I've been meaning to start a journal about what I am going through in regards to living with an alcoholic.  I'm just kind of "stuck" at how to do it.  I'd really like to put down my feelings but I also need to put down what happened or what was said.... do those of you that keep a journal write all this down?  Just looking for different ideas on how some are done.

 

I guess I'm concerned with the time it may take to log all that since I would be doing it while he is out.

Hi - do you have a sponsor that you work with? My sponsor suggested in journaling I try to keep a balanced view - positive and negative together. So I make an effort in my journaling that, no matter whether the day has felt on the whole positive or negative, I always write a gratitude list along with it. What I am grateful for and why. Helps me have a more balanced view of myself and my surroundings, even when i don't feel so balanced myself. Hope this helps, Kristen

For me, it depended on what I was trying to get out of journalling.... If I wanted to use it, as a reminder of the progress I was making, then I was all for the 'balanced view', keeping things in perspective, etc....

If you are at a point in your recovery, where you are still really fighting the reality that is before you - I think it is best to write down your true feelings, each and every day...  This is helpful, when the loneliness sets in, when we start looking at our situations through 'rose-colored' glasses, so to speak.

 

Tom

The balanced view is a good idea.  I guess what I mainly want to use it for is so I don't forget how whatever he said or how he acted made me feel - because by the end of the next day I am "over it" and seem to have forgotten how bad I felt because of what he did or said.  If I ever want to have a hope at "recovering" I think I need to remember these things, but I also don't want it to become sort of like an open wound to keep putting salt into either.