WomanSavers.com Forum / ALL OTHER EUROPEAN COUNTRIES / Irish men and drinking

Hello,

I married a guy from Belfast. I know its a different culture but what is up with the drinking. I think that my husband has to be an alcoholic.  It seems like everything we did revolved around drinking. Our sex life was non existant because it seemed like all he would want to do is drink and then go to sleep. He would go on about all the other irish people in the community how they drink 3 times more than he does. Even his mother said he was fine and he should be drinking. She almost died from alcholism so i dont understand why she would encourage it.  I use to tell him all the time that maybe he should stick to the irish women.  I am divorcing him now because i can live with that life. Along with the drinking came a lot of emotional abuse.  I start to doubt myself thinking maybe it is just cultural. He himself once told me he thought he had a drinking problem but then said he didnt.  Any opinions on this from an Irish persons point of view.

Thanks for the reply I know as americans most people drink a lot in college and maybe a few years after but it drops off and you loose interest.  Once in a while is ok but not every weekend. My husband went on how every other country drinks all the time and only americans were like this because of prohabtion.  I never had a problem with anyone else before.  Even with him i doubt myself because he went to work everyday and he wasnt fall down drunk it was just that life didnt seem fun to him unless we were drinking. I started to think there was a problem when we would go to the movies and he would drink two bottles of wine at 11 at night and sleep on the couch.  Then he cut back dramatically because i complained about it so much.  His family came over for the wedding and it went awful. His mom especially thought i was horrible and didnt want him to have any life. He never was physically violent but he put me down all the time and blamed me for everything and saying there was something wrong with me because i got so upset when he drank.  It did seem like the guys he knew drank a lot and my brother made a good point he was like well if your hanging out at a bars at 36 your going to find drinkers. I guess the Irish guys who dont drink all the time are not at the bars all the time.  I know in the long run i will be better off without him but it has been so hard because i really did love him and i would cry and tell him i didnt want him to end up like his mother.  I guess its easier for him to say i was up tight than to admit he has a problem.  I sent him some of the posts on here about abuse and i sent him a book on adult children of alcoholics but he managed to turn it around that i was the abusive one.  I may have been a little because he pushed me to the point of being hysterical so i definatly said things that were mean. This website has been helpful because i didnt even realize the stuff he was doing was abuse.  I think my brother noticed it first. He said that i shouldnt feel so off balance all the time and maybe there was a reason for it. 

It is good you got out too i cant imagine what it does to children. I see my neice and nephew and how much care they need and it makes me realize that if my husbands parents were drunk all the time who took care of him.

He didnt drink during the week that much only on weekends but he seemed aggrevated all the time because he knew i would freak out.  Im sure now that hes on his own its closer to every night. I got him to a marriage counselor once and she said she didnt think he was an alcholic yet but he was going down that road and the heavy drinking would get more and more. I would never go out with the girls because i didnt want him to drink.  I do miss him but i have to say i am less lonely now because i go out with the girls all the time.  He was always in his computer room playing video games so i felt more alone.  I hate that he thinks i want him to have no life and i hope i am wrong more than anyone that he is ok. I dont think i was imagining it all.

Hello there,

Being, Irish...I could write lots about Irish men and drinking...but the fact that they drink is NOT the problem....you need to look at WHY they drink...its usually to cover up a whole lot of other problems! Society is changing here in Ireland, and the internet is a HUGE help, this generation of women are copping on big-time....the reason why Irish men are the way they are is because of one thing....Irish MAMMIES....most of them are closet mysoginists!!!!

I can see that, his mother was a nightmare she was starting problems left and right. My nana was from Ireland and she didnt act like his mother at all. She drank but not so much that she was passing out half the time.  My husbands mother left him at an orphan home when he was five and drank till he was 30 and instead of wanting him to be happy she came over here to break us up and telling him that he forgot where he came from and she stole my bank card ,and she was telling me about all the girls he had back in Ireland. (this is the night before our wedding she is tellin me all this), she was trying to set him up with Irish girls over here.  My mother was sure that she wanted him to come home and support her. His mother was calling me lazy. This woman has been living on the Dole her entire life, she has never worked.  I work full time and I pretty much did all the cooking, cleaning, ect.  After this experience I dont think I ever want to get married again. It isnt just the irish men that want mommies to take care of them. All men treat there wives like servants. So annoying......

I guess my mom saw it because she grew up with all the Irish relatives around. 

 Its sad to me that he listened to her.  I could have dealt with her if he stood up for me, because she lived in another country and I would have only seen her once a year maybe. Now she has ruined her chance at grandchildren and he will resent her eventually for getting in the middle.  I bent over backwards for her too I always sent her gift packages and was after him to send her money.

He will probably have to go back home in May because he only got a two year temporary greencard and we would still have to be together for him to apply for a permanant one.  F#$@ that I called up immingration and I sent  a letter to INS to cancel my sponsorship.

Thanks for your input he always threw it in my face about how Irish girls were different. I was like then why arnt you with one there are plenty of them over here in the US.  I was like I find it hard to imagine any girl would want to be treated the way you are treating me. 

 I will be happy when the divorce is over so i can move on. 

I totally sympathise.  And it‘s weird - I am Irish, living in Belfast, living with an alcoholic boyfriend who is actually a foreigner living here.

I can only say it‘s down to 2 things: firstly, alcoholism is a personality trait, here as everywhere else.  From what you have told me, your husband seems to have a drink problem.

However, life in Belfast makes such a problem ten times worse, because it is culturally acceptable here to be hammered several times throughout the week.  In short, it makes a life of denial for an alcoholic an easy choice: "There can‘t be anything wrong with me!  Everyone I know is around me doing the same thing."  But, I‘ll bet that if your husband drinks 7 times a week, most of the company alternates - the friends maybe drink 3 times a week, but your husband happens to be there for every driking occasion.

I am actually leaving Belfast for this very reason.  I got into a relationship with an alcoholic from another European coutnry (where drunkenness was not so socially accepted) who made the terrible mistake of choosing Belfast as the place to get his life together.  At least in his home country social pressure made him see he had a problem, and when he first arrived here he described himself as a recovering alcoholic.  Now, after 3 years of life here, he thinks he had it wrong and that it is fine to be drunk every night.

My conclusion: Belfast will not create an alcoholic, but it‘s the worst place to be if you already have the disease and want to beat it.

I do agree with you as well that its a personality trait. I like to have a few drinks here and there myself and I have dated other men before and never had a problem with any of them drinking too much.  He caused problems in our relationship always picking fights over stupid things, and never wanting to have sex and that to me is not normal for a healthy young man.  I would say he was cheating but he never left the apt. It seemed like he just had no interest in it.  Was that the drinking or me i will never know.  He always seemed aggrevated when in the car, or about his co workers pretty much just life in general.  Is that why he drank to mask the pain he had.  He would complain about the guys at work all the time but then want to go out drinking with them.  I just know my older brother and his friends all have wifes and children and are home with there families not at the bars. They may go out occasionaly to a patriots game and drink all day but that is once in a great while.  I think just that i am questioning it that it was  a problem.  I never questioned it before and I started to think it was me that had the problem worrying to much. I wouldnt worry if i didnt have a reason too. 

Hi there,

I‘m not Irish but spent 2 years with my Irish ex fiance and it‘s funny how you notice how much they drink in the beginning but because you are swept away with their cuteness and charm you minimise it. My ex drank about 8 beers on our first date! (250ml glasses or schooners as we call them) I noticed that but I should have REALLY NOTICED and WALKED. Oh well. It has all been a lesson.

Yes apparently it‘s normal to go to the pub in Ireland 4-5 nights a week but not when you have a mortgage. Now people can only afford 1 night out a week.

There is definitely a cultural acceptance of drinking that is very much tied in with having fun and being social, perhaps even being "a real man". Here in Oz we have a lot of health campaigns on safe levels of drinking - no more than 2 for women per day and no more than 4 for men. I can hear my ex saying "You have GOT to be kidding me!" That was just a start for him. It was 4....plus4.....plus 4.....plus 4....etc!"

My ex‘s drinking improved - he switched to light beer but would still binge drink at weekends. In times of stress - like after our break-up - he turned into a fully blown alcoholic drinking copious amounts every night. That was just an excuse to get really tanked if you ask me. The guy LOVED his booze - more than me definitely! Funny, I recall a conversation we had on our first date and he said  in his cute Irish accent:" It‘s women who drive men to drink" I replied "Oh no, those men are in love with the bottle way before the women come along!" What a pity those nasty hormones/pheremones had to get in the way and make him so damn charming and attractive?! What a pity I could not step back and say "no - no thanks". He wanted me to drink more and encouraged me to do so. He loved seeing me pissed - it made him feel better about himself.

Lastly, I think it‘s normal especially for rednecks altho I have seen white collar alcos too.