The disease was progressing into something I could not comprehend. I had never been in the presence of someone who simply hated his existence and probably himself.
He was acting out, they call it a "cry for help". I heard his crys Loud and clear and still I could not help him.
I would come home and find him lying in bed with his wrists slit, actually there is still blood stains on the mattress of the pull out couch which was our only bed at the time. I would clean him up, feed him, and try to reason with him about how much he had to live for.
He didn't feel that way. His family was practicing tough love on him and simply left him to his own destructive behavior.
He was the "Golden Boy" in the family. They first one to get into Stanford in his family which started a whole line of relatives that would follow in his footsteps.
In the DA's office he never lost a case except I believe one. He was the smartest person I had ever known. I could not understand his fall from all that.
I have witnessed what it is to be a "Torchered Soul" it was heartbreaking and frustrating. We were both now 30 years old and life seemed too painful for him to continue. He tried to jump out of our apartment window one night. I must tell you that this apartment was in the Ghetto. The neighborhood was so bad that we were the only people living in our building that didn't have multiple families living with us.
He was no longer working, didn't have a car and started hocking whatever to get money for booze. I can't tell you how many times he walked down to the corner liquor store with a pocket full of pennies and change to buy a bottle of cheap Vodka.
We had two visitors at this apartment, one was my ex who literally broke into tears when he saw where I was living, it was a far cry from the house in Sausalito that we had together. The other visitor was his father, who offered to move us to a better neighborhood for the sake of his young daughter's safety.
When she came to visit on the weekends I think she must have been so scared when I look back at it. There was always a lot of loud music playing from the neighboring apartments, and once there were people spying on her through their windows.
She lived in a beautiful house in Beverly Hills, with her mother, and had the maids taking care of everything. It was like being in two different world for all of us.
That's what love can do for a person. I never cared about our surroundings. I just wanted to be with him. I wanted to SAVE him from himself. I just didn't know how.
After almost a year of being drunk and sick Bob checked into St. Johns Hospital for yet another attempt at getting sober. This was the first of many attempts at sobriety while we were together. I lost count somewhere after 30 times.
The one thing that I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt was that Bob wanted to be sober more than he wanted to be drunk. The sheer number of attempts to get sober where testimony enough in my mind.
What I had to learn was how to not Enable him. It was the hardest part of our life together.
The first time the hospital staff made me go to an Al-Anon Meeting, I left there upset and appalled at what I heard. In my world I always thought that you had to help your loved ones. They told me that I was not helping him, but hurting him by taking care of him. I did not agree. Actually had I listened to their advice, I think Bob would have died many years before he did.
The one person he knew that would always be there for him, no matter how tough or how many bad things that happened, was me. I am grateful to my God that I never abandoned him, no matter how angry he made me, I always forgave him. He was a sick man, not a bad man, as so many people viewed him. He simply needed help.
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