vehicle wrapped around some other family's car.  I know DUIs are expensive and a general pain in the a**, but don't be so passive about his drinking and driving.  If you know he will drive home drunk, why aren't you pissed off, rather than worried that talking about it will cause a fight?

he's not a hypocrite, he's a menace and a criminal. he needs to learn to take a cab to a hotel & sleep it off & drive home the next day after some strong coffee & a nice breakfast. in fact, you need to insist that he do this. stop tolerating it. stop minimizing it. stop enabling it. drive there with him if he plans to do this in the future. or drive to meet him & bring a friend to drive his car home. anything. get creative. this is criminal behavior and it's deadly. zero tolerance is the only solution & it'll be on your head for the rest of your life too if he kills someone.

My mother was killed last year by a couple of kids drinking and driving. She was still young and very healthy. She was engaged to be married and she should have had thirty more years at the very least.

It was devastating, and still is. It has destroyed my family. Watching my 90 year old grandmother cry over her lost daughter was almost the worst experience I have ever had. The worst was telling my mother's fiance over the phone that the love of his life was dead.

I think being concerned about a fight with your husband should be the least of your worries, and frankly I don't think it's very admirable. I am biased because of my experience, I know that, but if my husband drove drunk and said boo when I objected I don't know what I would do. At the very least it would be a swift divorce.

when you atlk to him about it, try using "I mesages"

I feel..... upset and angry

When you.... drink and drive

because.... i get very worried about what could happen. doing this puts you and other people at risk.

Iwant/i need.... you to not drink and drive. if you are going to drink, then you need to stay at a hotel for the night.

doing this will help him feel like you are not cornering him. it helps explain how you feel and really gets to the problem. maybe also mention that if he were to accidently hit someone he would ruin many lives. do you have children? if so, you could bring them into the scenerio.(ask him how he would feel if someone who was drinking and driving hit your child.this should get him thinking straight!)ask him if it is really worth drinking and driving.

good luck :)

I don't understand.  If he was going with them why would he be driving and if he is driving why would he take them with him or wait while they get drunk?

Orrr is it just a really lame excuse for him to get drunk with them and blame anybody but himself for his total lack of judgement and responsibility as usual with people who drink badly?

parre, my grandfather was also killed. he was young too, in his late 50's.  one morning he was on his way to pick up some medication for my grandmother, it was around 7 AM and he was hit by someone who was out all night drinking, slept for an hour in their car, and thought that they were "sober enough" to go home. he was not killed instantly. my grandmother was put through having to decide whether or not to take him off of life support.

i'm sorry about you mother, i know for my mom, losing her father to a drunk driver was and still is a hard thing to deal with.

nivy, hopefully you're husband doesn't put someone else's family through something like what parre's and my family have had to go through.

I agree with kazinya with using I statements. I am upset etc.... because you can only state how you feel, end of arguement, there is nothing he can say except he's sorry of upsetting you and you have stated how you felt with rationals reason. Don't give him the chance to argue back. Just the I have something to tell you and you need to listen and not interupt.

Okay now that I have given my 0.2 on how to have a conversation I can go on to say I agree that worry about having a fight was the least of the problem but I hope everyone has helped you find a way of approaching the situation. There only one person I hate more than a drunk and it's a drunk driver. We live near a military post and this is a weekly thing. We had 2 killed Sat. a week ago. A 32 yr women at 2 a.m. that went of the road and a guy on a motorcyle.  My neighbors 16 yr. old grand daughter got kill last yr just 1 mile down the road by a drunk in a 30mile hour zone. He had an open can with him and had already lost his license.  This isn't something to take lightly. 

 Also you did not say how often this happens, but once is all it takes. But need to put down the rules or take further steps.

personally, after I got angry..... I'd call the cops on him.  I'd find out where he was and get the cops to stop him as he left the parking lot.....Spending the night in jail would (hopefully) smarten him up not to drive.

I also had a friend who used to think he was okay drinking and driving....... then he killed two people and spent 10 years in jail.

ok, here is what happened.... He got home at 3:35am and was SOBER!!!!  I was in shock.  I told him how upset I had become and how I had vented on here because of his past behaviors and I really thought he would have been drinking.  He said he has decided that drinking and driving was not what he wanted to do.  And after thinking about how upset he was knowing how drunk the other guys get he decided to stay sober.  He said he actually drove the other 2 guys (both drunk) he was with  home.  that is why he was so late.  They rode together but met at a parking lot.  One guy lives 1 hr from us.  I did tell him that next time he should call me.  So we are ok.  And the last time he drove drunk...I did call the cops and turn him in but he got home before they got him.  

Thanks for all the advise and lectures.  Sometimes a person needs a wakeup calll.  When your in the situation its hard to see past your own feelings and fears to see things clearly. 

I'm so glad it worked out!

But seriously, being afraid to call someone on their bad behavior (I know it wasn't bad behavior in this case, but you thought it was and were afraid to say anything) is a bad sign!

I was always afraid to "start fights" with my ex - over his drinking, his drug use, his not having a job...  No matter what he was doing that was awful, it was MY fault for "causing" a fight. 

It's a bad sign of an abusive relationship.  I'm not saying you're in one - but do be careful.  If you're not allowed to speak your mind, or to tell him when he does something that upsets you, then something in the relationship is not right.

Frankly, this is sort of anticlimactic.

Glad things worked out.

Sort of.

Lol at dnrothx. I second that.

dnrothx be nice.

So glad he did the right thing and everything is okay.