Try to work out where to go, what to do. I've reached the end of the road with John, and it's been that way for several years. While Ali was ill and the children were younger felt like the wrong time to try to do something about it, but it has become more and more urgent, as things have deteriorated.

There's still the problem of what will happen: he seems to be drinking more and more, and is less in control of things the more time goes on. I worry about what will hapen if I leave... but things are getting worse even though I am not leaving, as a friend pointed out to me.

I have family around the country, in Devon, Scotland, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire. I really need to go somewhere which is cheap, where I will be close to communication links. I'm at a loss really, I feel I am no good at this. How do people do it? How do they manage to break up families/homes and move on?

I read something which said that if you had put up with a partner's substance abuse for more than two years, it made you a codependent, and possibly enabler. It seems a very black and white, no room for love sort of view of the world. An autistic, no room for caring for anyone who is damaged or in need of help, sort of view of the world.

As a person who believes that we are all the children of God, I wonder at this hard line. Are thy the only options? I have put up with it for 25 years. The trouble is, that I love the person he is sober... hate the one he is drunk.