Jane's Posts

Sep 22 1998 12:00 am

I am considering leaving my husband of almost 9 years due to his drinking problem (3 DUI's and continues to drink), his son (who he has custody of) refuses to speak to me, his family just acts like I don't exist, husband is very controlling....obviously a lot of reasons. My question is this -- how can I limit visitation between my husband and our almost 14 month old daughter? I certainly have no objection to him seeing her, but he still drinks. So, if she's visiting and it's time to bring her home, he'll already have two, possibly three or four beers by 6 p.m. on Sunday. He starts drinking around 11 a.m. or noon, and drinks about a beer an hour. Obviously I don't want my daughter getting into the car with him. I could bring her over and pick her up, which would probably be the best solution, but then I'm doing the driving and rearranging my life for him. Has anyone else been in this situation? Does anyone have any suggestions? Our lease here is up in August, so I have some time to plan and think, but was hoping someone else might have been in my shoes and might offer suggestions. Thanks for your help. Cindy

You can do several things. The easiest thing might be to do all the driving after a certain time of day: each of you drive the child to your own home. That way you are always driving in the evening when he has been drinking. If any of the OUI's are recent, a provision against his driving with the child in custody/visitation schedule sounds reasonable. If you believe that S2BX drinks too much to care for the child, raise the issue with the court. They can order alcohol evaluation. One OUI might be taken as an error in judgment, three seems to indicate a problem.

From what you said, though, it sounds like S2BX is keeping his blood alcohol level below the legal limit for driving. Breathalyzers measure the level of alcohol in your blood, not the amount of alcohol you have had drink. I don't know how big he is or what kind of beer he drinks, but his body most likely metabolizes his one beer per hour. Just on the issue of driving, I don't see that you have any more to worry about after 6 beers in 6 hours than you do after 1 beer in 1 hour. His blood alcohol level should be the same. Of course, those three OUI's would bother me a lot.

Good luck.

jane