Before my husband became official I took $2,000 from him and never paid him back. I am now to step 9 and I feel I owe him a financial amends but I don't know what I can do. He completely supports me now financially. I thought about getting a job but he doesn't want me to. I help him run his small business and if I got a job it would just leave him with more work. How can I make financial amends to the person who supports me financially when I have no other source of income? What are the alternatives?
Hmmmm.... now that he is your husband and supports you... perhaps your living sober and financially honest now is the best way you can make a day to day, "LIVING amends", as it is called. Bring it up to him when you intend to make amends, ask him if there is any way you could make it up to him, by giving up something you enjoy for awhile that costs money, like getting your nails done, shopping, or something else you like to do. To me, that would show a wonderful amount of sincerity.
I relapsed early in my marriage, and I spent a hell of a lot of my husband's money wrongly. I had great remorse when I had started working the steps again. I wanted to make amends as well, and my husbnand who is not an alcoholic said to me, "Just stay sober and happy, that is all I want".
Take care, Joni
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~Your Higher Power has not given you a longing to do that which you have no ability to do.
Wonderful advice Joni ! Good stuff Danielle ! I have a wonderful loving wife of almost 38 years. She put up with my drinking almost like she had been going to alanon all her life. She never tried to get me to stop drinking. She sometimes made it possible for me to be drinking by driving me from place to place. She had a learners permit. I had checked with the police and asked if the beginner must have a sober licenced driver beside her. I was told that as long as the licenced driver was concious and awake it was ok. They would much rather have a learners permit at the wheel than a drunk. That law was changed more than 10 years ago and both the licenced driver and learner must be sober. My wonderful wife lived with me 20 years when i was a drunk and almost 18 years with me sober. Financialy the 2nd paycheck that I earned was handed over to my wife to handle. Even as a drunk i could see that she was better at handling money than i was. Whenever it was financially possible she would portion my allowance to be close to 30 percent of our takehome pay. I believed a husband should be financially responsible. In a little more than 2 years my wife will have spent as long with me sober as she did with me as a drunk. God Bless the Mates of all alcoholics May they all find the peace and harmony that we have now. God Bless YOU and YOURS Cliff W S
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Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing it is not fish they are after. (Henry David Thoreau)
I think it shows amazing sincerity to be at this stage and I think you really help your husband in his business, could you do that if you were drunk? hell, no, so perhaps you could do something nice for his business, a bit of extra work, but your heart is truly in the right place so perhaps thats ok too, I know it would be enough for me.
I appauld you for getting to this, and doing some soul seaching.
How about checking with your Sponsor, about that Portion of the Amends, that states, "except when to do so, would injure the other person"
It sounds like you have some concerns that it might hurt him??
Maybe just reading between the lines.
Good to see you here and Welcome to MIP, think you will find this site, full of warm and wonderful and Helpful, Sober and Grateful recovering Alcoholics.
Hi I too am in the same sort of relationship, but with a boyfriend. I did not know him while drinking, we met 2 1/2 years after I got sober in 2004.
But now during the relationship 2004 to now, I lost my job of 10 years back in 2007. I had money left over for awhile but because of not having a license could not get a job anywhere.
That is another item if you have a job that requires a license and lose it--finding another job may be very hard for you. I have found that for many employers, NO LICENSE/NO JOB and in some cases DO NOT EVEN BOTHER APPLYING this even goes for fast food places.
Finally last year was the year I could get my license back--so most all of my extra monies went to the lawyer and reinstatement fees. Also due to losing job all the 401k and Stock money was listed as extra income on taxes but 2 figures were close in amounts and IRS thinks they were one and the same and claim I still owe--so they took what I had in some of my accounts. I have one to use but not by much.
My Parents are helping out with some bills and medical needs but not all.
My boyfriend has seen my woes, and I have broke down crying and worrying over how to keeps ends together. You see we had wanted to get married in 2006 but felt we were not quite ready to yet. Then lost job. So basically for normal needs I have to rely on him--his funds at times are limited also. At times when I did have money he needed some--he was waiting on a check and it was not here yet so I lent him $400.00 to pay for something, a few weeks later he gave me half back then another few weeks the other half.
Overall he has been very supportive in all I do and am trying to do both with sober time and job hunting and life in general.
Congratulations Danielle for working the steps, staying sober and genuinely wanting to make the financial ammends to your husband.
I cost my husband plenty when I was drinking and I do mean plenty. When it came time for me to make ammends to him, I wanted to come to some sort of $ figure amount and pay back what and when I could. He did not like this idea. But did like the idea that I was staying sober, I was being more responsible in our self-employed businesses and that I was being more of a wife, woman, soul-mate and person that he could have ever expected.
You have been given some great esh here. And if it really bothers you that you owe him the 2grand, then I would pinch pennies in every corner I could till I paid him back. No matter how long it takes, you will have a goal to strive towards
Hey Danielle - WELCOME! We're glad to have you join us for some conversation and recovery!
I'm with Joni (not actually...she's in Ohio and I'm in Iowa and while both states are four-letter-begin-and-end-with-a-vowel flyover states...there's a HUGE river in between us...but ya know, we ARE both in the Mississippi River watershed so that kinda makes us geographically connected in a way, Did you know that the Mississippi River's watershed is from the Rockies to the Apalachians? Isn't that just mind-boggling?) in that a LIVING amends is a beautiful way to go.
In your living amends you are no longer drinking his $$.
Many of my amends can only be accomplished my another day of sobriety, now if you'll excuse me...I have to go curl up with my cigarette withdrawals and do nothing for the rest of the day.
Aloha Danielle...this is so necessary a thread and discussion that Iwill keep coming back to it over and over. Amends for me is about change and where the other person is available to be a part of the solution that is also about the change for me. I acknowledge the error or wrong doing and if it isn't as fixed as returning the money or whatever I open myself up to other possiblities. I know the effect amends making has on my life and therefore my sobriety and I stay open and under my HP's guidance. The solution isn't all about me either. Insupport
Btw, welcome to the board and congrats on working the steps so diligently. That's a good question for your sponsor. If you husband doesn't want you to work then he likely won't care about the financial part of the amends. The verbal part is what's important. When my GF, who is my wife now, and I started living together, I paid off her credit cards (about $8000) by writing two checks. I still kid her about "owing" me. She just smiles and says she'll pay me anytime that I ask her too.
Welcome, I normally talk with my sponsor(spiritual advisor, understanding friend, etc...) when I'm not sure about making amends. One reason is, my sponsor knows my story and have more information about my situation. The Big book of Alcoholics Anonymous have some valuable suggestions in there or shall I say clear-cut directions on making amends. On some situations she has told me that being "willing" frees me. But again, it depended on what was shared with her during my 5th step based on the information in my 4 step. I owed my mom some money that I took from her. My mom was still supporting me at the time. I sat down with her and made a payment arrangement with her. Every month, I was paying back the money that I took from her. In turn she was putting the money back into the house or trying to give it back. I felt guilty at first because she was still helping me inspite of my behavior to her in the past. Needless to say, I made amends to her and I had to pray and ask God for the strength to get over the guilt. I also had to make amends to myself. "One day At a Time" the guilt left. Keep Coming Back!
