Messed up everything

LegacyUser

I was at a wedding this weekend with my partner and I have messed things up completely.

A bit of background:

I have been seeing my girlfriend for the last 2 years and despite a few bumps in the road I have never been happier.

Things however took a turn for the worst on Friday night when I got embarrassingly drunk and made a fool of myself and my girlfriend in front of her closest friends.

Now she wont even speak to me or look at me. I am currently at my parents place having been given absolute instructions not to contact her.

I would not mind but this is totally out of character for me. I rarely drink these days and can count the amount of times I have been drunk in the last year on two fingers.

I used to have a bit of an issue with drink and depression but after a long stint of counseling and some soul searching I made a decision to change my lifestyle about 3 years ago, live healthily and talk about how my feelings with my friends and people who are close to me rather than bottle them up until they become an issue. Now it feels that I have thrown away all my progress in a moment of sheer stupidity and lack of self control. I have hurt and shamed the person I care about the most in the world and it feels that my life has lost all meaning.

I refuse to let myself be drawn into another depressive episode after 3 years of making progress but that is of little consolation to me now. I have probably destroyed the trust of the most beautiful person I have ever met. I want to make things right but I am terrified to even talk to her, I cant bear to hear the disgust in her voice or see the look in her eyes.

Has anyone ever been in a similar situation? I feel like I have to come to terms with the fact that I have lost this amazing person but I don't want to give her up but I don't feel that I deserve her any more.

Jimmy Bottlehead

What exactly did you do?

LegacyUser

To cut a long story short, I had a cigarette while drunk, proceeded to deny it and then spent the rest of the evening sulking in the corner while getting paralytically drunk before falling down on the dance floor in front of everyone in a drunken stupor. I ignored my girlfriend all night following the cigarette (I quit smoking when we first started going out apart from a few occasions I have been good)
Now she has gone home to her parents for a few days. I know it may sound absurd but she had been looking forward to this evening for months and I made a complete balls of it for her. I have never got this drunk before and certainly never reacted the way I did while under the influence.
I have no idea why I reacted that way, I am completely shocked and disgusted that I am even capable of such behavior. So childish and stupid. Now it feels like I have lost the best thing that I have in my life, a few hours before this happened we were talking about how we want to spend the rest of our lives together.
I am still trying to figure out why I behaved like such a child but can come up with no answers.
It may sound cliched, but this is so out of character for me. I think that's what shocked her and myself the most.
She told me earlier today that she does not want to break up with me but she doesn't know if she can ever forgive me, and if that's the case then the relationship is over.
I don't make excuses for my own behavior, but I am so genuinely shocked that I was capable of being such an asshole.
It just feels like I have destroyed two years of trust. It took a long time to build it in the first place. She had been treated badly in the past by her partners and I swore I would never do that to her, yet here I am, possibly after hurting her more than anyone.

daisybelle2008

OP, is the smoking a big issue for your girlfriend? When you say you gave the up when you started going out, was that for her benefit?
What you describe is not the end of the world, no need to keep beating yourself up. Put it down to experience and move forward. I think you are both blowing it out of proportion, 'destroying two years of trust' is over the top.
I wouldn't keep grovelling, apologising of asking for 'forgiveness'. Forgive yourself and put it behind you. If she can't forgive you, then that's her problem. Honestly persecuting yourself in these kind of situations tends to create resentment and exacerbate them.

dellas1979

If you are more or less off alcohol for 2 years and cigs also, why did you pick that particular (seemingly important) night to have a binge?

Was it just that you started off with the usual "Ill have one or 2", then 3 or 4, next thing inhibitions are down, cig is smoked/denied, she gets cranky, you are already on the way to getting hammered, getting thicker, "might as well be hung for a sheep as for a lamb" scenario that the bravado of alcohol puts in us.

If you are prone to bouts of (severe enough) depression, why would you put yourself, let alone her, through all that?

Edit: Her reaction to the cig thing sounds like she is scared you/she is/are going to loose contol or something (which has now happened). You probably put the frighteners in her a little, and in the process frightened yourself too.

Pandora2

Firstly my heart goes out to you....but you are human and we all make mistakes. You mention that you have had, in the past, issues with alcohol and depression but from your post it seems that you felt you had addressed these issues. I too would have self-medicated with alcohol through the Years and like yourself would have taken steps to address the underlying depression but, even though I have no compulsion to drink alcohol at all now.. I too found myself at a wedding where I was in danger of indulging far too much and just caught myself before I too made a show of myself!!

I have now accepted that myself and alcohol are not compatible not because I have an awful need for it but because I react badly to it. Also as my depression is an ongoing thing, it's really quite silly for me to introduce an artificial depressant into my system. I have had the odd glass of vino at lunch or at dinner and gotten away with it but my experience at the wedding taught me that drinking over a long period of time, at a day long event like a wedding, is no longer something I can do! This is just my experience but perhaps something for you to think about.

Also, the whole thing about the cigarette....You mention that you stopped smoking just after you met? Was this at your girlfriend's request, do you still harbour resentment about it? I just think it worth mentioning as your reaction to getting caught, even with alcohol on board was a bit extreme.

As for what to do now... I'd give your girlfriend a couple of days to calm down and hopefully she will give you an opportunity to apologise and you will find a way through this. Good Luck!

thefeatheredcat

Did your girlfriend know that you had changed your life around 1 year before you go into a relationship with her? She might be shocked by you being so drunk, especially as this could be quite alien for her to see, for a behaviour to rear its head that would be, for the 2 years you've been together, not part of the equation before.

So yes to her it would have been shocking. And I think too, on your part, a major, major, major over reaction on a very immature scale.

However, kicking yourself so hard over this isn't going to help you. Not if you stand a chance of returning to a depressive state and a negative lifestyle, one that you worked hard to turn around from. And you can and will do that again. But beating yourself up isn't going to help the situation, nor is feeling sorry for yourself either.

The behaviour of denying having a smoke and making an issue of it, getting drunk, making a show of yourself and making someone else's big day into your own drama I think anyone would be upset about. Ignoring your girlfriend would be passive aggressive behaviour, that rather than getting over the issue there and then and having a nice night, you prolonged and extended the issue in embarrassing yourself and her and maybe the rest of the crowd or married couple and also made your girlfriend suffer more personally by ignoring her. She saw a side in you that she hasn't seen, was treated appallingly by someone she trusted which you realise would have hurt her and eroded trust. Did you care, at the time you were getting more and more drunk, about her feelings, or were you just focused on the negative that happened and thinking of only you? What was going through your mind at the time, were you just angry and upset and drinking yourself with the emotion of the moment and not caring about what anyone else thought? Did she or you try talking about the issue there and then, or was the lack of ability to talk about it for any reason a push towards drinking the problem away?

Was the smoking a root cause? I would think manifestations of other things that caused you to behave that way. I don't know what, but I think perhaps you need to be a bit more honest with yourself of what was really bothering you as I don't think getting caught with a smoke and denying it is the real reason for your behaviour, unless this is a on-going issue you argue about that came to a head that night.

I think really you can only look inward and ask yourself some serious questions why you felt the need to deny smoking and what is the real issue surrounding that. Then you need to take responsibility for your actions and behaviour and apologise and talk. Then your girlfriend needs to decide where she wants to take things from there..... but I think you need to have a serious talk about the underlying issue that lead to this outburst of behaviour. Whether or not she would want to put herself in a similar position or would trust you not to behave that way is really up to her and I don't think that's something you can convince her on as it will take a lot of trust on her behalf. No amount of assurances would do, but it may take time. The only way that she can have faith and trust in you is that if something should happen similar to the underlying cause or the behaviour masking it (such as denying smoking) that you remember that night and chose a different way of dealing with the situation in a much more positive manner. Words are one thing, actions and behaviour are another. Assurances run hollow when they are followed by negative behaviour.

LegacyUser

Hi Folks.

Thank you for taking the time to reply, It really means a lot to me.

I guess I am upset for two separate reasons.

Firstly that I fell of the wagon and in such a spectacular fashion. I really thought I was through this and then it rears its ugly head once again. The last bout of depressive behavior ended up costing me another long term relationship and yet, here I am, in the same situation once again, having learned nothing. I am by no means teetotal but I usually limit myself to a few glasses of wine the odd weekend.

The second issue is that I knew that my girlfriend had trust issues. It took me a long time to earn her trust and yet in one fell swoop, I have managed to destroy it in the most public setting possible.

Giving up smoking was a conscious decision I made before meeting her, I used to be a casual smoker with every intention of giving up. I did that fairly successfully with the occasional lapse. I'm more annoyed at myself for lying about it than actually having a smoke to be honest.

I am genuinely terrified that my depression has worked its way back, the last few weeks have been tough for me. I completed a masters degree last month and have been trying to find work. So far no success. The cause of my last depressive episode was feeling unwanted and I am starting to wonder if the whole job search and subsequent rejections is fueling this once again.

My girlfriend has been nothing but supportive of me in recent weeks and has been encouraging me to try harder. I feel like an absolute failure in the two things that I hold most important, namely being a good boyfriend and being a productive member of society.

LegacyUser

Thanks thefeatheredcat for your reply. I completely agree that my behavior was immature and selfish. As i piece together my thoughts and actions over the weekend I still cannot fully understand my behavior to be honest. I think (and I cannot be sure of this) that my reaction was due to feeling that I had completely let her down with the cigarette and I was feeling sorry for myself for having caused an argument at an important event for her. Rather than trying to make amends, in my drunken state I began to hate myself for being a cause of friction and just drank myself into oblivion. I never use alcohol as an excuse for bad behavior and I'm usually the one that minds my friends when they have had too much. I made a terrible mistake and I still cannot bring myself to forgive what I have done.
As a child I could never take correction and I have been wondering if my behavior was due to this childishness rearing its head once I had enough alcohol in my system to destroy my capability of adult reasoning, but I honestly cannot be sure why I did it or what my thought process at the time was because I was so plastered. I remember on the taxi home I nearly jumped out of it in the City Centre so I could walk home I was so disgusted with myself. If the taxi stopped I probably would have.

thefeatheredcat

On falling off the wagon: It happens to everyone with something, diets, exercise, quitting smoking, staying off drink, changes in life, making promises to do better on various things. The only thing you can do is ask yourself if you want to continue as you were before and if so, make a stronger commitment to yourself about that. There is no sense in beating yourself up about falling off the wagon re drink or smoking or even lying about it. The reminder always will be hurting someone you love, but even that is something that is unhealthy to beat yourself up over because you have to learn from it. And sometimes we keep going in circles until we finally do learn from it. Given that you are genuinely ashamed I think you have learned.

shamed&disgraced wrote: »

I am genuinely terrified that my depression has worked its way back, the last few weeks have been tough for me. I completed a masters degree last month and have been trying to find work. So far no success. The cause of my last depressive episode was feeling unwanted and I am starting to wonder if the whole job search and subsequent rejections is fueling this once again.

My girlfriend has been nothing but supportive of me in recent weeks and has been encouraging me to try harder. I feel like an absolute failure in the two things that I hold most important, namely being a good boyfriend and being a productive member of society.

This is really important what you've posted. Last episode was caused by feeling unwanted and rejected.... if you have been trying to get a job and have struggled, and getting no responses or rejection letters or nothing is going to feel rejected over time. Have you felt pressured about getting a job because of the encouragement from your girlfriend? Or because of the pressure you put on yourself and what you consider important you feel a failure in as a result of not getting anywhere as yet?

I would say that yes what you did was bad.... yes it was awful for your girlfriend.... but you can't beat yourself up about it. Simply because if you do it stands to make a negative impact on you, and how you feel about yourself. You have to forgive yourself too at some point for you to be psychologically happy. I'm not saying you shouldn't feel bad about what happened, (honestly I believe you should and you already do) but that you can't extend that to it consuming you and skewing your perspective of yourself. You let yourself and you let your girlfriend down, but you have to forgive yourself and feel worthy of forgiving yourself. Otherwise you'd probably never accept your girlfriend forgiving you, and would feel you don't deserve it and feel you don't deserve her either. Where does that leave but a slippery road to being unhappy with yourself and getting depressed and creating a wedge between yourself and your girlfriend in the long run. I mean, you feel bad about hurting your girlfriend this way, but if you get depressed and don't take control of the deeper issues that led to this, you stand to hurt her even more and yourself in the process.

I think you need to nip it in the bud what you feel about yourself. While she knows you are trying with getting a job, do you feel you need reassurance from her that even if you are not a productive member of society - as you phrased it and consider important to you - that she would love you anyway? Do you feel in some way you're letting her down despite your best efforts? Or do you just need that reassurance from her that you're not a failure, even if you may think so by your own measurement? And would you consider talking with your GP about depression and getting treatment for it if you genuinely think you're feeling that way again?

homerjay2005

she sounds like a drama queen. if she thinks this is a big drama and doesnt think she can ever forgive you for something so trivial, how will she cope when real/actual problems come her way.

you got drunk and fell, so what? we all have our moments.

LegacyUser

Falling off the wagon is fine, I would not be too hard on myself for an occasional slip. It is to do it so publicly that I have the issue with.

The lack of job is putting a lot of pressure on me to be honest. I was supposed to be going on holiday in October with her for 3 weeks. My original plan was to propose to her while away but only on condition that I was in employment. We were both keen to take the relationship to the next step and I have been looking forward to it since the day I met her. The lack of job and the subsequent pressure has left me a bit frazzled over the last few weeks. The warning signs were all there, harmful behavior, suicide ideation, lack of sleep. I think it just came to a head the other night.

I think I have always have had a habit of feeling bad about my shortcomings. I'm very slow to forgive myself when I don't meet targets. I don't take compliments well either.

I actually believe that this episode was enough of a shock to me to give me a kick up the arse and try harder to be honest. I am just terrified that at the same time I have lost the person I care most about in the process.

I don't think I will be going to the doctor over this to be honest. I did not react well to anti-depressants the last time.

Koptain Liverpool

You say she doesn't know if she can forgive you - wtf??
I agree the picture you paint of her is one of a serious drama queen.
Firstly if you want to smoke when you're having a few drinks then what's the problem? She's obviously given you grief over it before if you felt the need to deny it. If it was such an important night for her she should have focused on it rather than on acting the parent with you. Who is she to be telling you what to do.

Now of course your reaction was bad but all you need to do is apologize for getting so drunk and leave it at that.

It's not that big a deal and by continually apologizing to her you are enabling her over the top and controlling behavior.

December2012

I can't possibly know if either you or she is being over sensitive or too dramatic.

It does appear that you are panicking though.

Try to calm yourself down.

She is allowed to have her feelings and you are entitled to have yours.

Panicking will make things worse - look at the hung for a sheep as a lamb metaphor mentioned above.

Your behaviour at the event does not sound nice, however, we are all human and make mistakes.

Leave her be for now, let her calm down. Depending on her personality and preference you could send her a text acknowledging that she is upset and does not want to talk, but that you are sorry and are ready to listen to her when she wants to.

CarMe

Oh I've been there OP!!
I could go out ten times and have a few social drinks, totally normal, get merry and have a great night but then all of a sudden I'll have a night where I get so drunk I make a complete and utter fool of myself and everyone I'm with!

The only thing I can think of is these incidents usually happen when I'm around new people I've never met before, once at a concert with a group of my friends friends, I ended up in a cell for disturbing the peace (not moving along when told to after being thrown out for dancing on the seats) imagine the first impression that made, I'm a mother and not like that at ALL!!

I don't know, do you think maybe you were nervous around all these new people and drank out of awkwardness or something?

LegacyUser

It would be fair to say I'm panicking. I have just jeopardized the most important thing in my life in a stupid moment of madness.

I don't think it was because I was uncomfortable around new people but I am considering that it could possibly be a factor. The more I think of it the more I believe I was trying to release months of built up pressure as a result of my studies and job hunting.

The strange thing is I did not see it coming. I use cbt a lot to assess my moods and while I knew I was under pressure I did not foresee a situation that would cause me to lose complete control.

Still, she has not been in touch at all in the past few days. I am giving her some space as she requested but bloody hell its hard. I really appreciate all the advice guys.

For the record I do not think she is overreacting. She has remained perfectly calm through other crises that we have encountered. Her one pet hates is making a scene and being the centre of attention and I managed to be both in the most spectacular fashion.

ibarelycare

I think it's bizarre that she's refused to talk to you for a few days because you got drunk and made a bit of a tit of yourself. It's fair enough to be a bit annoyed at your partner that night and the next day, but you've expressed how sorry you are and you're obviously in bits over it, and she just seems to be punishing you. Saying that she doesn't know if she can ever forgive you for a getting too drunk is a huge overreaction. I find her behaviour quite controlling tbh. If she does decide to forgive you, are you prepared to spend the rest of your life afraid to get drunk?

LegacyUser

ibarelycare, I spend most of my time afraid to get drunk for other reasons, its not good for me mentally being the primary one. I wouldn't describe her behavior as controlling to be honest. I dont think she is trying to punish me as she is genuinely disgusted at what I did. Trust is a big thing for her and I broke that trust. I have been very drunk in her presence on one occasion and frequently very tipsy. She has been drunk around me several times and still managed to be in control of her senses. I believe the drunkenness isn't the issue here, it was my behavior while drunk. I don't use alcohol as an excuse for bad behavior but christ on a bike I was offensive. She has always allowed me to pursue my interests without the slightest sign of trying to control me.

Chucky the tree

If she breaks up with you because of this OP you should consider it a bullet dodged and be thankful about it. also I have no idea why considering your employment situation as a deciding factor in proposing to someone.

Big Bag of Chips

OP - look you embarrassed her. That's it. That's what all this is about. To be honest, and it might not be what you want to hear, but I think your posts are a bit over the top. You got drunk. Made a fool of yourself and embarrassed your gf.

Yes, she has a right to be annoyed. Yes, you have a right to feel a bit foolish and sorry for what you did. But all this talk of "never being able to forgive" and ruining your relationship etc..

Unless there is something you are not telling us, (like you regularly do this to her, you have promised on more than one occassion to never do it again and to never make a fool of her again, but you keep doing it, and keep letting her down etc..) it all seems very immature - both your (singular) behaviour on that night, and both your (plurual) behaviour since then.

If you cannot sit down together and discuss it like a mature couple, then to be honest you shouldn't even be considering marriage, or proposals or "rest of your lives" stuff, just yet.

This ignoring you, and not talking to you.. what's that supposed to achieve? Ok, so she was mad.. that should have lasted a day, 2 at most and then she should have been asking you to meet up with her to talk about how embarrassed she was.

You don't think her behaviour is controlling, that's fair enough - but I think it's very immature, and (to me) it reeks of someone who's been looking for a way out.. and now she has it.......